Opinion ID: 320436
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Evasiveness is an Element of Unavailability

Text: 80 The majority opinion states that it is 'not prepared to equate 'unavailability' with 'evasiveness. My answer to this argument is to rely upon a paraphrase of a recent decision by Judge Tamm: '(I) do not think this brief and conclusory statement is sufficient to sustain the . . . rejection of the (finding of the trial court).' 10 Certainly 'evasiveness' in witnesses is one element that makes them 'unavailable' at trials and makes it impossible for police, sheriffs and marshals to procure their attendance despite their most diligent efforts. To refuse to find that a witness is unavailable because he is evading his responsibility to testify is to ignore a highly important reason and frequent cause for unavailability. Any person familiar with the criminal trials in this circuit knows that many witnesses are evasive, unavailable and reluctant because of fear of bodily harm. 11 Some witnesses who did not adequately protect themselves recently are dead-- murdered in cold blood to prevent them from testifying. So 'evasiveness' should not be viewed merely in the abstract. Here we have a 17 or 18 year old girl who was evading her obligation to testify against what appeared to be a cold blooded murderer-- apparently engaged in the iniquitous narcotics traffic. Her evasiveness could have been based on more than just a juvenile desire not to testify. Indeed, many stouthearted citizens would view the obligation to testify under such circumstances with some trepidation. It is submitted that any fair interpretation of 'unavailability' would not exclude 'unavailability' caused by evasion. From a practical perspective it must be obvious that a witness who is unavailable because he is evasive is just as 'unavailable' as a witness who is unavailable for any other reason short of death. 81 In essence, the majority attempts to rewrite the law to equate the evasiveness of this juvenile with bad faith and collusion and to hold that the Government is responsible therefor. There is no evidence whatsoever that the Government caused her absence or knew where she was. As a witness she was not the property of the Government. The Government did not create her. She happened to be a witness to a crime and the Government had an obligation to call her as a witness and pursuant to its obligation it called her in the proper manner to testify. The Government in a criminal case cannot pick and choose its witnesses, it has to take them where it finds them. The missing witness here did know the defendant and had seen him previously five or six times at Wade's house, the last time within a week or two of the shooting (Tr. 517-18). Under such circumstances it would be more reasonable to equate her sudden absence from the trial with her acquaintance with the defendant, 12 with her lack of desire to testify against a person she knew, however slightly, or with an understandable fear to testify against a person she had seen murder a man in cold blood. There is, however, no basis in the law on the facts of this case to reach the result dictated by the majority, i.e., that the witness' absence should be held against the Government as though it were guilty of negligence or nonfeasance. Moreover, the public interest would be abused and justice frustrated by a rule that excludes prior testimony of witnesses who are acquaintances of the defendant where the witness evades testifying because of personal friendship or fear caused by having seen the accused conduct himself in a highly vicious and ferocious manner. 13 82