Opinion ID: 1820223
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: Crawford v. Washington Claim

Text: Diaz contends that certain hearsay statements admitted during the penalty phase of his trial violated his right to confront witnesses under the Sixth Amendment of the United States Constitution, [8] as explained in the United States Supreme Court's recent decision in Crawford v. Washington . In Crawford, the United States Supreme Court held that a testimonial hearsay statement is inadmissible at trial unless the declarant is shown to be unavailable and the party against whom the statement is admitted had an opportunity for cross-examination. Id. at 68, 124 S.Ct. 1354. Diaz asserts that it was error for the trial court to allow a police detective to testify about Diaz's previous conviction in Puerto Rico based on investigative witnesses' statements. Initially, we note that this Court has determined that Crawford does not apply retroactively to cases, such as Diaz's, that were final at the time the opinion was issued. Chandler v. Crosby, 916 So.2d 728 (Fla.2005), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 127 S.Ct. 382, 166 L.Ed.2d 275 (2006). However, even if Crawford were retroactive in application, it would not warrant relief in Diaz's case. During direct examination of Detective Jose Pizarro, the State asked about the detective's investigation of the murder for which Diaz was convicted in Puerto Rico. Pizarro begin his explanation of the investigation by stating, The investigation revealed, according to what the witnesses manifested, at which point defense counsel objected and argued that the testimony was based on hearsay. The trial court reminded the State that the testimony had to be limited to what Detective Pizarro's investigation revealed and not what was said by any witnesses. Throughout the remainder of the State's direct examination, the State confined its questions to the detective's own investigation and the detective answered accordingly. Therefore, there was no Crawford violation as Diaz alleges. Moreover, any possible Crawford violation would be subject to a harmless error analysis. See Rodgers v. State, 31 Fla.L. Weekly S705, ___ So.2d ___, 2006 WL 3025668 (Fla.Oct. 26, 2006). As this Court stated in Rodgers, an error is harmless beyond a reasonable doubt when, after considering all the permissible evidence, a court concludes that there is no reasonable possibility that the error contributed to the jury's recommendation of death. Id. at ___, at S707. Similar to the instant case, Rodgers involved hearsay testimony about a prior conviction presented during the penalty phase of trial. While we found that the testimony of a former police officer and a former prosecutor about eyewitness statements regarding the prior crime constituted testimonial statements under Crawford, we also concluded that this violation of Rodgers' Sixth Amendment confrontation right was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. We explained that the State's introduction of a certified copy of Rodgers' prior manslaughter conviction established the prior violent felony conviction aggravator and rendered any testimonial error harmless. Id. at ___, at S707. In the instant case, the State introduced a certified copy of Diaz's second-degree murder conviction that was the subject of Detective Pizarro's testimony. Thus, even if Crawford applied retroactively and even if the detective presented testimonial hearsay, the introduction of this certified copy of the conviction rendered any error harmless. See Rodriguez v. State, 753 So.2d 29, 45 (Fla.2000) ([I]n many cases, any error in admitting the hearsay testimony has been considered harmless because the certified copy of the conviction itself conclusively establishes the aggravator.). Accordingly, we conclude that Diaz is not entitled to habeas relief on this claim.