Opinion ID: 1924213
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: I-B The Admissions of Defendants Gleason and Rich

Text: Defendants Sanderson and Rich maintain that the use at trial of an extra-judicial statement attributed to their co-defendant, Gleason, violated their federal constitutional right to confront the witnesses against them. Also presented to us is a constitutional issue as to confrontation arising from the use at trial of an extrajudicial statement attributed to the defendant Rich. [1] Defendants' claim is that each of these extra-judicial statements made by one defendant (1) inculpated the other defendants (2) was not subject to cross-examination since none of the defendants testified at the trial and (3) was heard in full by the fact-finder. Hence, say defendants, Bruton v. United States, 391 U.S. 123, 88 S.Ct. 1620, 20 L.Ed.2d 476 (1968) mandates that the convictions be reversed. The contention is erroneous. The foundational holding of Bruton is that the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, binding on the States as incorporated in the federal Fourteenth Amendment, requires that a criminal defendant be afforded an opportunity to cross-examine with regard to evidence inculpating him. [2] Applying this principle, the Court in Bruton further decided that: (1) notwithstanding a Court instruction to a jury that it must not consider an extra-judicial confession of co-defendant A inculpating co-defendant B in assessing the guilt or innocence of co-defendant B, undue risk remains that the jury will nevertheless use A's inculpation of B against B; and (2) such approach by the jury would deny opportunity to co-defendant B to confront a witness against him, i. e., A's extra-judicial confession inculpating B. In express language Bruton also made plain, however, that were it an established fact . . . that the jury [fact-finder] disregarded the reference to the co-defendant, no question would arise under the Confrontation Clause, because by hypothesis the case is treated as if the confessor made no statement inculpating the nonconfessor. (p. 126 of 391 U.S., p. 1622 of 88 S.Ct.) (emphasis supplied) Thus, if it is the case that the fact-finder has not made use of co-defendant A's extra-judicial statement inculpating co-defendant B in determining the guilt or innocence of B, the Confrontation Clause issue is absent. In the instant case defendants were tried jury-waived, the fact-finder being the presiding Justice. In ruling on the admissibility as evidence of the statements in question, the presiding Justice treated each as an admission by the declarant. On this basis, under the Maine law of evidence each statement was evidence properly to be considered only against the declarant and not against the other non-declarant defendants. [3] It is well settled that a court learned in the law is presumed to render its decision on the evidence in the case which is legally admissible even though inadmissible testimony be received. This presumption must be rebutted before the reception of such evidence by the court will be deemed prejudicial. Lipman Bros. Inc. v. Hartford Accident & Indemnity Co., 149 Me. 199, 215, 100 A.2d 246, 255 (1953) Defendants do not point to any circumstances which here tend to rebut this presumption. Hence, we must proceed by taking as the facts that the presiding Justice followed the rules of evidence, disregarding defendant Rich's statement while he was determining the guilt or innocence of defendants Gleason and Sanderson and likewise giving no consideration to defendant Gleason's statement while he was determining the guilt or innocence of Sanderson and Rich. Accordingly, defendants' constitutional rights of confrontation, within the delineation of Bruton, supra, were not here violated. [4]