Opinion ID: 1136073
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Carolyn Grayson's statements to others regarding defendant's involvement in the death of Janet Benner

Text: To establish a connection between defendant and the death of Janet Benner, the prosecution intended to elicit the testimony of defendant's brother, Marlow Jones. [2] After the prosecution informed the trial court that Marlow could not be located, the trial court declared him to be unavailable within the meaning of Evidence Code section 240, subdivision (a)(5), and thereafter permitted the introduction of Marlow's testimony that had been adduced at the preliminary hearing in the present proceedings. At that hearing, when asked what Grayson had told him regarding Janet Benner's death, Marlow testified over unsuccessful objections by the defense (on hearsay and other grounds): She [Carolyn Grayson] told me [in July 1981] that she knocked on the door [to Janet Benner's apartment], and some lady come to the door and answered it, and Troy [the defendant] come in, and [Grayson] stepped aside, and he grabbed the woman and strangl[ed] her and she  she got to hollering `Help me.... Carolyn, help me. Carolyn, help me.' The prosecution also introduced the testimony of Grayson's daughter, Sauda, who was eight years of age at the time of defendant's trial. When asked by defense counsel on cross-examination whether she remembered a conversation she had had with her mother, in the summer of 1981, regarding defendant, Sauda testified: My mother  my mother says that Troy had killed  killed Janet. And she didn't tell me nothing else.