Opinion ID: 2033334
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: introduction

Text: I concur in the result reached by the majority; however, I do so based on different reasoning. With respect to the majority's conclusion that the Barnett custodial statement of September 28, 1996, should be excluded because it does not fall within a firmly rooted hearsay exception, I agree. With respect to the majority's analysis that the statement should be excluded as inadmissable hearsay because it lacks particularized guarantees of trustworthiness under the second prong of the test as articulated in Ohio v. Roberts, 448 U.S. 56, 100 S.Ct. 2531, 65 L.Ed.2d 597 (1980), I conclude that the Confrontation Clause, rather than the general rule against the admission of hearsay, requires the exclusion of the custodial statement as a constitutional, rather than an evidential, matter. Under the Sixth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, a defendant in a criminal prosecution has the right to be confronted with the witnesses against him. See, also, Neb. Const. art. I, § 11. The U.S. Supreme Court has directed that for hearsay evidence [to be] admitted under the Confrontation Clause [it must] be so trustworthy that cross-examination of the declarant would be of marginal utility, Idaho v. Wright, 497 U.S. 805, 823, 110 S.Ct. 3139, 111 L.Ed.2d 638 (1990), and has further stated that the prohibitions of the Confrontation Clause do not equate . . . with the general rule prohibiting the admission of hearsay statements, 497 U.S. at 814, 110 S.Ct. 3139. In this case, I conclude that the cross-examination of Barnett would be of greater than marginal utility and that adversarial testing would add to an assessment of the custodial statement's reliability, and, therefore, the admission of the Barnett statement, which is hearsay, violated the Confrontation Clause. Such admission was not harmless in this case, particularly in light of the fact that Barnett's statement tied the defendant to the crimes. I, therefore, concur in the result reached by the majority that the admission of the custodial statement was reversible error and that the cause should be remanded for a new trial.