Opinion ID: 2663136
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Clifford Ubani’s Testimony

Text: Turner argues that the district court erred in refusing to admit portions of Ubani’s testimony from when he appeared as a government witness in Turner’s prior mistrial. Ubani’s prior testimony was unquestionably hearsay because neither Turner nor the government called Ubani as a witness in the second trial, and Turner sought to introduce his testimony for the truth of his statements. 14 Turner expressly sought to introduce the testimony under the residual exception to the hearsay rule, Fed. R. Evid. 807, not the former testimony exception, Fed. R. Evid. 804(b)(1). Turner has a high bar to clear in seeking to reverse the district court’s decision. We review evidentiary decisions for abuse of discretion, subject to harmless error analysis if the district court abused its discretion. 15 We have explained that Rule 807’s residual “exception is to be ‘used only rarely, in truly exceptional cases.’” 16 Given this high hurdle, in the decision as to whether to apply the residual exception “district courts are given ‘considerable discretion,’ and a court of appeals will not disturb the district court’s application of the exception ‘absent a definite and firm conviction that the court made a clear error of judgment in the conclusion it reached based upon a weighing of the relevant factors.’” 17 14 Fed. R. Evid. 801(c). 15 United States v. Ricardo, 472 F.3d 277, 287 (5th Cir. 2006). 16United States v. Phillips, 219 F.3d 404, 419 n.23 (5th Cir. 2000) (quoting United States v. Thevis, 665 F.2d 616, 629 (5th Cir. 1982)). 17Id. (quoting United States v. Loalza–Vasquez, 735 F.2d 153, 157 (5th Cir. 1984) (quoting Page v. Barko Hydraulics, 673 F.2d 134, 140 (5th Cir. 1982)). 13 Case: 12-20707 Document: 00512581995 Page: 14 Date Filed: 04/02/2014 No. 12-20707 Fed. R. Evid. 807 provides: (a) In General. Under the following circumstances, a hearsay statement is not excluded by the rule against hearsay even if the statement is not specifically covered by a hearsay exception in Rule 803 or 804: (1) the statement has equivalent circumstantial guarantees of trustworthiness; (2) it is offered as evidence of a material fact; (3) it is more probative on the point for which it is offered than any other evidence that the proponent can obtain through reasonable efforts; and (4) admitting it will best serve the purposes of these rules and the interests of justice. (b) Notice. The statement is admissible only if, before the trial or hearing, the proponent gives an adverse party reasonable notice of the intent to offer the statement and its particulars, including the declarant’s name and address, so that the party has a fair opportunity to meet it. 18 Here, although the fact that Ubani’s prior testimony was sworn means that it is likely trustworthy under Rule 807(a)(1), and Turner is certainly offering Ubani’s testimony as evidence of a material fact under Rule 807(a)(2). The prior testimony does not satisfy Rule 807(a)(3), however, because offering portions of Ubani’s prior testimony from Turner’s mistrial on more limited charges is not more probative than Ubani’s live testimony would have been in this trial on four counts. 19 Although Rule 807 does not contain an explicit 18 Fed. R. Evid. 807. 19See, e.g., United States v. Mathis, 559 F.2d 294, 298 (5th Cir. 1977) (“The live testimony of the available witness, whose demeanor the jury would have been able to observe and whose 14 Case: 12-20707 Document: 00512581995 Page: 15 Date Filed: 04/02/2014 No. 12-20707 requirement that the declarant be unavailable, it still requires the proponent of the hearsay to undertake reasonable efforts to get better evidence, and Rule 807(a) only applies if another exception does not. Here, Turner has not pointed to any reasonable efforts to obtain Ubani’s live testimony. Indeed, Turner’s counsel argued that because she was relying on the residual exception only, there was no need to even determine whether Ubani was available. That contradicts both the letter and spirit of the residual exception, which is intended to be a last resort. Moreover, seeking to introduce Ubani’s testimony from Turner’s former trial would otherwise fall under the “former testimony” exception to the hearsay rule under Fed. R. Evid. 804(b)(1), which applies only if the declarant is unavailable. Turner cannot rely on Rule 807’s residual exception to do an end run around Rule 804(b)(1)’s requirement that the witness be unavailable, 20 particularly where she has made no attempt to show that Ubani is unavailable. We cannot say the district court abused its discretion in refusing to admit Ubani’s testimony under these facts. testimony would have been subject to cross-examination, would have been of more probative value in establishing the truth than the bare statements transcribed by the ATF agents.”). 20Applying the virtually identical former version of the residual exception, then Fed. R. Evid. 803(24), the panel in Mathis, supra, reasoned: While it has been contended that availability is an immaterial factor in the application of Rule 803(24), this argument is wide of the mark. Although the introductory clause of Rule 803 appears to dispense with availability, this condition re-enters the analysis of whether or not to admit statements into evidence under the last subsection of Rule 803 because of the requirement that the proponent use reasonable efforts to procure the most probative evidence on the points sought to be proved. Mathis, 559 F.2d at 298. 15 Case: 12-20707 Document: 00512581995 Page: 16 Date Filed: 04/02/2014 No. 12-20707