Opinion ID: 2321578
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Admission of Codefendant's Hearsay Statements

Text: Robles-Benevides argues that the admission of hearsay statements made by Bonilla violated his Sixth Amendment right to confrontation and was not supported by an exception to the hearsay rule. [34] In order to show that Bonilla was not just a bystander but a willing participant in the assaults, the government sought to prove he knew that two of his passengers, Velásquez and Ventura, were armed when they entered his car. The government asked to introduce, in its case-in-chief, a transcript of a redacted version of Bonilla's videotaped interview with the police in which he acknowledged knowing that the two men had knives when they got into his car. The trial court denied the government's motion, concluding that either Bonilla's trial would have to be severed, or the government would have to further redact the transcript to avoid incriminating any of the codefendants. [35] The government chose to make further redactions from the hour-long interview, down to a two-to-three minute segment. The court accepted the redacted transcript as a statement against Bonilla's penal interest, noting that [the prosecutor] seems to have eliminated everything that was of concern.... The day before the tape was to be played for the jury, counsel for Robles Benevides expressed concern that Bonilla's ambiguous use of the pronoun they when he said that they had knives would allow the jury to infer that Bonilla was referring not only to Velásquez and Ventura, but also to Robles-Benevides, who was a passenger in the car. When the prosecutor indicated that later in the tape Bonilla clarified that they referred to Velásquez and Ventura, counsel withdrew his objection, and the redacted statement was admitted into evidence. [36] The court gave a limiting instruction to the jury that Bonilla's statement could only constitute evidence against him, and not against any other defendant. It is clear that if an out-of-court statement is testimonialsuch as a confession to the policeit is inadmissible to prove the guilt of a defendant even if it comes within a recognized hearsay exception, absent an opportunity to cross-examine the declarant either at trial or at some prior proceeding. See Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 68, 124 S.Ct. 1354, 158 L.Ed.2d 177 (2004) (Where testimonial evidence is at issue ... the Sixth Amendment demands what the common law required: unavailability and a prior opportunity for cross-examination.); see also Morten v. United States, 856 A.2d 595, 600 (D.C.2004). Bonilla's statements to the police are clearly testimonial. See Crawford, 541 U.S. at 53, 124 S.Ct. 1354. The Sixth Amendment, however, does not bar the admission of the redacted tape introduced during the government's case-in-chief because, as all parties agreed at the time, those statements did not implicate Robles-Benevides in the crime. See Plater v. United States, 745 A.2d 953, 961 (D.C.2000) (holding that defendant's out-of-court statement does not violate codefendants' Sixth Amendment rights when it omits any facially incriminating references to the codefendants). Here, Bonilla was available for cross-examination when he took the stand in his own defense. Counsel for Robles-Benevides cross-examined Bonilla and elicited testimony that Bonilla did not hear any conversation in the car about knives, laying the groundwork, presumably, for later argument that Robles-Benevides similarly would not have overheard anything about knives while he was a passenger in the car. When the prosecutor then cross-examined Bonilla, however, he used portions of the unredacted transcript to refresh Bonilla's recollection and to impeach him. Robles-Benevides complains that introduction of Bonilla's use of the pronoun they in the unredacted portion of the transcript with which he was impeached implicated Robles-Benevides, who had gotten into his car outside the nightclub. [37] The Sixth Amendment did not bar the government's use of the unredacted transcript of the tape to cross-examine Bonilla, because the government used it only after Bonilla had taken the stand and he was available for cross-examination by the defendants. As the Supreme Court reaffirmed in Crawford, when the declarant appears for cross-examination at trial, the Confrontation Clause places no constraints at all on the use of his prior testimonial statements. See California v. Green, 399 U.S. 149, 162, 90 S.Ct. 1930, 26 L.Ed.2d 489 (1970). It is therefore irrelevant that the reliability of some out-of-court statements `cannot be replicated, even if the declarant testifies to the same matters in court.' .... The Clause does not bar admission of a statement so long as the declarant is present at trial to defend or explain it. 541 U.S. at 59 n. 9, 124 S.Ct. 1354 (citations omitted). Since Bonilla was available for cross-examination, and was in fact cross-examined by counsel for Robles-Benevides, the Sixth Amendment did not bar admission of his out-of-court testimonial statements. The Constitution as construed in Bruton ... is violated only where the out-of-court hearsay statement is that of a declarant who is unavailable at the trial for `full and effective' cross-examination. Ellsworth v. United States, 300 A.2d 456, 458 (D.C.1973) (quoting Nelson v. O'Neil, 402 U.S. 622, 627, 91 S.Ct. 1723, 29 L.Ed.2d 222 (1971)). Although Bonilla was available, Robles-Benevides did not recross-examine Bonilla to clarify or rehabilitate his testimony following the government's cross-examination. Because there was an opportunity for cross-examination, appellants' Sixth Amendment right to confrontation was honored. [38] Even where there is no Confrontation Clause concern, a hearsay statement admissible against one codefendant that inculpates a codefendant must be redacted to eliminate all incriminating references to the co-defendant. Carpenter v. United States, 430 A.2d 496, 502 (D.C.1981). See Geter v. United States, 929 A.2d 428, 431 (D.C.2007) (noting that limiting instruction is almost never an acceptable alternative to redaction or severance). Moreover, given the motivation to deflect blame, that a codefendant's statement falls within the hearsay exception for statements against the declarant's penal interest is insufficient, alone, to admit the statement against another codefendant. See Lilly v. Virginia, 527 U.S. 116, 128, 119 S.Ct. 1887, 144 L.Ed.2d 117 (1999) ([W]e have consistently either stated or assumed that the mere fact that one accomplice's confession qualified as a statement against his penal interest did not justify its use as evidence against another person.). Here, the hearsay statement was initially redacted, and neither Robles-Benevides nor Villatoro was named or otherwise directly implicated in Bonilla's statement. [39] Any potential prejudice from the unredacted version of Bonilla's ambiguous reference to they was largely cured by Bonilla's testimony clarifying that the they who had the knives when they got in the car were Velázquez and Ventura. Moreover, the trial court gave an instruction to the jury that it could use Bonilla's prior inconsistent statements only to evaluate his credibility and could not consider it in any way in determining the guilt or innocence of another defendant. Consequently, the admission of Bonilla's out-of-court statements in a joint trial was not improper.