Opinion ID: 2155146
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Amanda's Videotape Interview

Text: The court also conducted a pretrial N.J.R.E. 104(a) hearing to determine the admissibility of Amanda's eighty-two-minute videotape interview with Detective Dawn Cooper of the Burlington County Prosecutor's Office on September 10, 2001. [4] Throughout the interview, Amanda was reticent and not easily forthcoming, and Detective Cooper questioned the child, many times pointedly, with leading questions. Amanda identified defendant by writing the name Uncle John on a board. [5] Using a drawing of a female body, Amanda indicated that defendant touched her in the vaginal area and on the buttocks and, with the assistance of dolls, indicated that defendant partially penetrated her vagina with his finger. She also responded that defendant had touched her with his fingers and penis. Amanda demonstrated, with up-and-down hand motions, how defendant stroked his penis, stating that when defendant squeeze[d] his penis, white stuff landed on the floor and that he clean[ed] it up with a tissue paper. When the detective asked Amanda the direction defendant's wee wee [was] pointing when he [squeezed it], Amanda answered that he [m]akes it face up ... [t]o the sky. Without objection, the videotape and a transcribed statement of the interview were admitted into evidence.