Opinion ID: 400957
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Admission of Telephone Records

Text: 16 Vela argues that the district court erred in admitting copies of the telephone bills of Vela, Caballero, and Gutierrez under the business records exception to the hearsay rule because a proper foundation was not laid to support the reliability of Southwestern Bell Company's computer-billing process. We hold that the foundation was adequate to support admissibility under Rule 803(6). 4 17 At trial, an employee of Southwestern Bell described as custodian of the records sponsored copies of the telephone bills. He testified that the copies were made from microfiche records prepared by the comptroller's department of the company, that the records were prepared in the usual course of the company's regularly-conducted business activity, and that it was part of that activity to prepare such records. When questioned by Vela's counsel outside of the jury's presence, the employee explained the process by which automatic call identification equipment registers the dialing of long-distance telephone calls on electronic tapes. The tapes are then transmitted to the comptroller's office where the information is transferred onto billing tapes. Computers are used at two stages: first, in the recording of the initial dialing, and second, in the computation and preparation of bills in the comptroller's office. The testifying employee vouched only for the general reliability of the process. He was unable to identify the brand, type, and model of each computer, or to vouch for the working condition of the specific equipment during the billing periods covered. 18 The district court admitted the bills under Rule 803(6) declaring that they would be even more reliable than ... average business record(s) because they are not even touched by the hand of man. The defense had previously examined the custodian outside of the jury's presence. Before the jury returned, the court advised the defense that it might want to attack the credibility of the bills on cross-examination. However, the defense never cross-examined the telephone company employee in the presence of the jury. Moreover, the defense did not attack the accuracy of the bills during its closing argument. Indeed, the only reference made to the bills during the defense's closing argument is a suggestion that the jury consult the bills for information tending to exonerate Vela. 5 19 Vela's central attack on admissibility of the bills under Rule 803(6) is that the prosecution did not lay a satisfactory foundation. Vela does not dispute that insofar as the custodian of the records testified that the records were kept in the regular course of business the dictates of Rule 803(6) were satisfied. What Vela does argue is that by failing to establish that the computers involved in the billing process were in proper working order a satisfactory foundation was not made and Vela was denied confrontation rights. 20 Our review of a trial court's decision to admit business records is a limited one. We test it only for abuse of discretion. See Rosenberg v. Collins, 624 F.2d 659, 665 (5th Cir. 1980). While the suggestion has been made that there are unique foundation requirements for the admission of computerized business records under Rule 803(6), see generally United States v. Scholle, 553 F.2d 1109, 1125 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 434 U.S. 940, 98 S.Ct. 432, 54 L.Ed.2d 300 (1977); McCormick's Handbook of the Law of Evidence 733-34 (2d ed. 1972), this court has previously held that computer data compilations ... should be treated as any other record of regularly conducted activity. Rosenberg v. Collins, 624 F.2d at 665. Like the computer records in the Rosenberg case, the telephone company's long distance billing records are sufficiently trustworthy in the eyes of this disinterested company to be relied on by the company in conducting its day to day business affairs. Id. 21 The prosecution laid a proper predicate for the admission of the bills. A telephone company employee explained the precise manner in which the billing data are compiled. The failure to certify the brand or proper operating condition of the machinery involved does not betray a circumstance of preparation indicating any lack of trustworthiness. Fed.R.Evid. 803(6). This court has previously stated that computer evidence is not intrinsically unreliable. United States v. Fendley, 522 F.2d 181, 187 (5th Cir. 1975); Olympic Insurance Co. v. H. D. Harrison, Inc., 418 F.2d 669, 670 (5th Cir. 1969). Vela's arguments for a level of authentication greater than that regularly practiced by the company in its own business activities go beyond the rule and its reasonable purpose to admit truthful evidence. The court did not abuse its discretion in admitting the bills or deny Vela his confrontation rights. At best, the arguments made go to the weight that should be accorded the evidence, not its admissibility. See United States v. Scholle, 553 F.2d at 1125.