Opinion ID: 1742511
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: The Tape as Hearsay

Text: Counsel argues that he offered the tape not for its hearsay content but simply as evidence of the defendant's state of mind. In fact, however, counsel's arguments at trial indicate that the tape was offered for precisely a hearsay purposeto prove to the jury the truth of Langley's assertion that he killed in a state of delusion. The defendant's statements to Dr. Ware would have been admissible only for their non-hearsay value in revealing the basis of the doctor's opinion. See La.C.E. arts. 703 & 705(B). However, the statements themselves were already in evidence as part of Dr. Ware's testimony.
Counsel's argument that the tape is state of mind evidence also fails. The express language of La.C.E. art. 803(3) excepts from the definition of hearsay only [a] statement of the declarant's then existing state of mind, emotion, sensation, or physical condition ... offered to prove the declarant's then existing condition or his future action.  (Emphasis added). Counsel did not offer the tape to prove the defendant's state of mind in the spring of 1994 when he made the statement to Dr. Warea matter never at issue. Rather, defendant offered the 1994 tape to try to show his state of mind two years earliera matter very much at issue. [A] state of mind evidenced by a speaker's remarks cannot be used to prove the speaker's past conduct. State v. Martin, 458 So.2d 454, 461 (La.1984) (citing Shepard v. United States, 290 U.S. 96, 54 S.Ct. 22, 78 L.Ed. 196 (1933)). While there is some authority that evidence of a particular state of mind may look backward in time to prove the continuity of that state of mind, it is reasonable to require as a condition of invoking the continuity notion that the declaration mirror a state of mind which, in light of all the circumstances including proximity in time, has some probability of being the same condition existing at the material time. Where there is room for doubt, the matter should be left to the discretion of the trial judge. McCormick, Evidence, § 295, p. 696 (Cleary, ed., 1972). The tape was offered to prove the defendant's state of mind two years before he made the statement. There was substantial room for doubt as to whether the defendant's state of mind was the same when the tape was made as it was at the time of the crime. The taped statement did not come within the hearsay exception provided by art. 803(3) or any other exception to the hearsay rule. Under these circumstances, the trial judge correctly excluded the tape.
The defense also argues that Louisiana's hearsay rules must give way to the overriding Eighth Amendment requirement that juries have the opportunity to consider and act upon all mitigating evidence offered by the defendant. He cites Green v. Georgia, 442 U.S. 95, 99 S.Ct. 2150, 60 L.Ed.2d 738 (1979). The Supreme Court's per curiam opinion in Green v. Georgia , is so easily distinguished from this case that it hurts Langley's cause. In Green, a capital case, the trial court excluded as hearsay a statement made by the defendant's co-perpetrator who had previously been tried and sentenced to death on the basis of the statement. The co-perpetrator, Moore, had confessed to a close friend that he had sent the defendant off to run an errand before he shot and killed the victim. Moore's statement that he alone killed the victim out of the defendant's presence was highly relevant to the issue of punishment at the defendant's trial, and it was only under these unique circumstances, that the Supreme Court overturned the defendant's conviction and death sentence. Id., 442 U.S. at 97, 99 S.Ct. at 2151. The Green Court emphasized that substantial reasons existed to assume [the statement's] reliability: The statement had been made spontaneously to a close friend; it was amply corroborated by the other evidence at trial; it was clearly against the co-perpetrator's interest and made for no apparent ulterior motive; and [p]erhaps most important, the state considered the testimony sufficiently reliable to use it against Moore, and to base a sentence of death upon it. Id. (footnote omitted). By contrast, Langley's statements are essentially exculpatory, and were made long after his crime to a witness the defense planned to call at trial. In short, they possessed no indicia of reliability that would justify admitting them. This argument fails.
Finally, the defense argues that the tape was admissible as evidence upon which Dr. Rathmell relied in forming her opinion. See La. C.E. art. 705, subd. B. Defense Counsel had sent a copy of the tape to Dr. Rathmell, but she testified that it really didn't help her form her opinion. Moreover, the tape was not made until two years after Dr. Rathmell saw the defendant and rendered her opinion. The tape simply was not evidence upon which Dr. Rathmell relied in forming her opinion. Accordingly, it was not admissible under La. C.E. art. 705, subd. B and the trial court properly excluded it from both the guilt and sentencing phases.
The trial court's ruling on the admissibility of the tape at both the guilt and sentencing stages goes to the heart of the overriding preference for live testimony in a face-to-face confrontation before the fact finder. [6] The Confrontation Clause and the intertwined rules governing the use of hearsay evidence have as a basic purpose the promotion of the `integrity of the fact-finding process.' White v. Illinois, 502 U.S. 346, 356-57, 112 S.Ct. 736, 743, 116 L.Ed.2d 848 (1992) (Rehnquist, C.J.) (quoting Coy v. Iowa, 487 U.S. 1012, 1020, 108 S.Ct. 2798, 2802, 101 L.Ed.2d 857 (1988)). Thus, neither the state nor the defendant may conduct a trial on the basis of prepared affidavits or other litigation statements which otherwise do not fall within a well-settled exception to the hearsay rule. See State v. Rault, 445 So.2d 1203, 1208 (La.), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 873, 105 S.Ct. 225, 83 L.Ed.2d 154 (1984); State v. Martin, 356 So.2d 1370, 1373-74 (La.1978).