Opinion ID: 1890541
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Trial Court Properly Admitted Stephanie McClain's Hearsay Testimony.

Text: At trial, the Commonwealth called Adam Dudley, one of Brown's friends, and asked him if, in one of their conversations, Brown had not admitted that he murdered Bland. Dudley denied that Brown had made such an admission to him or that he had repeated the admission to his girlfriend. Thereupon, the Commonwealth called the girlfriend, Stephanie McClain, who testified that Dudley had told her that in a phone conversation with Brown, Brown had confessed to Bland's murder. Brown contends that the trial court erred by admitting McClain's testimony, which, by repeating out-of-court statements by both Brown and Dudley, amounted to double hearsay. The same issue arose at Brown's first trial when another of Brown's friends, Shane Hughes, similarly denied conversing with Brown about the murder or repeating Brown's remarks to Archie Lane. Lane then testified that Hughes had repeated Brown's confession to him, and in Brown's first appeal we rejected his hearsay objection. We explained that [a]lthough the testimony of Lane as to what Hughes said Brown told him was double hearsay, it was admissible because each part of the combined statements conforms with an exception to the hearsay rule. KRE 805. See also, Thurman v. Commonwealth, 975 S.W.2d 888, 893 (Ky.1998). Brown's statements were admissible as admissions of a party. KRE 801A(b)(1); Thurman, supra . Hughes could have testified to those statements because he was the person to whom the admissions were made. His statements to Lane were then admissible as prior inconsistent statements of a witness. KRE 801A(a)(1); Thurman ; Jett v. Commonwealth, 436 S.W.2d 788 (Ky.1969). The proper foundation was laid for the admission of Lane's testimony by asking Hughes if he had made any statements to Lane. KRE 613(a); Thurman . The fact that Hughes was never asked if he had made the particular statements to Lane is of no consequence. Hughes denied making any statements to Lane about what Brown had said to him. Brown v. Commonwealth, 2003-SC-1023-MR, 2005 WL 2044538 (Aug. 25, 2005). [15] Clearly McClain's testimony was admissible pursuant to the same rules and reasoning, but Brown contends that, while his statement to Dudley (and by implication to Hughes) would be admissible as the admission of a party, Dudley's (and Hughes's) repetition of that statement, although admissible under our evidentiary rules, was inadmissible under the Sixth Amendment's Confrontation Clause as interpreted by the United States Supreme Court in Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 124 S.Ct. 1354, 158 L.Ed.2d 177 (2004). We disagree. In Crawford , the Supreme Court held that if the declarant does not testify at trial, his testimonial hearsay statements are not admissible, regardless of the hearsay rules, unless he is unavailable to testify and his hearsay statements were previously subject to cross-examination. Id. at 54, 124 S.Ct. 1354. The Supreme Court has yet to provide a definition of testimonial, but in Crawford it distinguished testimonial statements from casual remarks to friends. It is highly unlikely, therefore, that Dudley's remarks to his girlfriend, McClain, are to be deemed testimonial for Crawford 's purposes. See Hartsfield v. Commonwealth, 277 S.W.3d 239 (Ky.2009) (spontaneous, informal statements unsolicited by law enforcement or its surrogate not testimonial under Crawford .). As the Crawford Court explained, moreover, 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.... The Clause does not bar admission of a statement so long as the declarant is present at trial to defend or explain it. Id. at 59, 124 S.Ct. 1354 (citation omitted). Dudley, of course, (and Hughes) did appear for cross-examination at Brown's second trial, and thus, even if his statements to McClain were to be deemed testimonial, Crawford would not bar their admission under our rules. Brown also invites us to jettison KRE 801A(a)(1), the rule permitting the introduction of a witness's prior inconsistent statement as substantive evidence as well as for impeachment, and urges us to adopt a rule whereby such prior inconsistent statements would not be admissible unless made under oath. Brown has offered no reason, much less a compelling one, to depart from a rule that has served us well for forty years, Jett, supra , and we thus decline his invitation.