Opinion ID: 2372783
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: admissibility of statements of defendant gomez

Text: In presenting his case the plaintiff called the police officer, Julio Santos, who investigated the accident. On direct examination the plaintiff asked the officer if the defendant truck driver, when questioned at the scene, had said that he could not see the victim Mr. Rokus in time before he struck him. Santos replied that the defendant had said that. On cross-examination the defendant tried to elicit the entire conversation from which that comment was excerpted: Q. And you talked to Mr. Gomez. He was still there. A. Yes. Q. Is. that right?
Q. And he told you, did he not, how this accident happened. Didn't he? A. Yes. Q. And what did he tell you? Before Santos responded, the plaintiff's counsel objected to the question on the grounds that the outof-court statement of Gomez would be self-serving, and thus inadmissible. The trial court sustained the plaintiff's objection over the defendants' claim that they had a right to elicit the entire conversation in which Gomez told the officer that he did not see the victim in time to stop. The defendants now advance that same claim on appeal. It is an elementary rule of evidence that where part of a conversation has been put in evidence by one party to a litigation or prosecution, the other party is entitled to have the whole conversation, so far as relevant to the question, given in evidence, including the portion which is favorable to him. State v. Savage, 161 Conn. 445, 448, 290 A.2d 221 (1971); see Sullivan v. Nesbit, 97 Conn. 474, 477, 117 A. 502 (1922); Clark v. Smith, 10 Conn. 1, 5 (1833). [T]he entire conversation in which an admission was contained should be related in order to prevent statements from being taken out of context.... State v. Hicks, 169 Conn. 581, 589, 363 A.2d 1081 (1975). At trial, the plaintiff was able to introduce the outof-court statement of Gomez through Santos' testimony because it constituted an admission by a party opponent. The statement was therefore exempted from the rule barring hearsay evidence. Ferris v. Polycast Technology Corporation, 180 Conn. 199, 204, 429 A.2d 850 (1980). The defendants, of course, could not avail themselves of that exception, because in most circumstances Santos' recitation of the defendant Gomez' outof-court statement would be inadmissible hearsay evidence when offered by the declarant. The principle announced in State v. Savage and State v. Hicks , however, is an independent exception to the rule against hearsay. When a portion of a party's out-ofcourt admission is placed in evidence by an opponent, the party has a right to introduce other relevant portions of the conversation from which it was excerpted, irrespective of whether it is self-serving or hearsay. State v. Hicks, supra, 589; 7 Wigmore, Evidence (3d Ed.) § 2094. Thus, the trial court erred in not allowing the defendant to introduce the entire conversation between Santos and Gomez during cross-examination. [2] The trial court's error, however, does not necessarily require reversal of the judgment. The mere fact that the [evidentiary] ruling is erroneous does not entitle an appellant to relief; it must be both wrong and harmful. Maltbie, Conn. App. Proc. § 23; see Saphir v. Neustadt, 177 Conn. 191, 201, 413 A.2d 843 (1979). Here, the record clearly indicates that the defendants suffered no prejudicial harm from the erroneous ruling. On further cross-examination by the defendants, Santos testified that the defendant Gomez had explained the entire course of events surrounding the accident and that Gomez' explanation went beyond the admission that he did not see the victim in time to stop. Later in the trial the defendant Gomez took the stand. On direct examination he related a full account of the accident, including that the victim ran in front of [the] truck. Gomez also testified that this was the same account of the incident that he gave to Santos at the scene. In sum, the defendants introduced the entire conversation from which Gomez' admission was extracted. Although the trial court should have allowed the defendants to introduce the conversation on cross-examination of the police officer, the defendants' ability to bring forward that evidence, albeit at a later time and through a partisan witness, negates any inference that the court's error affected the verdict. As such, the error was harmless and does not warrant reversal. Lancaster v. Bank of New York, 147 Conn. 566, 571, 164 A.2d 392 (1960).