Court Opinion

ID: 9666570
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 01:20:03.283812+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:30.249672
License: Public Domain

RONALD L. WALKER, Chief Justice,
concurring.
The admissibility or inadmissibility of hearsay evidence began many years ago as a plague upon human understanding, presently having evolved into endless circu-mambulation to the point that one’s battery goes dead from honking at one’s own tail-lights.
The proffered and admitted evidence in the instant case consisted of statements allegedly made by the decedent, Pamela Dorsey, to friends and co-workers. These statements are set out in the majority’s opinion. The majority does an excellent job addressing each of the hearsay statements elicited by the State or necessarily injected by appellant’s counsel in mitigation. Under present case law, I believe it safe to say that sometimes a decedent may speak from the grave and sometimes they must remain forever silent even to the point of freeing their killer. As the majority sets out, the decedent Pamela Dorsey may speak posthumously that she feared *931appellant and was contemplating divorce. However, when it comes to Pamela’s statement regarding those acts that created her fear, (appellant putting a gun to her head, threatening to kill her, placing a knife to her throat, etc.), we are compelled to conclude that under Tex.R. Evid. 803(3), Pamela should not speak, for indeed such hearsay is only a recounting of events to prove the fact remembered, i.e., Pamela’s fear of appellant.
My concurrence is for the purpose of pointing out the irony, and perhaps the injustice of 803(3), as applied to the present case.
Ironically, under 803(3), were the present case one involving the question of whether appellant unduly influenced Pamela in the execution of her will, the hearsay statements of decedent that she executed same because appellant held a knife to her throat and a gun to her head, would be admissible under 803(3). Not so however, in a case where appellant is charged with the execution of Pamela, to wit: killing her with a gun.
The rule needs revisiting in situations where a party is charged with the death of declarant.