Court Opinion

ID: 9524711
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 02:56:13.82242+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:11:35.850382
License: Public Domain

Wright, J.,
concurring,
I join in the majority opinion, but I write separately because I would also consider the fact that Barnett recanted his statement.
We must evaluate whether Barnett’s statement contains particularized guarantees of trustworthiness such that adversarial testing would be expected to add little if anything to its reliability. See Idaho v. Wright, 497 U.S. 805, 110 S. Ct. 3139, 111 L. Ed. 2d 638 (1990). In Wright, the Court declined to endorse a mechanical test determining particularized guarantees of trustworthiness but did state that evidence corroborating the truth of a hearsay statement cannot be used to support a finding that the statement bears the requisite particularized guarantees of trustworthiness. Thus, the proponent of the statement’s reliability is not permitted to bootstrap the statement’s admissibility by use of corroborating evidence. “[T]he presence of corroborating evidence more appropriately indicates that any error in admitting the statement might be harmless....” Wright, 497 U.S. at 823.
While it is clear that corroborating evidence cannot be used to enhance the reliability of a statement, it is not clear whether such a rule prevents consideration of a recantation of the statement by the declarant. In my opinion, courts can and should consider whether the declarant has recanted a statement. The right to cross-examine is abrogated only when adversarial testing would be expected to add little if anything to its reliability. *353What would be of greater significance than the fact that the declarant had recanted the statement? The Confrontation Clause should be abrogated only when the evidence is so sufficiently reliable and trustworthy that it obviates the need to explore the state of mind of the declarant. White v. Illinois, 502 U.S. 346, 112 S. Ct. 736, 116 L. Ed. 2d 848 (1992); State v. Hughes, 244 Neb. 810, 510 N.W.2d 33 (1993).
Barnett recanted the statement at least four times. He told his mother that he was not present when Bush was murdered, that he would tell the truth at Sheets’ preliminary hearing, that he and Sheets were not involved in the murder, and that he could not “send anybody else down for some drunken, stupid thing” he had started and could not get out of. Barnett was referring to an episode where he was drinking with Jason LaNoue and talked about the killing.
Barnett’s girl friend spoke with Barnett while he was in jail. She testified that Barnett said he and Sheets had not killed Bush. When she asked Barnett why he had not told the police that it was all a lie, he stated that he had tried to tell the police “it was just a bunch of drunken bull, and they wouldn’t believe him.” He told her that when he got to trial, “he was going to tell the truth that they didn’t do it.”
A cellmate of Barnett’s in the Washington County jail testified that Barnett told him that neither Barnett nor Sheets had any involvement in the murder of Bush. The cellmate stated that Barnett had made up the story to impress some people at a party.
Sheets’ wife testified that she had received a telephone call from Barnett while he was in the Washington County jail and that Barnett told her he had just been “bullshitting” and nothing he had said was true.
In my opinion, Barnett’s recantation is of enormous significance in our evaluation of the statement’s trustworthiness. The fact that Barnett made prior inconsistent statements and subsequently recanted his confession goes to the very heart of Sheets’ right to cross-examine his accuser.
This issue was addressed in Ryan v. State, 899 P.2d 1371 (Alaska App. 1995). There, the victim of a sexual assault committed suicide a few hours before she was scheduled to testify before a grand jury. The state secured indictments against the *354two defendants, John Ryan and Jerome Trigg, through testimony of a police officer who had interviewed the victim.
During the first interview by police, the victim denied that she had been socializing with the two men who had assaulted her. She claimed that the men had stolen her vehicle and driven away and that her uncle had driven her to a cabin and left. She then entered the cabin, and the men, who appeared to be drunk, ordered her to take off her clothes and assaulted her.
The next day, in a second statement, the victim altered her previous account of how she had arrived at the cabin and how the assault had occurred. She admitted socializing with Ryan and Trigg and driving to the cabin, where the three of them continued to drink. At some point, things got out of hand, and she was assaulted by both men.
Before trial, Ryan and Trigg challenged the admissibility of the victim’s statements, but the trial court found that the statements to police were admissible under Alaska Evid. R. 804(b)(5), one of Alaska’s two residual hearsay exceptions. The court concluded that the residual hearsay exceptions were not firmly rooted exceptions and, therefore, examined the statements for particularized guarantees of trustworthiness.
The appellate court reversed, stating that its task was to determine whether the statements were so inherently trustworthy, so free from possible doubt, that cross-examination of the victim would yield negligible benefit to Ryan and Trigg as they stood trial for sexual assault. The state claimed that Idaho v. Wright, 497 U.S. 805, 110 S. Ct. 3139, 111 L. Ed. 2d 638 (1990), prohibited consideration of the fact that the victim had made inconsistent statements in evaluating the trustworthiness of the hearsay statement. The court concluded:
The State’s argument, while perhaps ingenious, is inconsistent with both the law and common sense. In judging the reliability of an absent person’s assertion, reasonable people would want to know, and would take into account, the fact that the same person had made an inconsistent assertion on another occasion. The case law recognizes and employs this rule of common sense.
Ryan, 899 P.2d at 1377 n.3.
*355I conclude that Barnett’s recantation is a circumstance that should be considered.