Court Opinion

ID: 9499670
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 17:54:31.021503+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:59:39.204201
License: Public Domain

KAREN NELSON MOORE, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I disagree with the majority opinion’s conclusions regarding the sufficiency of the evidence, the admissibility of Gordon’s statements under the excited-utterance exception to the hearsay rule as well as under the Confrontation Clause, and the district court’s refusal to admit testimony from a defense witness. Accordingly, I respectfully dissent for the reasons detailed below.
I. SUFFICIENCY OF THE EVIDENCE
The court must first determine whether the prosecution presented sufficient evidence for a reasonable jury to conclude, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Joseph Arnold possessed the handgun found in his girlfriend’s car. The only evidence of such possession consists of (1) Arnold’s presence in the car, and (2) Tamica Gordon’s statements to the police that Arnold had threatened her with a gun (although not necessarily the gun at issue) earlier that day. As demonstrated by the cases the majority opinion itself cites, such evidence is not sufficient to support a felon-in-possession conviction under either an actual or constructive possession theory.
First, the majority opinion tellingly sloughs over a significant piece of evidence that undercuts its conclusion — the gun retrieved from Gordon’s mother’s car bore no fingerprints. If, as the majority opin*203ion concludes, Arnold had threatened Gordon with a gun and then took the gun with him into Gordon’s mother’s car, it stands to reason that the gun would carry his fingerprints. The gun found in the car, however, had none. This inconvenient fact undercuts the entirety of the majority’s analysis.
Second, the majority opinion provides no basis for concluding that a reasonable jury could have found that Arnold actually possessed the gun found in his girlfriend’s car. “Actual possession exists when a tangible object is in the immediate possession or control of the party.” United States v. Beverly, 750 F.2d 34, 37 (6th Cir.1984) (quoting United States v. Craven, 478 F.2d 1329, 1333 (6th Cir.1973)).- Put another way, “[a] person who knowingly has direct physical control over a thing at a given time is then in actual possession of it.” United States v. Frederick, 406 F.3d 754, 765 (6th Cir.2005) (quoting United States v. Wolfenbarger, 426 F.2d 992, 994 (6th Cir.1970)).
The jury lacked sufficient evidence to convict on an actual-possession theory because the government supplied no evidence that Arnold had “direct physical control over a thing” — the gun — at the relevant “given time” — when he was in the car. Instead, the government offered evidence only of Arnold’s mere proximity to the gun. Proximity, however, is insufficient to support a conviction for actual possession. Cf. Beverly, 750 F.2d at 37 (holding that evidence that defendant was standing next to a waste basket containing gun was insufficient to prove even constructive possession, let alone actual possession).
On this basis, each of the cases the majority opinion cites is distinguishable. For instance, United States v. Moore, 208 F.3d 411 (2d Cir.2000), involved a situation in which “the officers saw defendant-appellant Curtis Moore standing in the middle of the courtyard with a black and silver handgun in his waistband.” Id. at 412. Similarly, in United States v. Crowe, 291 F.3d 884 (6th Cir.2002), the officer “observed the butt end of a black semi-automatic handgun protruding from under the waistband of Crowe’s pants.” Id. at 885. See also United States v. Barnett, 398 F.3d 516, 522 (6th Cir.2005) (officer saw defendant “holding a long black object that looked like a shotgun” which police later recovered in the area where the defendant had dropped it); United States v. Daniels, 170 Fed.Appx. 409, 410 (6th Cir.2006) (unpublished opinion) (officer saw defendant pull out an object looking like a handgun and throw it to the ground, and handgun was later recovered); United States v. Austin, 133 Fed.Appx 271, 275 (6th Cir. 2005) (unpublished opinion) (officer saw defendant holding a gun before he fled, and later recovered the gun along his path of flight). In each of these eases, the government had evidence that the defendant had “direct physical control” over the gun in question at the relevant time because in each case, the police officer witnessed the defendant with the gun on his person. See Frederick, 406 F.3d at 765. No such evidence exists here.
As noted in the panel’s per curiam opinion, Gordon’s accusation that Arnold had a gun when he threatened her does not address whether Arnold had direct physical control over the relevant gun (the one found in the car) at the relevant time (when officers arrested him). Gordon’s testimony is insufficient to sustain a conviction because conviction requires proof that Arnold “possess[ed] the firearm and ammunition specified in the indictment.” United States v. Schreane, 331 F.3d 548, 560 (6th Cir.2003) (emphasis added). Because the prosecution presented no evidence showing that Arnold had physical control over the recovered firearm when it *204was recovered or immediately before, no rational trier of fact could have found that the government proved actual possession beyond a reasonable doubt.
Likewise, the government has not provided sufficient evidence for a reasonable jury to conclude that Arnold constructively possessed the gun found in the car. “Constructive possession exists when a person does not have actual possession but'instead knowingly has the power and the intention at a given time to exercise dominion and control over an object, either directly or through others.” Craven, 478 F.2d at 1333. One way the government may prove the defendant had the power to exercise dominion over a firearm is through evidence that he had dominion or control over the premises where the firearm was located. United States v. Kincaide, 145 F.3d 771, 782 (6th Cir.1998), cert, denied, 525 U.S. 1166, 119 S.Ct. 1085, 143 L.Ed.2d 86 (1999). However, a defendant’s presence where a firearm was found, without more, is insufficient to establish “the requisite knowledge, power, or intention to exercise control” over the firearm. United States v. Birmley, 529 F.2d 103, 107-08 (6th Cir. 1976).
Our previous decisions rejecting sufficiency challenges by defendants found in cars containing guns are all readily distinguishable, as in each case, there was sufficient evidence tying the defendant to a particular gun found in the car. For instance, in United States v. Murphy, 107 F.3d 1199 (6th Cir.1997), we noted that a defendant found in a car with a gun could not mount a successful sufficiency challenge when he was the car’s only occupant, and thus clearly exercised dominion over the car. Id. at 1208. But Arnold was not alone in the car. In United States v. Carter, 355 F.3d 920 (6th Cir.2004), a defendant’s sufficiency challenge was unsuccessful because other occupants in the car were precluded from being the source of the firearm. Id. at 925. But here, the government presented no evidence showing that Arnold’s girlfriend, the car’s driver, could not have been the source. In other cases, we rejected sufficiency challenges when the defendant was the owner of the car and had arranged to sell the gun, Birmley, 529 F.2d at 107, when the defendant drove the car containing the gun, id., when police saw the defendant attempting to conceal the weapon, Carter, 355 F.3d at 925; Schreane, 331 F.3d at 561, and when the defendant and the owner of the gun had a close relationship, id. But here, Arnold neither drove nor owned the car, there is no evidence that the police saw him attempt to conceal it (let alone touch it at all), and the government never established the identity of the gun’s owner. Because the record contains no evidence of any of these factors, this court lacks any basis upon which to conclude that Arnold exercised dominion or control over the car or the gun found inside it.
This conclusion is reinforced by our decision in United States v. Beverly, 750 F.2d 34 (6th Cir.1984), which involved a gun found in a home.1 An officer executing a search warrant found Beverly and another person (Austin) in the kitchen of yet another person’s (Hatfield’s) residence. Beverly, 750 F.2d at 35. While patting down Beverly and Austin, the officer noticed two handguns in a waste basket between the two individuals. Id. Beverly’s fingerprint was on one of the guns, and the print’s location suggested that the gun “would have had to have been laid down.” Id. at 36. We held that these facts were insuffi*205cient to prove constructive possession; instead, the evidence “established] only that Beverly was in the kitchen of Hatfield’s residence, that Beverly was standing close to a waste basket which contained two guns, and that Beverly had at some point touched one of the guns.” Id. at 37. In the instant case, Arnold and Gordon’s mother were located close to where the gun was discovered, just as the defendant and his companion were in Beverly. Here, however, no fingerprint was found on the firearm, so the evidence of constructive possession does not rise even to the level that we rejected as insufficient in Beverly. The majority’s half-hearted attempt to distinguish Beverly falls flat. The majority emphasizes that no eyewitness had seen Beverly possess the gun, but fails to explain how such testimony (present in this case) is more indicative of constructive possession than a defendant’s fingerprint on a gun that had been laid down soon before it was recovered. Again, if the evidence in Beverly could not sustain a conviction, the evidence in this case is woefully inadequate.
Similarly, our sister circuits have reversed on sufficiency grounds convictions stemming from far stronger facts than those of this case. For instance, in United States v. Blue, 957 F.2d 106 (4th Cir.1992), the Fourth Circuit overturned a conviction for felon-in-possession when the police found the gun underneath the defendant’s seat, notwithstanding the officer’s testimony that he saw the defendant “dip as if [he] were reaching under the seat with his right hand” after the officer pulled the car over. Id. at 107. Similarly, in United States v. Hishaw, 235 F.3d 565 (10th Cir. 2000), cert, denied, 533 U.S. 908, 121 S.Ct. 2254, 150 L.Ed.2d 241 (2001), the Tenth Circuit overturned such a conviction notwithstanding that the defendant was the driver of the car, and notwithstanding testimony that he had possessed a similar weapon on earlier occasions. Id. at 572-73. See also United States v. Kelso, 942 F.2d 680, 681-82 (9th Cir.1991) (notwithstanding defendant’s access to gun, rejecting argument that the defendant passenger constructively possessed a gun found behind the driver’s seat because government failed to show defendant’s ownership or awareness of the gun); United States v. Whitfield, 629 F.2d 136, 142-43 (D.C.Cir. 1980) (concluding that no reasonable juror could find evidence that gun was found under defendant passenger’s seat within his reach was sufficient to support constructive possession).
Nor do Gordon’s statements and gestures, as recounted by the police officers, establish a sufficient nexus between Arnold and the gun to support Arnold’s conviction. At best, they suggest that Arnold possessed a black, semiautomatic firearm at some unspecified earlier time. Again, conviction requires proof that Arnold “possess[ed] the firearm and ammunition specified in the indictment.” Schreane, 331 F.3d at 560 (emphasis added). Lacking any such evidence, the majority opinion takes the tenuous leap of inferring from Arnold’s putative earlier possession that he constructively possessed the black, semiautomatic gun recovered from the vehicle. While it is true that the recovered firearm matched Gordon’s generic description— statements that the brandished gun was black and gestures that an officer interpreted to indicate a semiautomatic with a chambered round — these attributes are too common for this equivalence to prove that Arnold constructively possessed the gun found in the car. See Hishaw, 235 F.3d at 571, 572 (holding that testimony that the defendant was seen with a semiautomatic pistol on several prior occasions was “simply too remote and too vague to support the inference that [the defendant] constructively possessed the pistol” found in *206the car).2 The government has not established any nexus between the gun found in the car and Arnold. Accordingly, this case is distinguishable from United States v. Thomas, 497 F.2d 1149 (6th Cir.1974), because in Thomas, the nexus between the defendant and the gun was the defendant’s own statement referring to the gun in question as “my gun.” Id. at 1150. By contrast, the only connection between Arnold and the gun specified in the indictment is that officers found it under a seat where Arnold was sitting in a car he was not driving and did not own.
And even if we were to infer that Arnold had previously possessed the gun found under the seat, prior possession cannot establish possession at a later time. Beverly, 750 F.2d at 37 (evidence that defendant had earlier held and laid down a gun was insufficient to establish constructive possession).
Until today, mere coincidence has never been a substitute for constitutionally sufficient evidence of possession. But with its opinion, the majority sweeps aside decades of authority from this court and others, rendering this Circuit alone in the country in holding that possession of a gun may be shown without some direct nexus between the gun and the defendant.
II. EXCITED UTTERANCE
After rewriting this circuit’s law on the threshold of evidence required to support a conviction for being a felon in possession of a firearm, the majority opinion next errs by concluding that Gordon’s statements to the 911 operator and to the police are admissible as excited utterances. Because the record does not support the conclusion that any of Gordon’s statements fall into this exception to the hearsay rule, I dissent on this ground as well.
As the majority correctly notes, Federal Rule of Evidence 803(2) permits a court to admit out-of-court statements for the truth of the matter asserted when they “relat[e] to a startling event or condition made while the declarant was under the stress of excitement caused by the event or condition.” The majority opinion also correctly cites the three elements of the Haggins test: (1) a startling event, (2) the statement’s being made so temporally close to that event that the declarant lacked time to contrive or misrepresent, and (3) the statement’s being made under the stress of excitement caused by the event. Haggins v. Warden, Fort Pillow State Farm, 715 F.2d 1050, 1057 (6th Cir.1983). As is typical of evidentiary matters, “the burden of proving that the statement fits squarely within a hearsay exception” rests with the proponent of the hearsay exception, here, the government. United States v. Kendrick, 853 F.2d 492, 496 n. 3 (6th Cir.1988) (citing United States v. Day, 789 F.2d 1217, 1221 (6th Cir.1986)). The district court failed to place the burden of proof on the government, and the majority repeats this error, notwithstanding its assertion to the contrary.
A. Gordon’s 911 Call
We must decide whether the trial court abused its discretion when it admitted the relevant out-of-court statements (Gordon’s 911 call and her statements to police officers at the scene) as excited utterances. With regard to the 911 call, the district court concluded that each statement con*207tained in the tape recording of the call (save Gordon’s claim that Arnold was convicted murderer, a statement the government did not seek to admit) was admissible under the excited-utterance exception to the hearsay rule. To evaluate this decision, I consider the record evidence regarding the first two prongs of the Hag-gins test.
Startling Event. The government failed to introduce any evidence of a “startling event” outside of the hearsay statement (the 911 call) itself. The majority glosses over this fact, stating without analysis that “being threatened by a convicted murderer wielding a semi-automatic handgun amounts to a startling event that would prompt at least nervous excitement in the average individual, if not outright trauma.” Maj. Op. at 184. This may well be true, but absent some independent evidence of such an event, the district court abused its discretion by admitting the tape.
I begin with first principles. Hearsay evidence is generally inadmissible because it is not sufficiently reliable and cannot be tested through cross-examination. See 1-14 Weinstein’s Evidenoe Manual § 14.01[1]. However, particular categories of hearsay statements that “contain inherent guarantees of their truthfulness” constitute exceptions to the general prohibition on hearsay. Haggins, 715 F.2d at 1057. Excited utterances are one such exception.
“The basis for the ‘excited utterance’ exception ... is that such statements are given under circumstances that eliminate the possibility of fabrication, coaching, or confabulation, and that therefore the circumstances surrounding the making of the statement provide sufficient assurance that the statement is trustworthy.” Idaho v. Wright, 497 U.S. 805, 820, 110 S.Ct. 3139, 111 L.Ed.2d 638 (1990) (emphasis added). More specifically, “a person under the sway of excitement precipitated by an external startling event will be bereft of the reflective capacity essential for fabrication and that, consequently, any utterance he makes will be spontaneous and trustworthy.” Haggins, 715 F.2d at 1057 (quoting 4 J. Weinstein & M. BergeR, Weinstein’s Evidence ¶803(2)[01] at 803-79 (1981)). To determine whether a hearsay statement contains such guarantees of reliability, we apply the aforementioned three-step inquiry: “First, there must be an event startling enough to cause nervous excitement. Second, the statement must be made before there is time to contrive or misrepresent. Third, the statement must be made while the person is under the stress of excitement caused by the event.” Schreane, 331 F.3d at 564 (internal quotation marks omitted). And as previously mentioned, the government bears the burden of establishing each of these elements by a preponderance of the evidence. See Kendrick, 853 F.2d at 496 n. 3.
These first principles demand that the excited utterance itself cannot constitute the only evidence of a startling event; instead, the proponent of a hearsay statement must offer independent corroborating evidence. This is true for two different, but related, reasons.
First, relying on the putative excited utterance itself to show that a startling event occurred is endlessly circular. In such a scenario, the district court would rely on the statement itself to establish an element of the test for whether the statement is sufficiently reliable to be admitted into evidence. Such circularity is problematic in and of itself, although the problem can potentially be explained away by reference to Federal Rule of Evidence 104(a), which permits district courts to resolve preliminary questions regarding admissibility by preponderance of the evidence. *208See Bourjaily v. United States, 483 U.S. 171, 175-76,107 S.Ct. 2775, 97 L.Ed.2d 144 (1987) (holding that district courts may resolve preliminary questions under Federal Rule of Evidence 801(d)(2)(E) by preponderance of the evidence).3 Notably, the record in this case reflects no such determination under Rule 104(a).
Second, and significantly, this circularity contradicts the purpose of the excited-utterance exception to the hearsay rule. As noted above, excited utterances are admissible because the startling event and corresponding state of alarm renders it “unlikely that the statement is contrived or the product of reflection.” Haggins, 715 F.2d at 1057. And, as we have previously noted, when determining whether a statement qualifies as an excited utterance, “the ultimate question is whether the statement was the result of reflective thought or whether it was a spontaneous reaction to the exciting event.” Id. at 1058 (quoting McCormick’s Handbook of the Law of EvidenCe § 297 at 705-06 (2d ed.1972)). Without some corroborating evidence of such an exciting event, the district court lacks the capacity to make such a determination, or to determine even that there was such an event. Put differently, when the only evidence of the startling event is the proffered statement, the proponent cannot carry its burden of establishing that the relevant circumstances “eliminate the possibility of fabrication,” Wright, 497 U.S. at 820, 110 S.Ct. 3139, or that the statement “contain[s] inherent guarantees of truthfulness,” Haggins, 715 F.2d at 1057. To the contrary, anyone could contrive a fact that — if real — would cause excitement, and state it in an exclamatory manner. To hold that such a statement, standing alone, is admissible for the truth of the matter asserted stands the hearsay rule on its head.
In this case, the possibility of fabrication was alive and well. Without any independent corroborating evidence of Arnold’s alleged gun-brandishing, the following series of events was certainly possible:
Gordon and Arnold got into an argument and Gordon stormed away angry. Although Arnold never brandished or mentioned a gun during the argument, Gordon knew that her mother kept handguns in the house and in her car. Gordon wanted Arnold to return to jail so that her mother’s relationship with him would end, so she contrived a story while fleeing the house: Arnold threatened her with a gun in the course of their argument. She then relayed this story to the 911 operator while still emotionally upset from the altercation.
The point here is not that this turn of events is more likely true than not, but rather that without any corroborating evidence of the putative exciting event, the government provided no indication that Gordon’s statement is any more reliable than any run-of-the-mill inadmissible hear*209say statement.4 The lack of such reliability undermines the rationale for admitting excited utterances, and accordingly, I would hold that the district court abused its discretion by admitting Gordon’s statement to the 911 operator without independent corroborating evidence of the alleged startling event.
Reaching the same conclusion that I have, various courts have held that a hearsay statement itself cannot serve as the sole evidence of the alleged startling event that spurred the statement. See, e.g., State v. Post, 901 S.W.2d 231, 234-35 (Mo. Ct.App.1995); People v. Burton, 433 Mich. 268, 445 N.W.2d 133, 144 (1989); Commonwealth v. Barnes, 310 Pa.Super. 480, 456 A.2d 1037, 1040 (1983); State v. Terry, 10 Wash.App. 874, 520 P.2d 1397, 1401 (1974); Truck Ins. Exch. v. Michling, 364 S.W.2d 172, 174-77 (Tex.1963); Beck v. Nat’l Sur. Corp., 171 F.2d 862, 863-64 (5th Cir.1949); see also People v. Leonard, 83 Ill.2d 411, 47 Ill.Dec. 353, 415 N.E.2d 358, 362 (1981) (upholding admissibility of statement because independent evidence corroborated occurrence of startling event, but noting that without such evidence, statement would be excluded).5 Even a panel of this court has noted in an unpublished opinion that “an excited utterance can not establish its own underlying event.” United States v. McCullough, 150 Fed.Appx. 507, 509-10 (6th Cir.2005) (unpublished opinion). In its supplemental brief, the government notes that some other authorities have reached the opposite conclusion. Appellee’s Supp. Br. at 27-28. Although some of these authorities claim that admitting such statements is the “generally prevailing rule,” see United States v. Brown, 254 F.3d 454, 459 (3d Cir.2001), they neither cite recent authority nor provide explanations of why such circular reasoning is permissible. More troubling, not one of these cases addresses the incompatibility of such bootstrapping with the foundations of the excited-utterance exception to the hearsay rule.6 The better rule, and the one I would adopt, requires at least some corroborating evidence of the alleged startling event.
Lack of Time to Contrive or Misrepresent. The district court concluded, and *210the majority now concludes, that Gordon lacked the time, between Arnold’s allegedly threatening her -with a gun and her 911 call, to contrive or misrepresent. Neither, however, provides a clear reason for this conclusion.
In Haggins, we noted that “the lapse of time between the startling event and the out-of-court statement,” while “not disposi-tive,” was still “[o]ne of the most relevant factors in determining spontaneity” and therefore admissibility. Haggins, 715 F.2d at 1057-58.7 Here, the majority maintains that the government need not establish with precision how much time passed between the two events. Even if this assumption were correct, the government (as the proponent and therefore the party bearing the burden of proof on evi-dentiary questions) must provide some indication of how closely tethered the two events were. But here, the district court placed no such requirement on the government. Instead, the district court admitted, “I don’t know the time frame.” J.A. at 56. Notwithstanding this uncertainty, the district court concluded without explanation that Gordon’s phone call “appears to have been made before there was time to contrive or misrepresent.” J.A. at 64. Without any explanation or any basis in the record for this conclusion, the district court’s decision cannot stand.
Next, the majority places undue emphasis on its interpretation of the tape. Although I question the utility of semantically dissecting Gordon’s statements, even if I take the majority’s approach, the tape does not indicate that Gordon spoke to the 911 operator before sufficient time to contrive or misrepresent had passed. According to the majority, Gordon said, “he’s fixing to shoot me,” as opposed to “he was fixing to shoot me.” Maj. Op. at 184-85, 186. After listening to the tape multiple times, I hear the words: “I guess he finna shoot me.” I find this significant for two reasons. First, Gordon’s inclusion of the words “I guess” (which the majority cleverly excises) renders her statement far less definitive than the majority chooses to present it. More importantly, the statement contains no auxiliary verb (e.g., “is” or “was”) connected to “finna,” which I understand to be a slang contraction for “fixing to,” much as “gonna” serves as a contraction for “going to.” See, e.g., http://www.urban dietionary.com/define.php?term=finna (last visited Apr. 19, 2007) (defining “finna” as, “Abbreviation of ‘fixing to.’ Normally means ‘going to.’ ”).8 The lack of an auxiliary verb renders determination of whether Gordon intended to imply the past or present tense an exercise in sheer guesswork. Accordingly, the words spoken on the tape do not establish that Gordon offered these statements before there was time to contrive or misrepresent.
*211The majority next attempts to satisfy the temporal element by noting that the district court concluded that Gordon sounded nervous and distraught. But this addresses the third element of the Hag-gins test (whether the statement was made while the declarant was under the stress of the event), not the second (whether the statement was made before there was time to contrive or misrepresent), and thus impermissibly collapses the second and third prongs such that a nervous tone, without more, is sufficient to establish both. The speaker’s tone, however, is plainly insufficient to satisfy the second element, for whether one sounds nervous or distraught is irrelevant to determining whether sufficient time has passed for the speaker to contrive or misrepresent.
Finally, the cases the majority relies upon are readily distinguishable. In Hag-gins, the court found the declarant’s statements admissible because of her young “age and physical condition,” emphasizing that “[s]he was bleeding and in critical condition.” Haggins, 715 F.2d at 1058. Gordon, by contrast, is an adult who suffered no physical harm. Similarly, the declarant in United States v. Baggett, 251 F.3d 1087, 1090 (6th Cir.2001), had suffered severe physical abuse that resulted in an undefined period of unconsciousness between the startling event (a prolonged beating) and the statement, which was made in the hospital after she regained consciousness. Likewise, the declarant in United States v. Cruz, 156 F.3d 22, 30 (1st Cir.1998), also suffered an intense and prolonged beating, and the declarant in United States v. Green, 125 Fed.Appx. 659, 662 (6th Cir.2005) (unpublished opinion), had been the victim of a physical assault. Again, and unlike each of these declarants, Gordon suffered no physical harm.
For all of these reasons, I would hold that the district court abused its discretion in admitting the 911 call, as the record presently before us cannot permit the government to satisfy either its burden of establishing that an exciting event occurred or its burden of proving that Gordon’s statements were made before she had the time to contrive or misrepresent.
B. Gordon’s Statements When the Officers First Arrived
Gordon’s statements to the police officers when they first arrived on the scene suffer from the same fatal defects as her statements to the 911 operator: the government failed to present any independent evidence that Arnold pulled a gun on Gordon and similarly failed to show that she lacked the time to contrive or misrepresent. Here, however, the district court and the majority’s conclusion regarding the second factor is even more specious, as the relevant evidence before the district court demonstrated a notable temporal disconnect.
Although the district court lacked any evidence regarding whether Gordon had time to contrive or misrepresent before making her 911 call, the evidence before the district court demonstrated that Gordon had sufficient time to contrive or misrepresent before talking to the officers when they arrived on the scene. Gordon made her 911 call at 7:43 a.m., and the call lasted approximately two minutes. Officer Brandon’s testimony established that the officers were dispatched sometime between 7:54 and 8:00 and arrived on the scene five to six minutes later. J.A. at 71-72. Thus, in addition to the unknown period of time between Gordon’s altercation with Arnold and her 911 call (during the course of which she had begun to calm down), between fourteen and twenty-one minutes elapsed until the officers arrived on the scene. This clearly represents sufficient time for someone in Gordon’s posi*212tion to contrive a story or misrepresent the details of her account.
The majority opinion obscures the time line of these events by assuming that only five minutes passed between the end of Gordon’s 911 call and the officers’ arrival on the scene. Even if this were true, it does not follow that five minutes is not sufficient time for Gordon to have misrepresented what happened. I know of no binding case holding that an adult declar-ant who suffered no physical harm is incapable of conscious reflection sufficient to fabricate or misrepresent a story in even this short period of time, let alone the fourteen to twenty-one minutes that actually passed.9 For these reasons, I would hold that the district court abused its discretion in admitting Gordon’s initial statements to the officers as excited utterances.
C. Gordon’s Statements to Officers After Arnold’s Arrival
When Arnold returned to the scene in a car driven by Gordon’s mother, Gordon repeated to the officers her allegation that Arnold had pulled a gun on her. I would hold that, for reasons similar to those expressed above, the district court abused its discretion by admitting this statement under the excited-utterance exception.
As previously shown, the record contains no independent evidence of Arnold’s alleged gun-brandishing, or any evidence of the amount of time that elapsed between Gordon’s altercation with Arnold and her 911 call. Because of these defects, the government cannot carry its burden of establishing that Gordon’s claim that Arnold pulled a gun on her “contain[s] inherent guarantees of truthfulness,” Haggins, 715 F.2d at 1057, or that there was no “possibility of fabrication,” Wright, 497 U.S. at 820, 110 S.Ct. 3139. Merely repeating an unreliable statement does not miraculously imbue it with reliability. The doubts expressed regarding Gordon’s previous statements lead me to conclude that this statement, too, was plainly inadmissible on the record before the district court.
In conclusion, the majority opinion eviscerates the three-part test that has long governed the admissibility of hearsay statements under the excited-utterance exception. The effect of the majority’s reasoning is that a statement uttered in an exciting manner, alleging that a startling event occurred, is automatically admissible for the truth of the matter asserted. After today, no independent evidence is required of either the event’s occurrence (the first prong) or the amount of time that passed between the alleged event and the statement (the second prong); instead, the de-clarant’s excited tone permits the court to infer both. And after making these inferences, the court may then satisfy the third prong by inferring that the alleged event (the occurrence of which was inferred from the speaker’s tone) caused the speaker’s tone. Thus, a convincing liar need not fear the pains of perjury, for a court may admit his out-of-court statement for the truth of the matter asserted on the basis of the statement and tone alone, insulating the liar from both oath and cross-examination. This approach is flatly inconsistent with our existing excited-utterance jurisprudence.
III. CONFRONTATION CLAUSE
Even if each of the statements discussed above were admissible under the Federal Rules of Evidence, we must undertake an analysis under the Sixth Amendment’s *213Confrontation Clause. As the majority-notes, the crux of the constitutional inquiry for Confrontation Clause challenges has changed since Arnold stood trial. Previously, the government needed to establish only (1) the witness’s constitutional unavailability and (2) the statement’s indicia of reliability (e.g., admissibility under a hearsay exception). Ohio v. Roberts, 448 U.S. 56, 65-66, 100 S.Ct. 2531, 65 L.Ed.2d 597 (1980). But now, the government must establish that the proffered statements were not “testimonial.” Davis v. Washington, - U.S.-, 126 S.Ct. 2266, 2273, 165 L.Ed.2d 224 (2006); Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 53-54, 124 S.Ct. 1354,158 L.Ed.2d 177 (2004). In this case, the government developed the record to fit the first inquiry; quite understandably, neither the government nor the district court considered the second. But that does not give this court a license to contort the record to fit the Davis test, which is exactly what the majority opinion does. In so doing, the majority’s revisionist approach effectively turns the applicable burden of proof on its head.
A. Burden of Proof
The proper starting point of the Confrontation Clause analysis is the allocation of the burden of proof, an issue the majority does not address. When a criminal defendant raises a constitutional challenge to the government’s proffered evidence, the government must show by a preponderance of evidence that the evidence is constitutionally admissible. This principle rings true in a variety of circumstances implicating the Fourth and Fifth Amendments. For instance, we have noted that “[t]he government bears the burden of proving that exigent circumstances such as a medical emergency existed to justify a warrantless search.” Hardesty v. Hamburg Twp., 461 F.3d 646, 655 (6th Cir. 2006); see also United States v. Huffman, 461 F.3d 777, 783 (6th Cir.2006) (“The government, in order to satisfy the exigent-circumstances exception in the present case, must show that there was a risk of serious injury posed to the officers or others that required swift action.”). Similarly, in cases involving consent to a search, the government has the burden of demonstrating that the defendant consented to the search, United States v. Hurst, 228 F.3d 751, 757 (6th Cir.2000), “that the consent was freely and voluntarily given and was not the result of coercion, duress, or submission to a claim of authority,” United States v. Wellman, 185 F.3d 651, 657 (6th Cir.1999), and, in cases involving third-party consent, that the third party had common authority sufficient to consent to a search, Illinois v. Rodriguez, 491 U.S. 177, 181, 110 S.Ct. 2793, 111 L.Ed.2d 148 (1990). In the context of the Fifth Amendment, the government must establish by preponderance of the evidence that the defendant knowingly waived his Miranda rights, Colorado v. Connelly, 479 U.S. 157, 169, 107 S.Ct. 515, 93 L.Ed.2d 473 (1986), and that any confession was voluntary, Lego v. Twomey, 404 U.S. 477, 489, 92 S.Ct. 619, 30 L.Ed.2d 618 (1972), if the jury is to receive such statements.
The same principle applies in determining admissibility in light of a Confrontation Clause challenge. It is clear that before Crawford the government bore the burden of proving the admissibility of statements under the Confrontation Clause. Roberts, 448 U.S. at 74-75, 100 S.Ct. 2531 (“As with other evidentiary proponents, the prosecution bears the burden of establishing” that a witness is constitutionally unavailable); Wright, 497 U.S. at 816, 110 S.Ct. 3139 (recognizing that government has the burden of establishing sufficient indicia of reliability). Nothing in either Crawford or Davis states, or even hints, that the Supreme Court intended to *214alter this allocation of burdens. The inescapable conclusion, then, is that post-Dams, the government retains the burden of defeating, by preponderance of the evidence, a defendant’s Confrontation Clause challenge. This means that the government must establish facts showing that the proffered statements are nontestimonial, i.e., that they were “made in the course of police interrogation under circumstances objectively indicating that the primary purpose of the interrogation is to enable police assistance to meet an ongoing emergency.” Davis, 126 S.Ct. at 2273. On the record presently before the court, the government cannot meet this burden.
B. Gordon’s 911 Call
As noted above, the core inquiry under Davis is whether the statements were offered to enable police to address an ongoing emergency. Id. at 2273. To determine the purpose of the statements, courts must consider the circumstances under which they were made, emphasizing both temporal factors (e.g., whether the statement described present or past events and whether the emergency was ongoing) and environmental factors (e.g., whether the statements were made in a formal, or a safe, setting). Id. at 2276-77. Considering these categories of factors as they apply to Gordon’s statements to the 911 operator, the record does not contain sufficient information for the government to establish that her statements were nontes-timonial. For this reason, the statements are not admissible on the record presently before the court.
First, I consider temporal factors. Notwithstanding the majority opinion’s insertion of an auxiliary verb into Gordon’s speculative statement regarding Arnold’s intent to shoot her, Arnold was clearly reporting past events when she spoke to the 911 operator. While she claimed to “need police” at the time of the call, her reasons for this need were all stated in the past tense: “Me and my momma’s boyfriend got in a throw-up, and he went in the house and got a pistol, pulled it out on me. I guess he finna shoot me. So I got in my car and [inaudible] and went around the corner from the house.” Audio tape: 911 call dated Sept. 19, 2002. Notably, Gordon spoke in the past tense, as each of the italicized verbs in Gordon’s statement illustrates. This is notably different from the statements at issue in Davis, where the 911 caller spoke in the present tense, saying “He’s here jumpin’ on me again,” “He’s usin’ his fists,” and “He’s runnin’ now.” Davis, 126 S.Ct. at 2271. While McCottry, the victim in the Davis case, “was speaking about events as they were actually happening,” id. at 2276, that was not true of Gordon. To the contrary, Gordon was “describing] past events.” Id. (quoting Lilly v. Virginia, 527 U.S. 116, 137, 119 S.Ct. 1887, 144 L.Ed.2d 117 (1999) (plurality opinion)) (alteration in original).
Similarly, it is not clear that the environment in which Gordon spoke to the 911 operator was sufficiently chaotic to render her statements nontestimonial. It is true that Gordon sounded upset, and that her voice was raised throughout the 911 call. Nonetheless, we know that Gordon had extricated herself from the scene of the alleged assault, as evidenced by her indication that she had left the house and gone around the corner (either to, or in, her car). The 911 operator knew this fact as well; she reminded Gordon, “Ma’am, listen to me. You’re not there now.” Audio tape: 911 call dated Sept. 19, 2002. Davis strongly suggests that this fact itself may well be sufficient to end the inquiry, as the Court stated that physical separation between the assailant and the alleged victim is often sufficient to terminate the emergency. Davis, 126 S.Ct. at 2277 (“after the operator gained the information need*215ed to address the exigency of the moment, the emergency appears to have ended (when Davis drove away from the premises ).” (emphasis added)).
While the majority insists that the emergency continued, insinuating that Gordon feared that Arnold might pursue her, Maj. Op. at 189-90, the circumstances do not objectively reveal that Gordon considered herself to be in such danger. Short of Gordon’s yelling (which reflects her subjective emotional state), the 911 call reveals none of the objective indicia of her being hunted that one would expect to hear from someone facing such an “ongoing emergency.” Davis, 126 S.Ct. at 2276. The 911 tape does not contain the sound of footsteps pounding the pavement or heavy breathing, which indicates that Gordon did not run quickly from the house to her car. Nor does it contain any indication that Gordon was operating the car, let alone the sounds of hurriedly driving away from a dangerous situation (ignition starting, engine revving, tires screeching). Remaining stationary in or outside of (the record is unclear) a car sitting “around the corner” from the location of a recent assault with a firearm is hardly the type of behavior exhibited by someone in the throes of an “ongoing emergency.”
For these reasons, I would conclude that the statements in Gordon’s 911 call are testimonial, and therefore not admissible. At minimum, it is clear to me that on the record presently before the court, the government cannot establish “circumstances objectively indicating that the primary purpose of the interrogation is to enable police assistance to meet an ongoing emergency,” id. at 2273, based on the factors emphasized in Davis.
C. Gordon’s Statements When the Officers First Arrived
Because the emergency was no longer “ongoing” when Gordon made her 911 call, Gordon’s statements to the officers were also testimonial and thus inadmissible. But one need not accept my conclusion regarding the 911 call to agree with me here. As noted supra in Part II, the relevant testimony establishes that fourteen to twenty-one minutes separated the phone call and the officers’ arrival. This additional time was certainly sufficient to quell any “emergency” that may have been “ongoing” at the time of the 911 call, especially because the record contains no evidence of any aggravating factors in the interim sufficient to rekindle the emergency-
Further, the record contains no evidence that Gordon fled from her position “around the corner” from 1012 Oak View during this intervening period, which renders it doubtful that any real emergency continued. We know that Joseph Arnold had, at some point, left 1012 Oak View in a car driven by Gordon’s mother, but we do not know whether Gordon knew that Arnold left. Either way, the record does not reflect any actions on her part consistent with an ongoing emergency. Assume first that Gordon did not know that Arnold had left the house, but instead was under the impression that he remained in the house. The record’s lack of any indication that she left her spot around the corner implies that she felt safe enough to remain within walking (and shooting) distance of the house where her alleged assailant remained. Alternatively, assume that Gordon knew that Arnold had left the house. In this instance, the lack of any evidence that she moved from the corner indicates that she did not think Arnold was pursuing her to shoot or assault her.10 While the *216majority may be correct that remaining in the same place “offered the quickest route to making contact with the officers,” Maj. Op. at 192, remaining there also offered the quickest route to make contact with a bullet, assuming that an ongoing emergency existed. Simply put, no matter which inference one draws regarding Gordon’s knowledge of Arnold’s whereabouts, the circumstances do not objectively indicate that the emergency was ongoing.
Similarly, Gordon’s statements themselves reveal that they were testimonial. According to Officer Brandon, Gordon said “that her mother’s boyfriend had pulled a gun on her,” J.A. at 72; and this thus recounted “what had happened in the past,” Davis, 126 S.Ct. at 2276, as opposed to present events. Like Amy Hammon, the declarant in the other case the Supreme Court decided under the caption of Davis v. Washington, Gordon delivered to officers, who had arrived at the scene of an earlier disturbance, a “narrative of past events ... at some remove in time from the danger she described.” Id. at 2279. And unlike McCottry, Gordon was not discussing “events as they were actually happening,” id. at 2276 (emphasis in original), as Arnold was not even present when her statements were made. Even if one rejects the previous analyses of which inferences one can reasonably draw based upon Gordon’s behavior, that Gordon spoke in the past tense, relaying past events, is sufficient to establish that her statements were testimonial and inadmissible.
D. Gordon’s Statements to Officers After Arnold’s Arrival
Gordon’s statements to the officers once Arnold arrived are not admissible under the Confrontation Clause. The relevant testimony indicates that once the car pulled up, Gordon pointed to it and said, “that’s him,' that’s the one that pulled the gun on me.” J.A. at 74. This statement, like Gordon’s statements to the officers when they first arrived on the scene, clearly references past events. As noted previously, Gordon was not recounting “events as they were actually happening. ” Davis, 126 S.Ct. at 2276 (emphasis in original). Additionally, similar to declarant Amy Hammon whose statements were held to be testimonial by the Supreme Court in Davis, Gordon made this statement while officers were present on the scene to investigate “possibly criminal past conduct.” Id. at 2278. Further, Gordon, like Hammon, was protected by the officers. Id. at 2279. And, unlike the declarant McCottry whose statements were held to be nontes-timonial in the Davis case, there is no indication that Gordon was “in immediate danger” when the car arrived. Id. For each of these reasons, Gordon’s statements were testimonial, and thus inadmissible.
IV. REFUSAL TO ADMIT PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR’S STATEMENT
My final disagreement with the majority opinion lies in its conclusion that the district court did not commit reversible error by excluding from evidence a private investigator’s statement that Gordon told him that she had never seen Joseph Arnold with a gun that day. In reaching its conclusion, the majority opinion applies plain-error analysis. This approach is highly speculative, as the record demonstrates that Arnold’s counsel “brought to the court’s attention” the error in not admitting the private investigator’s state*217ment, which is all that is necessary for the harmless-error standard to apply. Compare Fed.R.Crim.P. 52(a) with Fed. R.CRIM.P. 52(b). It is true that Arnold’s counsel did not specifically mention Federal Rule of Evidence 806 as the basis for admitting the testimony. But such a “specific ground” is necessary only when a party objects to the admission of evidence. Fed.R.Evid. 108(a)(1). When, as here, a party challenges the exclusion of evidence, it is sufficient that the basis for admissibility “be apparent from the context.” United States v. Ganier, 468 F.3d 920, 924 (6th Cir.2006).11 Because the district court knew that Arnold sought to introduce testimony that Gordon told a private investigator that Arnold never possessed a gun that day and because it was apparent that Arnold intended to attack Gordon’s credibility with this evidence, I believe that harmless-error review should apply.
Assuming arguendo that we should review only for plain error, I cannot conclude that this error did not seriously affect the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of the judicial proceedings. Gordon’s statements that Arnold threatened her with a gun constituted the only evidence tying Arnold to the gun found in the car. Setting aside the constitutional infirmity of convicting a defendant upon such insufficient evidence, see supra Part I, I cannot see how denying the defendant the right to introduce evidence that Gordon later recanted these statements could do anything but affect the fairness and integrity of Arnold’s trial. For this reason, I would hold that Arnold has demonstrated that the district court’s decision to exclude the investigator’s statement was plain error, and remand for a new trial.
V. CONCLUSION
For each of the reasons described above, I believe that the district court erred, and the majority today utilizes incorrect analy-ses and reaches the wrong result.

. Constructive-possession decisions involving homes can inform the inquiry in cases involving vehicles. See United States v. Cazares, 121 F.3d 1241, 1245 (9th Cir.1997) (“The same reasoning [used in vehicle cases] applies to occupants of a house.”)

. The Hishaw court noted that "in certain circumstances,” possession of a similar gun on prior occasions “may support an inference of constructive possession.” 235 F.3d at 572. Gordon's reference to a black handgun is certainly too vague for this case to constitute such an occasion, especially in light of testimony that about half of all handguns are black. J.A. at 128.

. In Bowjaily, the Supreme Court concluded that a district court may consider an alleged co-conspirator’s statements regarding the existence of a conspiracy as an aid to establishing Rule 801(d)(2)(E)’s co-conspirator exception to the hearsay rule. 483 U.S. at 180-81, 107 S.Ct. 2775. However, the Court explicitly refused to decide whether an alleged co-conspirator’s statements could, in and of themselves, satisfy the proponent’s burden. Id. at 181, 107 S.Ct. 2775. Thus, the Supreme Court left open the issue of whether some independent proof of the relevant preliminary fact was required.
In response to Bourjaily, Rule 801(d)(2) was amended to reflect that the contents of the statement at issue "are not alone sufficient to establish” the existence of a conspiracy. Fed. R.Evid. 801 advisory committee’s note, 1997 amendment. This amendment reflects a policy against the type of bootstrapping that the majority here condones.

. Brushing this concern aside, the majority offers five items of "corroborating” evidence. Maj. Op. at 185-86. As an initial matter, it is far-fetched to count each of these items as an independent piece of evidence. For example, the majority attempts to parse surgically Gordon's "act of calling 911” from the "fear and excitement” in her voice, and to distinguish both of these from the statements made during the call, counting each as a separate factor indicating that the alleged startling event actually occurred. But the point remains that each item is part of the same whole, a whole that is perfectly consistent with the hypothetical contrivance recounted above. The majority’s rationale thus fails to illustrate how Gordon's statements in the 911 call are more reliable than any made-up out-of-court allegation.

. The excited-utterance rule applicable in each of these cases is substantively indistinguishable from Rule 803(2).

.Further, as the Michigan Supreme Court illustrated in Burton, the authorities generally cited in support of the government’s position are of dubious value. For instance, the vast majority of such authorities predate 1943. Burton, 445 N.W.2d at 142. In many of the cases cited in the McCormick treatise, independent corroborating evidence of the startling event existed. Id. at 142-43. These cases are therefore distinguishable from the case at bar.
Perhaps in recognition of these distinctions, the latest version of the McCormick treatise now notes that "[t]he issue [of whether an exciting event may be proved simply by relying on the statement itself] has not yet been resolved under the Federal Rules.” 2 McCormick on Evid. § 272 (6th ed.2006).

. In Haggins we noted several factors that often will extend the window of time in which a statement may still be considered spontaneous. These factors include the declarant's age, the declarant's physical and mental condition (including shock, intervening unconsciousness, and pain), "the characteristics of the event, and the subject matter of the statements.” Haggins, 715 F.2d at 1058.

. Understanding Gordon's statements in the 911 tape requires an understanding of slang, which is constantly evolving. Turning to a source that operates by consensus, and thus develops along with slang usage, therefore seems unusually appropriate in this instance. UrbanDictionary.com is such a source, as it permits users to propose definitions for slang terms, and other users to vote on whether they agree with the particular definitions posited. At the time of the last visit, the definition cited above (which was posted in June 2003) had received 272 positive votes, and only 45 negative votes, making it the most popular of the twenty proposed definitions of "finna,” all but one of which connote future action.

. Even this calculation is extremely charitable to the government, as it assumes that Gordon made the 911 call immediately after the altercation with Arnold. As noted previously, there is no support for this assumption in the record.

. Further, it is overwhelmingly unlikely that Arnold left the house to hunt Gordon, as *216Arnold returned to the scene in a car driven by Gordon’s mother. To conclude otherwise requires one to accept the counterintuitive proposition that Gordon's mother decided to aid Arnold’s pursuit of her own daughter, notwithstanding any evidence of hostilities between Gordon and her mother.

. Even this requirement stretches beyond the bounds of the relevant rule's text, as Federal Rule of Evidence 103(a)(2) explicitly requires only that the proponent apprise the district court of "the substance of the evidence" he or she seeks to admit. And that requirement attaches only if the substance of the evidence was not "apparent from the context within which questions were asked." Fed.R.Evid. 103(a)(2).