Court Opinion

ID: 9475254
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 05:21:43.641646+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:44:36.295554
License: Public Domain

CUDAHY, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
This is a disturbing and elusive case which admits of a number of different approaches, all of which can lay claim to some support in the record and all of which present substantial problems of analysis as well as of policy. As I see it, the state fell short in discharging its burden of showing that L.L. was “unavailable” to appear as a witness at the trial. In my view the state failed not so much because its determination was clearly wrong but because the elements underlying the determination were stale and therefore the record support is inadequate.
Judge Evans in the district court has written a persuasive opinion demonstrating that Wisconsin committed constitutional error in failing to “meet its ‘good faith’ duty to procure the testimony of L.L. or to prove at the time of trial her unavailability.” Burns v. Clusen, 599 F.Supp. 1438, 1447 (E.D.Wis.1984). Judge Evans went on, however, to hold that the admission of the preliminary hearing testimony into evidence at trial in lieu of presenting a live witness was harmless error. He reached this determination of harmlessness after a careful analysis of the purposes underlying the confrontation clause. He determined that here only the purpose that the witness be present so that the jury might observe his or her demeanor was frustrated by the use of the prior statement. And he concluded that the defendant rather than the state benefited from L.L.’s nonappearance. 599 F.Supp. 1448-50. Although I find Judge Evans’ approach persuasive, it is certainly unconventional and perhaps unprecedented in focusing not apparently on the question whether admission of L.L.’s former testimony was harmless error but instead on the question whether the state’s failure to present L.L. as a witness at trial was harmless error. In effect Judge Evans tried to assess the chances of a change in result if a new trial were ordered.
Judge Swygert, in a clear and well-reasoned opinion for the panel, agrees with the district court’s determination that the state failed to discharge its burden of showing L.L.’s availability and thereby committed constitutional error. In this connection, both Judge Swygert and the district court face difficult problems of deference to the findings of the Wisconsin courts in resolving this basic issue. Judge Ripple, on the other hand, accords these findings a degree of deference I am unable to muster in part because the confusion or uncertainty in labeling psychiatric syndromes seems to vitiate the force of the state determinations. In any event, the error here appears to me more clearly procedural (the failure to make a timely assessment) than necessarily substantive. Nonetheless, I think Judge Ripple’s analysis presents us with a difficult question.
I certainly agree with Judge Swygert and apparently Judge Ripple that “unavailability” presents a mixed question of fact and law as to which a federal court on a habeas corpus petition is not required to apply the 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d) presumption of correctness. But on such subsidiary questions as whether L.L. suffered from schizophrenia (long-term) or acute schizophreniform disorder (short-term) or the inferences to be drawn from L.L.’s religious behavior as an indicator of her psychiatric condition we are presumably to defer to an appropriate degree to the state courts, and perhaps here to the Wisconsin Supreme Court as opposed to the state trial court. See Sumner v. Mata, 449 U.S. 539, 101 S.Ct. 764, 66 L.Ed.2d 722 (1981); Holleman v. Duckworth, 700 F.2d 391, 395 (7th Cir. 1983). We are not in the same position as *946Justices Heffernan and Abrahamson, who filed moving dissents to the opinion of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, written by the able and articulate Justice Day. Despite these concerns, however, I believe that, although the question is made difficult by the obligation of deference, the state failed to discharge its burden of showing “unavailability.”
Although I therefore believe the state failed to meet its full obligations, I also believe that it may be appropriate here to adopt a somewhat unconventional approach to the harmless error issue or even to question the proposition that “unavailability” must invariably furnish the key to error of constitutional magnitude. The extraordinary, if not unique, circumstances of this case may permit a minor departure from the usual analysis. First, although the state failed to show that L.L. was unavailable, it is not clear to me that the defendant’s rights of confrontation were significantly violated. In this regard we should examine the three purposes of the confrontation requirement: (1) that the testimony in question be under oath, (2) that there be full opportunity for cross-examination and (3) that the jury be accorded an opportunity to appraise credibility based on the demeanor of the witness. At the preliminary hearing L.L. testified under oath and was subjected to an extensive cross-examination about the events surrounding the crime and about her identification of the defendant. As Judge Evans pointed out in his district court opinion the only function of the confrontation requirement that was not fulfilled in this case was to allow the jury to observe demeanor. But L.L.’s credibility is apparently not at stake here. The focus of the defense was on her ability to observe her assailant, not on her truthfulness. Her ability to observe her assailant was thoroughly probed in her cross-examination at the preliminary hearing. And, of course, the opportunity to cross-examine is the heart of the confrontation clause.1 See Ohio v. Roberts, 448 U.S. 56, 63-64, 100 S.Ct. 2531, 2537-38, 65 L.Ed.2d 597 (1980); Pointer v. Texas, 380 U.S. 400, 406-07, 85 S.Ct. 1065, 1069-70, 13 L.Ed.2d 923 (1965) (“A major reason underlying the constitutional confrontation rule is to give a defendant charged with a crime an opportunity to cross examine the witnesses against him.”)
Second, there is nothing in this case to suggest that the crime did not take place or that the defendant was misidentified as the perpetrator. Usually when we are assessing the effect on a jury of admitting improper evidence, we are not entitled to assume that that evidence could ever properly be brought before the jury. In the case before us, however, the question is in what form L.L.’s testimony may be presented to the jury. Had L.L. testified, she most likely would have identified the defendant as her assailant — even though one whom she would apparently forgive. In the unlikely event that she recanted her prior testimony, she could have been overwhelmingly impeached. Soon after the assault, L.L. positively identified a photograph of the defendant. She unequivocally identified the defendant as her assailant at the preliminary hearing, and her identification withstood thorough cross-examination. Even L.L.’s letters and visits to the defendant in jail only tend to confirm his role as the perpetrator of the crime. Finally, the state would undoubtedly point to her reli*947gious convictions to explain her recantation.
Third, the issue of unavailability turns on a difficult appraisal of the mental illness of the victim. The extent and duration of a witness’s mental illness — and the effect of having to testify against an assailant — are often difficult to determine and in this case seem to have presented particularly troubling and close questions. The difficulty of these issues is evidenced by the confusion and uncertainty about the labels “schizophrenia” and “acute schizophreniform disorder”. Even though L.L. may have been “available,” her psychiatric history indicates a risk of psychological trauma if she had testified. And the state does have a legitimate interest in protecting L.L.’s mental health. When the issue is as close as this one, when an appraisal of serious mental illness is involved and when the basic facts indicating guilt seem not really to be in controversy, I do not believe that the use of an earlier sworn and cross-examined statement must necessarily result in error of constitutional magnitude. Or, if there is constitutional error, it is harmless. The district court, following an analysis very much like my own, concluded that the error here was harmless. Burns v. Clusen, 599 F.Supp. 1438 (E.D.Wis.1984). Judge Swygert, pursuing a more orthodox approach, reaches the same conclusion. Certainly infringements upon the confrontation clause are not to be taken lightly. But the extraordinary circumstances existing here argue, on balance, against the grant of a writ of habeas corpus.

. Wigmore comments:
The main and essential purpose of confrontation is to secure for the opponent the opportunity of cross-examination. The opponent demands confrontation, not for the idle purpose of gazing upon the witness, or of being gazed upon by him, but for the purpose of cross-examination, which cannot be had except by the direct and personal putting of questions and obtaining immediate answers.
That this is the true and essential significance of confrontation is clear, from the language of counsel and judges from the beginning of the hearsay rule to the present day: [Wigmore quotes numerous authorities at length.] Thus the main idea in the process of confrontation is that of the opponent’s opportunity of cross-examination; the former is merely the dramatic feature, the preliminary measure, appurtenant to the latter.
J. Wigmore, V Evidence § 1395 at 150-52 (1974).