Court Opinion

ID: 9679771
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 07:05:52.118171+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:19.763987
License: Public Domain

Opinion by
Justice SCHRODER,
concurring in result only.
I concur with the majority as to the SANE nurse. As to the statements made to the passerby and daughter, I concur in result only based on the legal analysis.
The first step in a Crawford analysis (before any hearsay exception may be considered) requires a determination of whether the statements at issue are testimonial or nontestimonial. Davis v. Washington, 547 U.S. 813, 126 S.Ct. 2266, 165 L.Ed.2d 224 (2006); Rankins v. Commonwealth, 237 S.W.3d 128 (Ky.2007).1 Deciding whether the statements at issue are *247testimonial in this case presents a puzzle. Neither Crawford nor Davis limited testimonial statements to those obtained by law enforcement or them agents. And, Crawford itself appears to support the trial court’s ruling that the admission of these statements would violate the Confrontation Clause. Crawford, 541 U.S. at 44, 62,124 S.Ct. 1354 (discussing Raleigh’s Case, 2 How. St. Tr. 1 (1603)). However, Crawford was subsequently followed by Davis’s holding that even accusatory statements which are in the nature of seeking help for an ongoing emergency are generally nontestimonial.2 The Court’s explanation in Davis was lacking, but seemed to center on the dissimilarity between a present-tense statement proclaiming an emergency (i.e. “what is happening”), and in-court testimony (i.e. “what happened”), the former not being a functional equivalent of the latter.3 This creates a dilemma in the present case, because, unlike the statements to the 911 operator in Davis, describing events as they occurred, the statements here, while clearly in the context of an ongoing emergency, referred to a criminal event which had already taken place (recognized by Davis as characteristic of a testimonial statement). 547 U.S. at 827-830, 126 S.Ct. 2266. Further, in light of the facts of this case, we cannot ignore Davis’s reference to an old English case, King v. Brasier, wherein “a young rape victim, ‘immediately on her coming home, told all the circumstances of the injury1 to her mother.” Id. at 828, 126 S.Ct. 2266 (quoting Brasier, 168 Eng. Rep. 202 (1779)). The Court appears to infer that these statements were testimonial, because the story was an account of past events. Id.
In the present case, even though the admission of the statements at issue appears to violate the Confrontation Clause under Crawford, I believe that the statements fall under the ongoing emergency exception created by Davis. The statement to the passerby was virtually contemporaneous with the crime, made as the victim/declarant was escaping. The record further indicates that the victim/declarant ran to the daughter’s in her escape, gained entry, and they locked the door. I believe there was still an ongoing emergency.4 Unlike Brasier, the statement to the daughter was a cry for help, not an account of “all the circumstances of the injury.” Therefore, under Davis, I believe both statements are nontestimonial.
Having first determined that the statements to both the passerby and daughter are nontestimonial, the issue then becomes whether the statements are admissible under any hearsay exception. Crawford, 541 U.S. at 68, 124 S.Ct. 1354. I agree with the majority that both statements would qualify as excited utterances.

. The majority's analysis appears to follow that of the Arizona Court of Appeals in State v. Aguilar, 210 Ariz. 51, 107 P.3d 377 (2005), a pre-Davis case cited in the Commonwealth's brief.

. Davis had not been rendered at the time the trial court made its ruling on the admissibility of the statements at issue on May 16, 2005.

. 547 U.S. at 827-828, 126 S.Ct. 2266. While Davis articulated a "primary purpose” test regarding interrogations by law enforcement, the Court clarified that "it is in the final analysis the declarant's statements, not the interrogator’s questions, that the Confrontation Clause requires us to evaluate.” Id. at 822, n. 1, 126 S.Ct. 2266.

.While lacking specificity, the record indicates that all of the events were close in time and location.