Court Opinion

ID: 9698585
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 19:54:40.248994+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:42.104966
License: Public Domain

Sullivan, J.
(dissenting). I dissent.
I would reverse defendant’s conviction and remand the case to the trial court for a new trial. The hearsay testimony of the six-year-old victim’s examining physician, which related the victim’s identification of defendant as the perpetrator of the sexual assault, was improperly admitted at trial. Moreover, such admission was not harmless error.
The hearsay exception at issue both in this case and in People v LaLone, 432 Mich 103; 437 NW2d 611 (1989), provides for admission of
*375[statements made for purposes of medical treatment or medical diagnosis in connection with treatment and describing medical history, or past or present symptoms, pain, or sensations, or the inception or general character of the cause or external source thereof insofar as reasonably necessary to such diagnosis and treatment. [MRE 803(4).]
In LaLone, our Supreme Court concluded that the trial court improperly admitted testimony of a psychologist which consisted of the complainant’s hearsay statements that she had been sexually abused by the defendant, her stepfather. Such testimony, the Court held, did not come within the literal or intended purpose of the MRE 803(4) exception. LaLone, supra, pp 116-117. I believe that the victim’s hearsay statements admitted in this case do not come within that exception. The victim’s statements identifying defendant as the perpetrator, made to the physician almost two weeks after the alleged sexual assault, were not "[statements made for purposes of medical treatment or medical diagnosis in connection with treatment and describing . . . the inception or general character of the cause or external source” of the injury. See LaLone, supra, pp 111, 113. Nor was the victim a member of defendant’s household. I would therefore reverse defendant’s conviction and remand this case for a new trial during which the statements would not be admitted.