Court Opinion

ID: 9530809
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:03:47.743632+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:15.331675
License: Public Domain

PARKS, Presiding Judge,
concurring in result:
I concur in all respects with the majority opinion except that portion which addresses appellant’s third assignment of error. The majority holds that “[ojnce the trial court correctly determines in camera that the *601state has evidence sufficient to prove the conspiracy, the order of proof to the jury becomes a matter of prosecutorial discretion and is outside our ruling in Harjo.” Majority at 598. I disagree. The purpose of the trial court’s in camera hearing in these matters is to make a preliminary factual determination that (1) a conspiracy existed, (2) the declarant and the defendant against whom the declarations are offered were members of the conspiracy, and (3) the statements were made in the course and in furtherance of the conspiracy. Bourjaily v. United States, 483 U.S. 171, 175, 107 S.Ct. 2775, 2780, 97 L.Ed.2d 144 (1987); United States v. Mobile Materials, Inc., 881 F.2d 866, 869 (10th Cir.1989); Harjo, 797 P.2d at 344. The majority correctly states that a trial court may consider both independent evidence and hearsay statements, in no particular order, when making such a determination. See Id. at 344-45. However, the majority does not recognize that this determination is preliminary in nature.
In Laske, this Court held that at the conclusion of all the evidence, the trial court must determine as a factual matter whether the prosecution has satisfied its burden under 12 O.S.1981, § 2801(4)(b)(5). Laske, 694 P.2d at 538. See also Harjo, 797 P.2d at 343. A trial court is unable to make such a determination at an in camera hearing prior to trial, as there are no assurances that exactly the same evidence will be offered and admitted during the course of trial.
If a co-conspirator’s hearsay statement is admitted prior to the independent evidence, and the State does not subsequently satisfy the evidentiary predicates for admissibility, then the court is faced with instructing the jury to disregard the statement or, in appropriate circumstances, granting a mistrial if a cautionary instruction will not suffice to cure the prejudice caused by admitting the statement into evidence. Moreover, there exists a danger that conditionally admitted hearsay, combined with other evidence subsequently admitted, will blend such “that there [will be] no distinction between hearsay and non hearsay.”
Id., at 345 (citations omitted) (emphasis added). It is for these reasons that the Harjo Court specifically “decline[d] to abandon that portion of our Laske decision which mandates that independent evidence be presented to the jury before co-conspirator hearsay testimony is admitted. Harjo, 797 P.2d at 345.
Notwithstanding the erroneous order in which co-conspirator testimony and independent evidence was admitted in the present case, or the fact that the trial court did not make a final determination under Section 2801(4)(b)(5), I find no reversible error. The record supports a finding (1) that a conspiracy existed; (2) that the co-conspirator and the defendant against whom the co-conspirator’s statements were offered were members of the conspiracy, and (3) that the statements were made during the course and in furtherance of the conspiracy. On this basis, I concur in the affirmance of appellant’s conviction.