Commonwealth v. Rodriguez (Lawyers Weekly No. 11-132-16)
NOTICE: All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports. If you find a typographical error or other formal error, please notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Judicial Court, John Adams Courthouse, 1 Pemberton Square, Suite 2500, Boston, MA, 02108-1750; (617) 557-1030; SJCReporter@sjc.state.ma.us 15-P-131 Appeals Court COMMONWEALTH vs. CARLOS RODRIGUEZ. No. 15-P-131. Hampden. March 18, 2016. – September 22, 2016. Present: Milkey, Agnes, & Maldonado, JJ. Assault and Battery. Evidence, Spontaneous utterance, Hearsay, Unavailable witness. Constitutional Law, Confrontation of witnesses. Practice, Criminal, Hearsay, Confrontation of witnesses. Witness, Unavailability. Complaint received and sworn to in the Springfield Division of the District Court Department on March 7, 2014. A motion in limine was heard by Robert A. Gordon, J., and the case was tried before William P. Hadley, J. Anders Smith for the defendant. Thomas R. Worger (Amal Bala, Assistant District Attorney, with him) for the Commonwealth. AGNES, J. The defendant, Carlos Rodriguez, was convicted on August 14, 2014, of assault and battery following a two-day jury trial. He was sentenced to a term of six months in a house of correction. The Commonwealth’s case was based principally on the testimony of West Springfield police Officer Paulina Hannah, the second officer to respond to the scene of a domestic violence incident. She testified to certain statements made to her by the victim, who did not testify at the trial. On appeal, the defendant argues that the trial judge improperly admitted those statements because they did not fall within any exception to the hearsay rule, and they violated his independent constitutional right under the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution and art. 12 of the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights to confront the witnesses against him. We agree with the judges[1] below that the statements in question made by the victim to Officer Hannah were admissible as excited utterances. However, we agree with the defendant that those initial statements were testimonial, and thus were subject to the confrontation clause. Finally, we conclude that despite the testimonial character of those statements, the defendant’s confrontation rights were not violated and the statements were properly admitted, because the victim was unavailable to testify at trial and the defendant had an adequate prior opportunity to cross-examine her at a pretrial dangerousness hearing. Background. Prior to trial, the defendant filed a motion in limine to exclude all of the statements made by the victim to the first police officer at the scene, Officer Robert Wise, and to Officer Hannah. Following an evidentiary hearing, at which both officers […]