5 results for 'cat:"Confrontation" AND cat:"Evidence" AND cat:"Murder"'.
J. Dato finds that the trial court erred by allowing the state to present hearsay testimony during a murder trial. The state failed to show it diligently tried to locate the witness before it relied on her preliminary hearing testimony, so defendant's murder conviction is reversed. Also, lying in wait and torture murder special circumstances against a co-defendant based on placing the victim in a fire while allegedly alive are supported by sufficient evidence and may be retried. And the trial court improperly allowed the state to introduce evidence that defendant was a Satan worshipper, as it had minimal probative value. Reversed.
Court: California Courts Of Appeal, Judge: Dato, Filed On: March 29, 2024, Case #: D082754, Categories: confrontation, evidence, murder
J. Procaccini affirms the district court's findings that police had probable cause to arrest the defendant, later convicted of first-degree murder, and that police did not materially misrepresent information in an application for a warrant to search the defendant's residence, along with its denial of the defendant's motion to admit reverse-Spreigl evidence and his request to cross-examine a lead investigator as to whether police had investigated unnamed suspects from a prior shooting. Security footage depicting the defendant having an "animated exchange" with the victim at a bar, monitoring the victim inside the bar, going outside to an idling vehicle and reaching inside, climbing into a car across the street and turning off the headlights, the victim walking toward the car and the victim's subsequent collapse in the street near the car was sufficient to establish probable cause to arrest the defendant for the victim's murder. The district court also did not clearly err in finding that police's description of this interaction as a "confrontation" in their search warrant application was not reckless misrepresentation. The district court also did not abuse its discretion in finding that prior crimes of another person in the car and at the scene were not relevant to this case and in excluding that evidence, since there are few similarities between those crimes and this one, or in denying the request to question the lead investigator, since it properly cited concerns about the risk of creating unfair prejudice or impugning the victim's character and about a lack of relevance. Affirmed.
Court: Minnesota Supreme Court, Judge: Procaccini, Filed On: March 20, 2024, Case #: A23-0154, Categories: confrontation, evidence, murder
J. Singas finds that the appellate division properly held that confrontation violations had not occurred in convicting defendant, a nanny, of the stabbing deaths of two children in her care because the admission of "testimonial" autopsy reports and the failure to allow defendant to cross-examine the medical examiner who wrote the reports constituted harmless error in light of the overwhelming evidence of guilt, including the confession entered in mounting an insanity defense. Affirmed.
Court: New York Court Of Appeals, Judge: Singas, Filed On: November 20, 2023, Case #: 74, Categories: confrontation, evidence, murder
J. Gravois finds that defendant was properly convicted as a principal to second degree murder based on the admission of evidence of the content of two 911 calls. In this case, the information relayed to the the 911 operators was necessary to resolve an ongoing emergency of hearing gunshots and people fleeing the scene of the gunshots. The 911 calls were not testimonial because the conversations between the callers and 911 operators were not in formal settings, but in the immediate aftermath of the incident and before the police arrived on the scene. Therefore, the admission of the calls did not violate defendant's right to confrontation. Affirmed.
Court: Louisiana Court Of Appeal, Judge: Gravois, Filed On: November 15, 2023, Case #: 23-KA-55, Categories: confrontation, evidence, murder
J. Bush finds the trial court did not violate defendant's confrontation rights when it admitted into evidence a letter written by the victim about defendant's stalking. Although the letter was testimonial, sufficient evidence in the record showed defendant killed the victim to prevent him from testifying, which allowed for application of the forfeiture-by-wrongdoing exception. Affirmed.
Court: 6th Circuit, Judge: Bush, Filed On: October 17, 2023, Case #: 22-3587, Categories: confrontation, evidence, murder