Under New York law, a criminal defendant “opens the door” to evidence that would otherwise be inadmissible if the evidence is “reasonably necessary” to correct a misleading impression created by the defense.
When New York prosecutors attempted to submit such evidence in response to Darrell Hemphill’s third-party defense, which accused Nick Morris instead, Hemphill asserted that his rights under the Sixth Amendment had been violated.
Can the use of a third-party defense “open the door” to testimonial hearsay? Claudia Trupp of the Center for Appellate Litigation discusses the meaning of the Sixth Amendment’s confrontation clause in Hemphill v. New York.
Featuring:
SCOTUSblog: “Justices affirm Crawford’s application of Sixth Amendment confrontation clause to testimonial evidence”
https://www.scotusblog.com/2022/01/ju... FedSoc Blog: “The Rule of Completeness After Hemphill” https://fedsoc.org/commentary/fedsoc-...
New York State Bar Association: “The Supreme Court, the Constitution and ‘Misleading’ Arguments” https://nysba.org/the-supreme-court-t...
University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review: “Evidence—Sixth Amendment and the Confrontation Clause—Testimonial Trumps Reliable: The United States Supreme Court Reconsiders Its Approach to the Confrontation Clause” https://lawrepository.ualr.edu/cgi/vi...
Tennessee Law Review: “The Modest Impact of the Modern Confrontation Clause” https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.c...
Florida State University Law Review: “The Confrontation Clause and the Hearsay Rule: A Problematic Relationship in Need of a Practical Analysis” https://ir.law.fsu.edu/cgi/viewconten...
University of Miami Race & Social Justice Law Review: “Confrontation During COVID: A Fundamental Right, Virtually Guaranteed” https://repository.law.miami.edu/cgi/...
*******
As always, the Federalist Society takes no position on particular legal or public policy issues; all expressions of opinion are those of the speaker.
