WASHINGTON — Prosecutors may use victim statements given at the crime scene even if the victim dies before he can testify at trial, the Supreme Court ruled Monday.
The decision is a step back from the court’s recent decisions that the Constitution demands that the witness be present and available for cross-examination. A majority of the court drew a distinction between statements made during an emergency created by a crime event and statements made when police are investigating the crime.
The ruling could reinstate murder charges against a Detroit man who in 2001 was identified by his victim shortly before the victim died of his wounds.
The 6-2 ruling drew a withering dissent from Justice Antonin Scalia, the court’s most outspoken advocate for the Sixth Amendment’s requirement that the accused “be confronted with the witnesses against him.” The majority’s reasoning, Scalia wrote, “is so transparently false that professing to believe it demeans this institution.”
Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who wrote for the majority, shot back, accusing Scalia of “misreading” the rules the court set for when statements could be admitted as evidence.
Starting with a decision in 2004, Scalia has been the most outspoken about the absolute requirements of the “Confrontation Clause,” even when it might undermine criminal prosecutions and set the accused free.
The Michigan Supreme Court relied on those decisions in the case of Richard Bryant, who had been convicted of second-degree murder in the death of Anthony Covington.
Detroit police in 2001 were called to a gas station where Covington lay bleeding with a gunshot wound to the stomach. Asked what had happened, Covington replied “I was shot” or “Rick shot me,” depending on the recollections of the five police officers on the scene.
In the minutes before medical personnel arrived, police pieced together the story that Bryant had shot Covington through Bryant’s back door and that Covington had driven himself to the gas station. Covington died a few hours later.
The judge at Bryant’s trial allowed police to relate Covington’s statement about Bryant. But the Michigan Supreme Court threw out the conviction, citing the justices’ recent decisions that seemed to mandate the witness be available for cross-examination.
But Sotomayor announced a different rule for statements made while police are involved in an “ongoing emergency” in which there is a “potential threat to the responding police and the public at large.”
Covington’s statements were made to police whose “primary objective” was looking for a gunman, not trying to solve Covington’s shooting, Sotomayor explained. A judge may rule that such statements can be used at trial, she said. Statements that amount to “testimony” about the accused are not allowed.
Other court action
• On Monday, the Supreme Court refused to insulate the drug industry from having to pay overtime to thousands of sales representatives, turning away appeals from units of Novartis and Merck.
The companies sought to overturn a federal appeals court’s conclusion that their salespeople are covered by a federal wage-and-hour law.
• Justices refused to toss out a defamation award to a fired pastor, despite claims by the church that dismissed him that its actions — telling congregants that he had misappropriated church money — are protected by the Constitution’s religious freedom guarantees.
• The high court refused to hear an appeal by New York City officials who want to make cab companies buy more fuel-efficient vehicles. Federal judges had blocked the city’s new taxicab fuel regulations.
