LAW 682 Lecture Notes - Lecture 13: Bruton V. United States, Confrontation Clause, Declarant
Document Summary
Bruton rule-not about hearsay: a limiting instruction won"t suffice to cure a spillover problem in a criminal case if: Use of the co-defendant"s statement against the defendant would violate the confrontation clause; and the co-defendant"s statement directly implicates the defendant. Limits of bruton rule: bruton"s strict prohibition doesn"t apply if: If can"t let in statement: go to trial without excluded statement or, government can sever trial. Applying bruton rule: declarant not testifying, directly implicate non-declarant co-defendant, redact. Use vague pronouns and remove number of people-symmetry-number of people at trial/number of blanks-no more bruton problem. Defendant and declarant need to be members of conspiracy. Ask from the perspective of the declarant whether he or she thinks it would help the conspiracy, not if the action actually helped the conspiracy. Can"t rely on statement alone to decide if there is a conspiracy-801(d)(2)(c)-(e) Residual hearsay exception; impeaching hearsay declarants; introduction to the.
