Hemphill v. New York
595 U. S. ____ (2022) (2022)
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Rule of Law:
A criminal defendant does not forfeit their Sixth Amendment right to confront witnesses by engaging in a line of defense that the trial court perceives as creating a misleading impression. The admission of unconfronted testimonial hearsay to correct such an impression is a violation of the Confrontation Clause.
Facts:
- In April 2006, a 2-year-old child was killed by a stray 9-millimeter bullet during a street fight in the Bronx.
- Eyewitnesses described the shooter as wearing a blue shirt or sweater.
- Police investigating the incident searched Nicholas Morris's apartment and found a 9-millimeter cartridge and three .357-caliber bullets on his nightstand.
- Initially, the state charged Morris with the murder. To secure his release, Morris later pleaded guilty to a new charge of possessing a .357-caliber revolver, a different type of weapon than the one used in the killing.
- Another man, Ronnell Gilliam, first identified Morris as the shooter but later recanted and identified his cousin, Darrell Hemphill.
- Years later, police discovered that DNA on a blue sweater recovered from Gilliam's apartment shortly after the crime was a match for Darrell Hemphill.
Procedural Posture:
- The State of New York indicted Darrell Hemphill for murder.
- At Hemphill's trial in state court, his defense theory was that Nicholas Morris was the actual shooter.
- To support this theory, Hemphill's counsel elicited testimony that police found 9-millimeter ammunition in Morris's apartment.
- The prosecution sought to introduce the transcript of Morris's plea allocution, in which he admitted to possessing a .357 revolver, not a 9-millimeter handgun. Morris was unavailable to testify.
- Over Hemphill’s objection that it violated his Sixth Amendment right to confrontation, the trial court admitted the transcript, ruling that Hemphill's defense had 'opened the door' to its admission by creating a misleading impression.
- The jury found Hemphill guilty of murder.
- Hemphill appealed to the New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division, which affirmed the conviction.
- Hemphill then appealed to the New York Court of Appeals (the state's highest court), which also affirmed.
- The U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari.
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Issue:
Does the admission of an unavailable witness's testimonial plea allocution, based on a state court's evidentiary rule that the defendant 'opened the door' to the evidence by creating a misleading impression, violate the defendant's Sixth Amendment right to confrontation?
Opinions:
Majority - Justice Sotomayor
Yes. The admission of Morris’s unconfronted, testimonial plea allocution violated Hemphill’s Sixth Amendment right to confrontation. The Confrontation Clause's central command is that reliability of evidence must be assessed through cross-examination, not by a judge's determination of whether the evidence is needed to correct a 'misleading impression.' The 'opening the door' rule, as applied by the New York court, is a substantive rule of evidence that improperly substitutes a judge's reliability assessment for the constitutionally mandated 'crucible of cross-examination' established in Crawford v. Washington. The Court rejected the state's argument that this was a mere procedural rule, finding it fundamentally antithetical to the principles of the Confrontation Clause, which admits no exception for evidence a judge deems 'reasonably necessary' to correct a defense argument.
Concurring - Justice Alito
Yes. While a defendant can validly waive their Sixth Amendment right to confrontation, either expressly or through conduct, Hemphill's actions did not constitute such a waiver. Presenting evidence that may be misleading as to the real facts is not an action inconsistent with the assertion of the right to confront adverse witnesses whose statements could clarify those facts. This situation is distinct from the 'rule of completeness,' where introducing part of a declarant's statement could be seen as an implied waiver regarding the admission of the remainder of that statement, as that action would be inconsistent with a simultaneous objection to the declarant's full testimony on the subject.
Dissenting - Justice Thomas
The Court should not have reached the merits of this case because it lacks jurisdiction. Hemphill did not properly present his Sixth Amendment claim to the New York Court of Appeals, the highest state court that rendered the decision. In state court, Hemphill's arguments focused on the trial court's misapplication of the state's 'opening the door' evidentiary rule, not on a direct constitutional challenge to the rule itself. Under 28 U.S.C. §1257(a), a federal right must be 'specially set up or claimed' in the state court, and because Hemphill failed to do so, this Court is divested of jurisdiction to review the decision.
Analysis:
This decision reinforces the Supreme Court's commitment to the robust, procedure-focused interpretation of the Confrontation Clause established in Crawford v. Washington. It squarely rejects the creation of common-law, judge-made exceptions that would allow unconfronted testimonial evidence based on a court's assessment of its necessity or reliability. By invalidating New York's 'opening the door' rule as applied, the Court strengthens a defendant's ability to present a third-party culpability defense without forfeiting fundamental constitutional rights. This ruling will likely cause state courts to re-evaluate evidentiary rules that permit the admission of testimonial hearsay based on equitable or balancing considerations rather than the strict requirements of confrontation and cross-examination.
