The Massachusetts Appeals Court today reversed a man's conviction for a 1988 rape because Suffolk County prosecutors relied on testimony from a Boston police officer whom the victim told about her rape even though he was not the first person the victim talked to.
In sexual-assault cases in Massachusetts, prosecutors are allowed to call "first complaint" witnesses to testify on what the alleged victim told them about the attack.
In the case of Shirley McGee, indicted in 2003 only days before the statute of limitations would have run out, the first person the victim talked to was a neighbor, who opened her door to see her "huddled on the ground outside." The neighbor also testified; the appeals judges ruled the trial judge erred in letting the cop also testify, because state case law only allows for a second-complaint witness if the first one is too young or not competent to testify:
The testimony of the complainant's neighbor was that the complainant reported having been sexually assaulted. This testimony plainly qualified as first complaint, and there was no evidence to suggest the neighbor was incompetent or biased. Indeed, her testimony closely matched what the complainant remembered telling her. The Commonwealth was not entitled to substitute a more detailed subsequent complaint merely because it strengthened the Commonwealth's case.
McGee was already in prison on an unrelated child-rape case in 2003 when the state's DNA database linked him to the 1988 rape. His contention was that the woman made the rape charge only after a night of consensual, drugged-up sex.
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Comments
This is procedural wrangling
By Haviland
Tue, 10/20/2009 - 12:57pm
This is procedural wrangling to get scum off the hook at its worst.
This is procedural wrangling
By Lanny Budd
Tue, 10/20/2009 - 2:01pm
No it isn't. The prosecution of the case was contrary to existing case law. You may disagree with the existing case law, and you are free to have your state rep file a bill to change this situation. We may agree that the scumbag should have been nailed to the wall, but this was not someone walking on a technicality. It sounds like some young ADA being asleep the day they taught the rest of the class this subject.
The ADA argued that the
By JakeWark
Tue, 10/20/2009 - 3:23pm
The ADA argued that the exceptions in King applied here and allowed for a police officer, rather than a neighbor, to act as the first complaint witness.
The judge (a Superior Court justice with, I believe, decades on the bench as of 2005) agreed and allowed the officer's testimony to come in at trial.
The Appeals Court did not agree, finding that the judge erred in making that allowance. It's not an indictment of the prosecutor's legal acumen, and it's not even the end of the road for the case -- the decision can be appealed to the SJC or it can go back to a Superior Court trial session.
I don't get it
By dmjossel
Wed, 10/21/2009 - 6:05am
I honestly don't get it. What's the line of thinking behind this-- administrative efficiency?
If you're a victim of rape, you can only have the first person you talk to testify, unless they are unreliable? I hope someone is advising people of this, so they can be sure to give a complete and detailed report to the first person they see. I'm sure that won't be a problem, as I doubt rape victims ever act confused, disoriented, or shocked. They'll remember that they need to give a full and complete report to the first able-minded adult they see, because anything they leave out and tell another person later won't be admissable.
I'm sure I'm missing something here-- is this just an exception to the hearsay rule? Is the idea that alleged victims would be bringing in scads of friends and acquaintances to "testify" to what they told them? Aren't there better ways of assessing the reliability of such witnesses besides eliminating all of them except the first?
the first complaint doctrine ...
By bandit
Wed, 10/21/2009 - 9:23am
... stems out of an even more antiquated rule called the "fresh complaint" doctrine. the idea used to be, back in the unenlightened stone age, that women who were raped would *immediately* run to tell people. so the first people they confided to would be able to testify that it must be true.
in 2005, Commonwealth vs. King, this changed to the first complaint doctrine, with the understanding that many victims of sexual assualt, for a variety of reasons, did NOT rush right out to tell the world. so the rule got modified by the SJC to be the first person you complained to, no matter when that complaint occurred. commonwealth vs. king also changed it to just the first person. the idea was that the first complaint doctrine existed only to prove the victim credible, and that further testifying was just sort of a piling-on effect, and didn't add any value.
it's an outdated and full of crap rule, but it does allow the victim to get around some of the hearsay rules. normally this sort of testimony would not be allowed, because the testifier is talking about something they didn't personally witness. but the courts allow it in this case because they are not testifying about the facts of the case, just the validity of the victim.
all crazy weird, right?