Criminal Defendant Accidentally Confesses To A Robbery Unaware Of Recording Device Inside Of Police

By Author: Malcom Bloczynski
Total Articles: 4
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The legal meaning of the word "hearsay" is "an extrajudicial statement that only has evidentiary value for the truth of the matter asserted." Hearsay is typically excluded from trials because it is deemed to be unreliable. However, there are a lot exceptions to the hearsay rule. An out of court statement is only hearsay, & therefore inadmissible, if the statement is testimonial in nature. If the extrajudicial statement is not testimonial, it can still be admitted into evidence.

In the case of Bowens v. State, the District Court addressed this subject as it related to a co-defendant's recorded statements while in the back of a police vehicle. Police get information as well as confessions in this manner rather regularly. 2 people sitting in the back seat of a police vehicle trying to get their stories the same inadvertently furnish the police a confession.

The District Court, after the defendant's appeal of a strong-armed robbery judgment and sentence, affirmed the lower court's refusal to keep out a surreptitiously recorded conversation containing admissions by defendant while in the rear of a patrol ...
... vehicle, and upheld the trial court's denial of a motion for mistrial.

After being arrested for strong-arm robbery, the defendant and the driver of the car wherein he was a passenger, were put into the back of a police vehicle. A concealed microphone recorded the discussion in which defendant admitted facts with regard to the robbery. The Fourth District Court of Appeal held that the taped statements of the defendant were admissible as the statements were determined to be a party admission under Florida Statute 90.803(18)(a), and that the statements of the co-defendant were also admissible to place defendant's statements in context (thereby making the statements non-testimonial). The District Court also found that the statements weren't instigated or otherwise facilitated by anyone for the main reason of collecting evidence for a prosecution, but were a recording of a spontaneous conversation. The Fourth District Court of Appeal order contains an in depth discussion of Crawford v. Washington, in addition to other cases which have ruled on surreptitious tape recordings.

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