I am going to try to link to an article I read this morning abt a case in WIS where they are using other people's testimony of the wife saying that her husband was trying to murder her. She was poisoned, they have her body, but trying to prove who poisoned her is similiar to Drew's case with both Kathleen and Stacy. Infact he even had a girlfriend waiting in the wings that is the new Mrs. Sound familiar..
http://www6.comcast.net/news/articles/national/2008/01/02/Poisoning.Death/
It has a great discussion about hearsay and circumstantial evidence..which there is alot of involving Kathleen's and Stacy's cases/
I will dramatically net. The case is Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (2004). The ruling in Crawford supplanted the prior controlling standard covering unavailable witnesses and their testimonial statements. That prior standard being Ohio v. Roberts, 448 U.S. 56 (1980).
In "Crawford", the Supreme Court gave resolution favor to the Confrontation Clause in the 6th amendment, which gives the accused the right to confront witnesses against him. This tightened the standard held in "Ohio", which required an adequate indicia of reliability (famous guideline) along with a firmly rooted hearsay exception or, on another possible path, it looked for particular guarantees of trustworthiness.
Bottom line, the ruling in "Crawford" narrowed the hearsay exception standard as regards unavailable witnesses and their testimonial statements.
I am going to try to link to an article I read this morning abt a case in WIS where they are using other people's testimony of the wife saying that her husband was trying to murder her. She was poisoned, they have her body, but trying to prove who poisoned her is similiar to Drew's case with both Kathleen and Stacy. Infact he even had a girlfriend waiting in the wings that is the new Mrs. Sound familiar..
http://www6.comcast.net/news/articles/national/2008/01/02/Poisoning.Death/
It has a great discussion about hearsay and circumstantial evidence..which there is alot of involving Kathleen's and Stacy's cases/
The Wis. case is the one I was referring to Wudge. And your explanation is dramatically different from what the media is explaining. According to what the media is saying, the US Supreme court seems to have allowed more leeway in the hearsay exceptions and the state courts are following up by reflecting that in their case law. You might want to read the articles quoted by DeltaDawn and Barfield.
Until recent years, using such evidence in court was virtually unheard of because of constitutional guarantees that give criminal defendants the right to confront their accusers.
But the Wisconsin Supreme Court created new rules, prompted by a U.S. Supreme Court decision that laid the groundwork for her accusatory letter and statements to police to be used as evidence in the trial.
and...
In March 2004, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a 1980 case that laid out complex rules about when statements can be used without the opportunity for cross-examination.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/01/02/poisoned.wife.ap/index.html
This is the part that I am having difficulty reconciling with your statement:
And the result was that when the Wisc. Judge refused to allow the evidence into admission the prosection did appeal- and won the appeal with the state State Supreme court saying that if the judge believed that the actions of the defendant "prevented the testimony of the witness" not killed the witness the evidence had to be allowed into evidence.
The way I am reading it, this could possibly also apply if a witness talks about a crime, then refuses to testify because of threats or intimidation from the defendant and that intimidation action could be proved.
LOL, I can never understand the legal gobbledegook of those legal decisions, but my understanding of that document is that the Court overturned their previous stand and pretty much is leaving the decision of whether or not hearsay evidence can be admitted in trial up to the lower courts. Which means that each state's legal decision to exceptions of hearsay could be different. And that Harvard is disapproving of the Court's decision. Of course this clears the way for any decision of the court for or against the hearsay evidence, to be appealed because they didn't provide guidelines.
The document does clear up one thing for me though. When Brodsky made the insinuation that Stacy was having an affair with the pastor, it seems that he may have been trying to prevent the pastor's testimony in court by saying that his testimony would not be reliable. Of course by making that info public, Brodsky probably thought that by starting the rumor he would be helping the unreliability factor along. But in actuality what he did was to raise defense of the pastor and to provide the prosecution advance knowlege of the strategy.
Oh, I like this person! Thank You! I was one of those honestly worried about everything I ever said...even if I did try to be cautious. I almost stopped posting here or anywhere! I was terrified! (People have been nice enough to point out the realistic points already!)As to the defamation argument, I was very troubled to read all the posts warning about being sued for defamation and I was even more troubled to see the effect it had on posters on the Stacy Peterson site. I get the sense that the defamation posts were made to scare and possibly to stifle speech, rather than in an effort to protect the posters (Sorry Wudge, that's my opinion!) The statements that there are tons of defamation suits across the country seems misleading. There are tons of all sorts of suits across the country. That does not mean they have merit. As someone posted here, it is very hard to prove a defamation suit. A guy like DP is unlikely to ever file such a suit against on-line posters because he must first prove that what they wrote is a lie and if successful, he must then prove that the statement damaged his reputation is a quanitfiable way. How the heck can he prove that such a statement damaged him instead of his own conduct? He cannot. I sincerely hope posters will not allow themselves to be intimidated further by these kinds of posts. This is a sleuthing site in which people post opinions, brainstorm and vent. And in doing so, they are chipping away at the evil that skulks through this world, and helping to make this world a safer, better place, one post at a time. I wish more people would speak out against inhumanity and work to end it by solving and exploring cases the way the posters here do. As a mostly lurker, I am often astounded by the passion, hardwork and creativity of the posters. Do not let someone who may have an ulterior motive or other negative agenda stifle you!
P.S. This is not meant to be legal advice.
I have a question about the Will Coounty Grand Jury in relation to this case.
Will the same jurors continue on this GJ until they come to a decision? I read at the Will CO GJ site and Ill GJ site that Will CO requires a GJ juror
to meet once a week for 4 months once they are called to serve. Does this mean that they will soon have to recruit new jurors..or will they require that the same jurors continue to serve? And what if someone says I cannot because I have travel plans or an opertion scheduled during that time due to not being able to do so in the past 4 months? Or if they start the next sessions with new jurors how to they get them up to speed so speak on what has transpired in the GJ so far? I just don't think that would be possible given a four month period with so many witnesses already called. The new jurors would possibly have different questions for the witnesses and I could see this going on and on every 4 months if that was so.
Thoughts....knowledge anyone?
ENOUGH of the singling out of members. The next post that is about another poster I will be arranging some vacations from the board. Either edit your posts yourself or I will be deleting them.
I have a question about the Will Coounty Grand Jury in relation to this case.
Will the same jurors continue on this GJ until they come to a decision? I read at the Will CO GJ site and Ill GJ site that Will CO requires a GJ juror
to meet once a week for 4 months once they are called to serve. Does this mean that they will soon have to recruit new jurors..or will they require that the same jurors continue to serve? And what if someone says I cannot because I have travel plans or an opertion scheduled during that time due to not being able to do so in the past 4 months? Or if they start the next sessions with new jurors how to they get them up to speed so speak on what has transpired in the GJ so far? I just don't think that would be possible given a four month period with so many witnesses already called. The new jurors would possibly have different questions for the witnesses and I could see this going on and on every 4 months if that was so.
Thoughts....knowledge anyone?