A Reliability Hearing Serves No Purpose In a Bench Trial

State of Utah v. K.O., 2010 UT App. 155, (Utah Court of Appeals June 17, 2010).

K.O. appeals his conviction of burglary of a vehicle because of insufficient evidence; second, because the Juvenile Court failed to hold a reliability hearing before admitting eyewitness testimony; third, because the court failed to exclude hearsay evidence. 

The Court of Appeals concluded that the eyewitness testimony combined with the testimony of K.O.’s conduct of attempting to avoid police detection was sufficient to uphold his conviction.  Second, because reliability hearing is to protect the jury from hearing unreliable testimony it is only helpful in jury trials. A judge has an opportunity to evaluate the reliability of the eyewitness at the time of trial.  Finally, the Court concluded that the testimony of the arresting officer was not hearsay because the officer (declarant) was available for cross examination and under Utah Rules of Evidence 801(d), such evidence is not hearsay.

Full Decision available at http://www.utcourts.gov/opinions/appopin/JV_ko061710.pdf

One Eyewitness Is Enough

State of Utah v. Brandon Lee Sandoval, 2010 UT App. 3, (Utah Court of Appeals, January 14, 2010).

Brandon Lee Sandoval was convicted of aggravated burglary and now appeals based on a jury instruction given by the trial court that stated that conviction can be based on the uncorroborated testimony of a single eyewitness. The Utah Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction finding that such an instruction did not give additional credibility to any one witness at trial. “The instruction merely told the jury that, if it chose to believe the eyewitness, it could convict Sandoval without concern that the eyewitness testimony was not corroborated.”

Full Decision available at http://www.utcourts.gov/opinions/mds/sandoval011410.pdf