Philip Wallace v. State of Arkansas, 2023 Ark. 7

Defendant Philip Wallace was convicted of rape for alleged deviate sexual activity with his two‑year‑old daughter on Sept. 6–7, 2018 and sentenced to life.
A roommate, Luis Santiago, provided police a surreptitious ~25‑minute audio recording from his phone; police used Cellebrite to extract and copy the file.
Police officers and a child‑victim interviewer (Debbee Deckard) identified the voices on the recording as Wallace and the child; Wallace, when shown the recording in custody, made incriminating admissions (including that semen got in the child’s mouth).
The State played Santiago’s recording for the jury and also played Wallace’s custodial interrogation; the defense objected to authentication and Confrontation Clause grounds and rested without presenting evidence.
On appeal Wallace argued (1) insufficient evidence to prove deviate sexual activity and to corroborate his out‑of‑court confession, and (2) admission of the surreptitious recording and the child’s statements violated his Confrontation Clause rights.
The Arkansas Supreme Court affirmed, holding the recording and statements were properly authenticated/admitted and the evidence was sufficient to support the conviction.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Sufficiency of evidence to prove deviate sexual activity / corroborate confession	The recording and Wallace’s own admissions, plus the child’s statements on the recording, constitute substantial evidence and corroborate the confession	Evidence insufficient to prove penetration/deviate sexual activity and confession not independently corroborated	Affirmed: child’s statements and Wallace’s admissions constitute substantial evidence of deviate sexual activity and satisfy corroboration requirement
Admissibility / Confrontation Clause: surreptitious recording and child’s statements	Recording properly authenticated (voice ID by interviewer and officers; Wallace’s reaction/vouching) and child’s statements were non‑testimonial (exceptions: present‑sense impression, excited utterance, state of mind)	Recording was unauthenticated, edited and produced by absent roommate; child’s statements were testimonial hearsay barring admission without cross‑examination	Affirmed: trial court did not abuse discretion in admitting recording; child’s statements were nontestimonial under Crawford/Clark/Bryant and did not violate Confrontation Clause

Holly v. State, 520 S.W.3d 677 (standard for reviewing denial of directed‑verdict; view evidence in light most favorable to verdict)
Kellensworth v. State, 614 S.W.3d 804 (circumstantial‑evidence must exclude every reasonable hypothesis of innocence to be sufficient)
Williamson v. State, 429 S.W.3d 250 (review considers all evidence supporting verdict, whether properly admitted or not)
Keesee v. State, 641 S.W.3d 628 (abuse‑of‑discretion standard for evidentiary rulings)
Vankirk v. State, 385 S.W.3d 144 (de novo review for questions of constitutional interpretation)
Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (Confrontation Clause bars testimonial hearsay absent prior cross‑examination)
Ohio v. Clark, 576 U.S. 237 (statements by very young children to non‑police agents are unlikely to be testimonial)
Michigan v. Bryant, 562 U.S. 344 (test for whether statements were made with primary purpose of creating testimony)
Davis v. Washington, 547 U.S. 813 (distinguishes statements describing ongoing emergency from testimonial statements)