State Of Washington v. Christopher Lewis Locken, 74036-9

Locken was charged with second-degree assault and hit-and-run after allegedly striking David Solis with his vehicle; jury convicted on assault only.
Locken and Solis had a long, deteriorated relationship with mutual hostile messages prior to the incident.
Locken sought to admit threatening text messages sent by Solis to Locken to show Solis’s bias and instigation.
The trial court excluded Solis’s messages as hearsay but allowed Locken’s messages as admissions by a party opponent.
The jury heard testimony establishing prolonged antagonism, Solis’s provocations, and Locken’s claim that his messages were responsive to Solis’s threats.
The trial court did not inquire into Locken’s ability to pay discretionary legal financial obligations (LFOs) at sentencing.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument (Locken)	Defendant's Argument (State)	Held
Whether the trial court erred by excluding threatening texts from the victim as hearsay	Texts were offered not for their truth but to show Solis made threats and was biased/instigated the confrontation	Exclusion was proper hearsay ruling; any error was harmless	Exclusion was error (abuse of discretion) but harmless because trial testimony already showed extensive mutual hostility
Whether the court erred by failing to inquire into Locken’s ability to pay discretionary LFOs	Trial court failed to perform Blazina ability-to-pay inquiry, requiring reversal/remand	State conceded the failure	Court reversed imposition of discretionary LFOs and remanded for an ability-to-pay inquiry

State v. Bourgeois, 133 Wn.2d 389 (Washington 1997) (standard for reviewing evidentiary rulings)
State v. Magers, 164 Wn.2d 174 (Washington 2008) (abuse of discretion standard explained)
State v. Crowder, 103 Wn. App. 20 (Wash. Ct. App. 2000) (purpose-of-offer governs hearsay analysis)
Tompkins v. Cyr, 202 F.3d 770 (5th Cir. 2000) (threats as verbal acts, not hearsay)
State v. Spencer, 111 Wn. App. 401 (Wash. Ct. App. 2002) (right to impeach witness with bias; harmless-error framework)
State v. Flores, 164 Wn.2d 1 (Washington 2008) (exclusion of cumulative evidence is harmless)
State v. Blazina, 182 Wn.2d 827 (Washington 2015) (requirement to inquire into defendant’s ability to pay discretionary LFOs)