In Maryland v. Craig (1990)
FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY
I. Offense Conduct
A. Lena
In the spring of 2006, James C. Lujan was dating Stacy B. When Lujan, Stacy B. and her 17-month-old daughter Lena started living together in a converted garage, Lena was a “very happy” and healthy toddler. Over the next several weeks, that chаnged. Lujan’s family members and others noticed bruises on Lena’s shoulder blades, head, neck and chest. They saw she had a black eye and that her fingertips were burnt and red. Lujan told a friend that the injuries to Lena’s shoulder blades looked like they were made with “a fucking stick.” Others noticed that Lena seemed frightened of Lujan. Thеy saw him swaddle Lena tightly like a “burrito” and put a blanket over her head. They also saw Lujan put Tabasco sauce on Lena’s tongue, which became blistered and swollen.
On the morning of June 12, 2006, Stacy B. left Lena with Lujan. Lujan wanted to go with his brother to a flower show, but could not because he was watching Lena. When his attempts to reach Stacy B. failed, Lujan said he became “frustrated” and “hella mad.” When Stacy B. returned that afternoon, Lena had a seizure and difficulty breathing. Responding emergency paramedics dislodged an almond from Lena’s throat, but she still struggled to breathe.
By the time she arrived at the emergency room, Lena wаs “near death.” The emergency room doctor testified that Lena displayed “classic” symptoms of shaken baby syndrome—namely, bleeding in the brain and bleeding behind the eyes. The injuries had been inflicted within the prior 48 hours. Both of
B. Diego
Three years later, Lujan was living with Meagan D. She had two children, five-year-old Vanessa and four-year-old Diego. Although Lujan was good to Diego at first, by the time they moved into the Budget Motel in Lompoc in mid-July 2009, things had started to deteriorate. Lujan would bite Diego’s fingertips and feed him Tabasco sauce. If Diego upset him, Lujan would make Diego stand in the comer with his arms up, head back and knees bent. When the stance became painful and Diego cried, Lujan would call Diego a “little bitch,” a “little baby,” a “piece of shit.” He would also punch him in the sides, back and stomach, and kick him in the back of the legs. These beatings, which both Meagan D. and Vanessa witnessed, occurred on July 16 or 17. By the morning of July 18, Diego displayed flu-like symptoms. Meagan D. called 911. Lujan left the motel as soon as she did so.
Diego died hours later. The cause of death was blunt force trauma to the abdomen that raptured the connection between his stomach and small intestine, сausing stomach contents to spill into his abdominal cavity. The autopsy also revealed that Diego had 128 bmises all over his body, including his arms, legs, back, chest, stomach, head and penis.
II. Charges
The state charged Lujan with torturing Lena and Diego, in violation of Penal Code section 206.
III. Procedures Regarding Remote Testimony
The trial court allowed Vanessa, age seven at time of trial, to testify over a two-way, closed-circuit television. Vanessa sat in a separate room from which Lujan, his attorney, the district attorney and the jury could see her on a video monitor. Vanessa could view a monitor that showed everyone in the courtroom except Lujan. The judge admonished the jury not to place any weight on the use of the closed-circuit television procedure. Before allowing this procеdure, the judge heard testimony from family therapist Virginia Rohen
IV. Verdict and Sentencing
The jury convicted Lujan of all charges with respect to Lena and Diego. The trial court sentenced him to 64 years to life, plus 11 years.
DISCUSSION
I. Remote Testimony of Vanessa
Lujan mounts a three-pronged attack on the court’s ruling allowing Vanessa to testify by closed-circuit television (TV). First, he argues that Crawford v. Washington (2004)
A. Crawford Did Not Overrule Precedent Governing When In-court Testimony Is Required
Our Supreme Court recently rejected the argument that Crawford modified the United States Supreme Court’s approach to determining when face-to-face testimony is required. (People v. Gonzalez (2012)
B. When Necessary, Nonvictim Child Witnesses May Testify Remotely
In general, the confrontation clause guarantees a criminal defendant “a face-to-face meeting with witnesses appearing before the trier of fact. [Citation.]” (Coy v. Iowa (1988)
So far, the United States Supreme Court has been called upon to apply Coy’s exception in only one case. In Craig, the court upheld a Maryland statute that authorized underage victims of child abuse to tеstify by one-way, closed-circuit TV upon a witness-specific showing that face-to-face testimony would be traumatic to the child.
Lujan argues that Craig marks the outer boundary of when remote testimony is acceptable under the confrontation clause. According to Lujan, allowing children who are not victims to testify remotely transgresses Craig’s boundary and is unconstitutional. At no point in the Craig opinion, however, did the Supreme Court indicate that it was staking out the perimeter of when the confrontation clause permits remote testimony. Craig simply applied Coy’s exception to the facts before it. We now do the same. Because this is a question of constitutional law, our rеview is de novo. (People v. Ramos (1997)
The trial court in this case based its use of remote testimony on its earlier finding that Vanessa would be traumatized by facing Lujan in court. This satisfies the necessity component of Coy’s exception. Consequently, the constitutionality of Vanessa’s remote testimony turns on whether the state has an important public policy interest in protecting minor witnesses who are not victims from the trauma of facing in court the perpetrators of the crimes they witnessed. We conclude that the state has such an interest for three reasons.
First, the court in Craig recognized (or, at a minimum, strongly hinted) that the state’s compelling interest in protecting child witnesses from trauma reaches all child witnesses—not just the subset who are charged as victims. To be sure, Craig cited the state’s interest in “ ‘the protection of
Second, there is no principled basis upon which to distinguish the state’s interest in protecting child witnesses who are victims from those who are not. The state’s long-standing interest in protecting the welfare of children applies just as readily tо children, such as Vanessa, who are forced to witness the abuse of their siblings at close range as it does not the actual victims of such abuse.
Third, viewing the state’s interest in protecting nonvictim child witnesses as less important is itself constitutionally suspect. Lujan urges us to treat children who are not victims of a crime as categorically lеss traumatized and hence never excused from face-to-face confrontation. Doing so commits the very sin the Supreme Court condemned in Coy—that is, mating a “generalized finding” about the level of trauma certain groups of witnesses experience when confronting defendants. (Coy, supra, 487 U.S. at pp. 1020-1021.) This argument is particularly unpersuasive in this case, where Lujan does not dispute the trial court’s finding that Vanessa would be traumatized by confronting him, even though she is not the victim of any charged crime.
We hold that child witnesses shown to be traumatized by face-to-face confrontation may testify remotely without violating a defendant’s confrontation clause rights, whether or not those witnesses are victims of an independent crime committed by that defendant. (Accord, U.S. v. Etimani (9th Cir. 2003)
C. The Trial Court Had Authority to Order Remote Testimony
Lujan also argues that, even if his constitutional rights were not violated, the trial cоurt lacked the authority under state law to order remote testimony. Lujan contends that section 1347 already speaks to this subject and limits the use of remote testimony to child victims of certain enumerated offenses. (Id., at subd. (b)(1).) By exceeding this statutory grant of authority, he asserts that the trial court’s order permitting Vanessa to testify remotely was invalid.
Lujan is correct that the trial court’s order falls outside the ambit of section 1347, subdivision (b)(1), because Vanessa is not a victim of a sexual
The propriety of Vanessa’s remote testimony turns on whether the trial court had the inherent authority to order rеmote testimony by a nonvictim child witness whom the court found would be traumatized by in-court testimony. We review the existence of this authority de novo. (Carpenter v. Jack in the Box Corp. (2007)
We are mindful that courts must tread carefully when exercising their inherent authority to fashion new рrocedures. We may not sanction procedures of dubious constitutional validity. (In re Amber S. (1993)
These countervailing concerns are not strongly implicated when it comes to remote testimony by nonvictim child witnesses. As explained above, necessity-based remote testimony by child witnesses stands on solid constitutional footing.
Authorizing remote testimony in this context also does not contravene our Legislature’s intent. To the contrary, the Legislature in section 1347 itself declared its intent “to provide the court with discretion to employ alternative court procedures to protect the rights of a child witness, the rights of the defendant, and the integrity of the judiciаl process.” (Id., subd. (a), italics added.) This intent is not limited solely to child witnesses who are victims. (Accord, Evid. Code, § 765, subd. (b) [authorizing court to “take special care
The trial court required the state to comply with every procedural requirement of section 1347, except the requirement that the child see the defendant. (Id., at subd. (i).) Thus, the court effectively used its inherent authority to extend section 1347 to nonvictim witnesses. This is an incremental extension and does not transmogrify criminal procedure in any fundamental way. In light of these considerations, the propriety of remote testimony by child witnesses is much different today than it was when Hochheiser held that a trial court lacked authority to allow a child abuse victim to testify remotely. (Hochheiser, supra, 161 Cal.App.3d at pp. 791-792.) Because Hochheiser was decided before Coy, Craig or section 1347 existed, it is no longer good law.
The soundness of our conclusion is confirmed by the many cases that have upheld a trial court’s inherent authority to implement a plethora of alternate procedures for witness testimony. Courts have upheld the use of different in-court seating arrangements for children. (People v. Sharp (1994)
We hold that the trial court possessed the inherent authority to permit the use of two-way, closed-circuit TV for a child witness after the necessity for that procedure was demonstrated, even though she was not a victim. In light of this holding, we need not address the State’s alternative argument that Vanessa was a “victim,” within the meaning of section 1347, subdivision (b), of various uncharged crimes.
[[II.-IV.]]
DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
Yegan, Acting P. J., and Perren, L, concurred.
A petition for a rehearing was denied January 15, 2013, and the opinion was modified to read as printеd above. Appellant’s petition for review by the Supreme Court was denied March 20, 2013, S208177.
Notes
Judge of the Los Angeles Superior Court, assigned by the Chief Justice pursuant to article VI, section 6 of the California Consitution.
All statutory references are to the Penal Code unless otherwise stated.
Lujan was also charged with willfully inflicting сorporal injury on Meagan D., in violation of section 273.5, subdivision (a). The jury acquitted him of that charge.
Because Craig approved of a one-way video feed that did not allow the child to see the courtroom at all, there is no merit to Lujan’s subsidiary argument that his confrontation rights were violated because Vanessa could see everyone in the courtroom except him over the two-way video feed.
See footnote, ante, page 1499.