State v. Lebrick


*********************************************** The “officially released” date that appears near the be- ginning of each opinion is the date the opinion will be pub- lished in the Connecticut Law Journal or the date it was released as a slip opinion. The operative date for the be- ginning of all time periods for filing postopinion motions and petitions for certification is the “officially released” date appearing in the opinion. All opinions are subject to modification and technical correction prior to official publication in the Connecticut Reports and Connecticut Appellate Reports. In the event of discrepancies between the advance release version of an opinion and the latest version appearing in the Connecticut Law Journal and subsequently in the Connecticut Reports or Connecticut Appellate Reports, the latest version is to be considered authoritative. The syllabus and procedural history accompanying the opinion as it appears in the Connecticut Law Journal and bound volumes of official reports are copyrighted by the Secretary of the State, State of Connecticut, and may not be reproduced and distributed without the express written permission of the Commission on Official Legal Publica- tions, Judicial Branch, State of Connecticut. *********************************************** STATE v. LEBRICK—CONCURRENCE AND DISSENT ROBINSON, C. J., with whom MULLINS, J., joins, concurring in part and dissenting in part. I respectfully disagree with part I of the majority opinion, in which the majority concludes that the state did not engage in a diligent, reasonable, and good faith effort to procure the in-court testimony of a witness, Keisha Parks, at the trial at which the defendant, Horvil F. Lebrick, was convicted of, inter alia, felony murder and home inva- sion. Given this conclusion, the majority holds that the Appellate Court improperly upheld the trial court’s determination that Parks was an unavailable witness and that the admission of her testimony from the defen- dant’s probable cause hearing did not violate the con- frontation clause of the sixth amendment to the United States constitution. See State v. Lebrick, 179 Conn. App. 221, 235–36, 178 A.3d 1064 (2018). In my view, the major- ity relies on twenty-twenty hindsight to conclude that the state’s efforts to find Parks, which utilized compre- hensive online resources and on the ground assistance from an investigator with the Kings County District Attorney’s Office to look for her at several potential addresses in two boroughs of New York City, were not reasonable. Because I would affirm the judgment of the Appellate Court upholding the judgment of conviction, I respectfully dissent.1 By way of background, I agree with the majority’s statement of the relevant facts and procedural history. I also agree with the general principles of law stated by the majority, along with its conclusion in part I A of its opinion that whether a witness is unavailable for confrontation clause purposes presents a mixed question of law and fact subject to plenary review.2 ‘‘The [s]ixth [a]mendment’s [c]onfrontation [c]lause provides that ‘[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right . . . to be confronted with the wit- nesses against him.’ ...

Original document
Source: All recent Immigration Decisions In All the U.S. Courts of Appeals