Page 1
Court of Appeal:
Delay Does Not Affect Admissibility of Child-Abuse Report
Lack of ‘Freshness’ Goes to Weight Only, Resolving Ambiguity in California Supreme Court Decision
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Div. One of the Fourth District Court of Appeal has held that a delay in disclosing sexual abuse by a child victim does not affect the admissibility of out-of-court statements detailing the assault for nonhearsay purposes—such as establishing the reasons for not reporting the assault earlier—even when the statements were made years after the incident.
Justice Martin N. Buchanan wrote the opinion, filed Monday and publicly released yesterday, which affirms a judgment of conviction by Riverside Superior Court Judge Matthew C. Perantoni against Manuel Flores for multiple counts of sexual assault against a minor. Acting Presiding Justice Joan Irion and Justice Truc T. Do joined in the opinion.
Buchanan said “[t]hirty years ago, our Supreme Court updated the so-called ‘fresh complaint’ doctrine governing evidence of an extrajudicial disclosure made by the victim of a sexual assault,” but in the intervening years since “California courts have not elaborated on its holding regarding the admissibility of a delayed disclosure.” Buchanan opined that the present case provides an opportunity for such an elaboration.
On-Going Abuse
Between 2006 and 2008, sisters B.C. and Y.G. were repeatedly sexually assaulted in their Palm Desert home by Flores, a family friend. B.C. was between five and seven years old and Y.G. was between four and six years old when the assaults occurred.
The abuse went unreported until 2016 when B.C. disclosed the molestation to friends during her freshman year of high school. Flores was arrested and charged with six counts of lewd and lascivious acts on a victim under 14 years of age in violation of Penal Code §288(a), as well as other charges.
At a pretrial hearing, Perantoni found that B.C.’s statements to her friends were admissible under the fresh complaint doctrine as evidence establishing the circumstances surrounding the report, rejecting Flores’ argument that the statements were not “fresh” enough to be admissible.
After a 13-day trial, the jury found Flores guilty of four counts, two as to each sister, and he was sentenced to 50 years to life in prison.
Supreme Court Case
The 1994 California Supreme Court case of People v. Brown addressed the application of the fresh complaint doctrine to statements reporting sexual abuse.
In Brown, then-Justice Ronald M. George, who served as the chief justice of California from 1996 to 2011, wrote the opinion which rejected the historically-accepted view that a sexual assault victim’s complaint had to be close in time to the assault in order to be admissible.
George’s opinion upheld the admission of evidence of a victim’s complaint, despite a delay of several years between the assault and the statement, for the nonhearsay purpose of establishing the circumstances surrounding the disclosure, including timing, and not as to a description of the molestation itself.
Ambiguity Addressed
Buchanan opined that Brown created some ambiguity as to the admission of delayed statements of sexual abuse, writing:
“On the one hand, the court stated that the timing of the complaint is ‘not necessarily determinative’ of its admissibility…, suggesting that delay may at least have some relevance to the admissibility question. On the other hand, the court emphasized that delay is merely one of the factors ‘to be considered among the circumstances of the victim’s report or disclosure that are relevant in assisting the trier of fact in assessing the significance of the victim’s statements in conjunction with all of the other evidence presented.’….This latter comment suggests that the delayed nature of a disclosure generally goes to its weight, not its admissibility.”
Explaining that “no California court has grappled further with this question,” Buchanan looked to decisions in other jurisdictions and said:
“[T]here is a growing consensus among courts which have considered evolving jurisprudence and current research that a child victim’s delay in disclosing sexual abuse should not affect the admissibility of the disclosure, but should instead be considered by the trier of fact as one factor in evaluating its weight.”
Finding the reasoning in these cases persuasive, the jurist said:
“Consistent with these authorities, we likewise conclude that under California’s version of this evidentiary rule, a child victim’s delay in disclosing sexual assault generally goes to the weight of the disclosure, not its admissibility.”
Noting that this did not preclude the defense from arguing that a jury may draw negative inferences from any such delay, he reasoned:
“[T]here could conceivably be cases in which the timing and other circumstances of a particular disclosure render it unduly prejudicial even if otherwise relevant. In the usual run of cases, however, an otherwise relevant disclosure should not be excluded merely because it was not made freshly after the sexual assault or assaults.”
Under this rule, Buchanan said the admission of B.C.’s statements disclosing the abuse to her friends was proper “for the limited nonhearsay purpose of establishing the circumstances surrounding disclosure” and added to the testimony by B.C. that she did not disclose the abuse earlier due to embarrassment and other factors.
Prior Disclosure Doctrine
Having “take[n] this opportunity to elaborate on the significance of a delayed disclosure,” Buchanan encouraged a change in lexicon.
He said:
“[W]e also find it appropriate to follow the lead of other jurisdictions by dispensing with the inapt and misleading ‘fresh complaint’ label. We instead encourage California courts and commentators to refer to this approach as the ‘prior disclosure’ doctrine.”
Two Footnotes
The jurist said in a footnote that “[a]lthough much of our reasoning arguably applies to adult victims of sexual offenses as well, we focus our attention on child victims because that is the only issue presently before us.”
He additionally declined to address a challenge to Perantoni’s instruction to the jury that they may consider the victim’s statements as evidence of the molestation itself, explaining in a separate footnote that Flores had forfeited the challenge.
The case is People v. Flores, 2024 S.O.S. 1338.
Copyright 2024, Metropolitan News Company