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Friday, July 16, 2010
Ind. Decisions - "When Do a Criminal Defendant’s Compulsory Process/Due Process/Confrontation Rights Trump Evidentiary Privileges?"
Crisis Connection, Inc. v. Ronald K. Fromme, decided July 15, 2010 by the Court of Appeals (ILB summary here). The Court said:
Crisis Connection appeals, requiring us, as a matter of first impression, to interpret Indiana‘s victim-advocate privilege and to determine whether it must be limited by a criminal defendant‘s constitutional rights. Concluding that an in camera review properly balances Fromme‘s constitutional rights and the victims‘ interest in privacy, we affirm.Prof. Eugene Volokh looks at the opinion today in his blog, writing in part:
This is a difficult and recurring question, and arises with regard to a wide range of privileges — lawyer-client, psychotherapist-patient, clergy-penitent, and more. It is particularly difficult when the conflict is with the constitutionally secured privilege against self-incrimination: A defendant argues that to properly defend himself he needs to have someone’s testimony (often a coconspirator’s), but that potential witness refuses to testify for fear of self-incrimination. And similar issues also arise with regard to so-called “rape shield” laws, which preclude the introduction of some kinds of evidence of the victim’s past sexual conduct.For the most recent example of this, involving the relatively new “victim-advocate” privilege (which is intended as a variant of the psychotherapist-patient privilege for crime victims who go to specialized “victim advocate’ services rather than to traditional psychotherapists), see In re Subpoena to Crisis Connection, Inc. (Ind. Ct. App. July 15). The Indiana court canvasses the precedents from other states (which point in different directions), and holds that the Indiana victim-advocate privilege may have to yield to the defendant’s rights.
Posted by Marcia Oddi on July 16, 2010 08:05 PM
Posted to Ind. App.Ct. Decisions