Preview:

COURT OF APPEALS OF VIRGINIA Present: Judges Frank, Kelsey and Powell Argued at Chesapeake, Virginia DARIN MONTA SATTERWHITE v. Record No. 0849-09-1 OPINION BY JUDGE D. ARTHUR KELSEY JULY 27, 2010

COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE CITY OF NORFOLK Everett A. Martin, Jr., Judge 1 Michael C. Rosenblum (Duncan R. St. Clair, III; St. Clair & Rosenblum, on brief), for appellant. Jennifer C. Williamson, Assistant Attorney General (Kenneth T. Cuccinelli, II, Attorney General, on brief), for appellee. Dominic Joyner was shot four times at close range. As he faded in and out of consciousness, he identified the shooter as Darin Satterwhite. Joyner later died from gunshot wounds. A jury found Satterwhite guilty of murdering Joyner. At trial and on appeal, Satterwhite argues the victim's statements were inadmissible both under state evidentiary and federal constitutional law because the victim was not present at trial and thus was unavailable for cross-examination. Affirming the trial court, we hold Joyner's statements constituted dying declarations admissible under the common law and categorically outside the reach of the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment. I. On October 19, 2005, Tanisha Naar left work on a lunch break and returned to her apartment. She found her boyfriend, Joyner, lying on her bathroom floor. He was covered in Before trial, in response to two evidentiary motions, Judge Charles D. Griffith, Jr., ruled the victim's statements were admissible as dying declarations. Judge Everett A. Martin, Jr., later denied appellant's motions to reconsider and set aside the verdict on this basis.
1

blood. Naar called out to Joyner, but he did not answer. She went over to Joyner and knelt down beside him as he gasped for breath. Joyner faded in and out of consciousness. He appeared limp and unable to feel anything. Because Joyner was bleeding so profusely, Naar could not identify the entry wounds. When she asked him where he had been shot, Joyner replied, "everywhere." Naar called 911. Joyner had been bleeding for about half an hour by this time. The 911 operator asked Naar what happened. While still on the phone, Naar asked Joyner "who did it?" Breathing heavily, Joyner replied, "Darin Satterwhite did it." He said it loudly enough for the 911 operator to overhear the statement. Joyner added that Satterwhite had shot him inside Naar's apartment at around 12:45 p.m. Paramedics arrived within minutes and found Joyner conscious but in critical condition. He had three gunshot wounds to the chest and one to the head. Joyner had no feeling in his legs. Police detectives also arrived on the scene. They, too, asked Joyner what happened. He told them Satterwhite had shot him. The paramedics rushed Joyner to the hospital where he was admitted for emergency surgery. The gunshots had damaged his spine and led to renal failure, liver failure, sepsis, pneumonia, rhabdomyolysis, gastrointestinal bleeding, and coagulopathy. Joyner died in the hospital six weeks later. At Satterwhite's jury trial, his counsel expressly denied that Joyner falsely identified Satterwhite as the shooter. "There's no motive for him to say that falsely," counsel argued, "they were friends." Instead, counsel asserted, Joyner was simply mistaken. The jury disagreed and convicted Satterwhite of second-degree murder. II. By admitting into evidence Joyner's statements identifying him as the shooter, Satterwhite argues, the trial court violated his right to cross-examination both under common law -2-

hearsay principles and under the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment. We disagree with both assertions. A. DYING DECLARATIONS UNDER THE COMMON LAW Unless displaced by statute or constitutional principles, the common law "shall continue in full force" and "be the rule of decision" in Virginia courts. Code

Download 0849091.pdf

Virginia Law