Reversing a Clarksville judge’s decision, the state Supreme Court has upheld a state law that allows child victims of sexual assault to testify via video tape rather than in open court despite contentions that the Legislature infringed on judicial branch authority and violated the defendant’s constitutional rights.
The unanimous decision, written by Justice Gary Wade, came in the case of Barry D. McCoy, charged with seven counts of child rape. A Montgomery County Circuit Judge had ruled that the Legislature “overstepped its constitutional bounds” in enacting the statute allowing video testimony under some circumstances.
The lower court judge also held the video statement of the 13-year-old boy was inadmissible hearsay under other rules of evidence promulgated through the court system and violated the defendant’s rights to confront witnesses under the Tennessee Constitution. The Supreme Court rejected all three contentions.
Citing provisions of the state constitution on separation of powers between the judicial, executive and legislative branches of government, the decision declares:
“Based upon these principles, but taking into account considerations of comity among the three branches of government, this Court has exercised measured restraint by repeatedly holding that a “legislative enactment which does not frustrate or interfere with the adjudicative function of the courts does not constitute an impermissible encroachment upon the judicial branch of government’.”
Wade was quoting from a 2006 Supreme Court ruling and also quotes an 1899 decision:
“It is only by remembering the limits of the power confided to the judicial department of the government, and respecting the independence of the other departments, that the judiciary can maintain its own independence in the proper sense of the term.”
“Thus, this Court will consent to rules of procedure or evidence that are promulgated by the legislature so long as they “(1) are reasonable and workable within the framework already adopted by the judiciary, and (2) work to supplement the rules already promulgated by the Supreme Court.”
The full decision is HERE.
On her relatively-launched blog, News Sentinel court reporter Jamie Satterfield suggests Wade is saying the Supreme Court “in no way wants to butt heads with or thumb their noses at the legislature on the heels of an epic political battle over whether justices should be elected or appointed.”
She quotes from the above passage and adds a translation: “We’re not a bunch of power hungry, flaming liberals seeking to destroy America as we know it.”
Note: See also the Clarksville Leaf-Chronicle’s report on the case, HERE.