Denver criminal defense lawyer / hearsay

A common objection Denver criminal defense lawyers will make is that something is hearsay. It's something that also comes up a lot in movies and books about lawyers. So what is hearsay? Is that just lawyerly mumbo jumbo? Well, it's not exactly the world's most complicated thing. Basically, all this is is a out of court statement introduced in court to prove the thing that was said.

The most common context for hearsay is a witness repeating something that was said outside of court. If you hear someone say "I was shot by a tall, brown haired man in a red jacket," you may remember that and you may think that was the truth. But if you are called into court to testify about this, you won't be able to talk about the statement that was made out of court. The defendant's Denver criminal defense lawyer will object, and the judge will tell you to stick to what you personally know.

Why do we not allow people to testify about things that were said out of court? There are a couple of reasons. First, one of the defendant's rights is to have his Denver criminal defense lawyer cross examine the witness. If the witness doesn't come to court and say what he saw, but someone else does, the truth of the statement can't be evaluated by cross examination. You can cross examine the person who heard the statement about the guy in the red jacket with brown hair. You can evaluate whether he heard that for real, or whether he's making it up. But you can't evaluate the initial statement.

The other issue that's nearly as important is we'd hate our trials to turn in to a massive game of telephone. If you allowed someone who heard something to relay his recollection of the out of court statement, would you take it another step further and let someone relay their recollection of the third party? Basically it would never end. May as well cut it off at the start.