Admissibility of Statements Made in Forensic Interviews

Facts of the Case

At trial, the Commonwealth presented the following evidence. Mr. Rodriguez, the victim, and three others resided together in a rooming house in Boston. Mr. Rodriguez and the victim had a history of arguments while living together, including both verbal and physical altercations in which Mr. Rodriguez was the aggressor.

Two of the roommates testified that, on February 9, 2012, they heard noises coming from the victim's room, including the sound of someone falling, eight to ten banging noises, and the victim grunting. They also testified that they heard someone run out of the apartment, and they discovered the victim lying face up with significant head trauma, barely breathing. Around the same time, a woman was parking her car and saw Mr. Rodriguez running toward her with a baseball bat. She recognized him from the neighborhood due to a scar on his face. She saw him place the bat in a garbage can, where she later returned to find a bloody metal bat. She also identified Mr. Rodriguez from a photo array.

Subsequently, Mr. Rodriguez's jacket, shirt, and shoes tested positive for blood. A sample from his pants also matched the victim's DNA profile. At trial, Mr. Rodriguez admitted that he used the baseball bat to kill the victim. The cause of death was determined to be blunt trauma to the head with associated skull fractures and brain injuries.

During the trial, the defense argued that Mr. Rodriguez lacked criminal responsibility for the victim's murder. They presented evidence that Mr. Rodriguez was arrested in the early morning hours following the murder after unsuccessfully attempting to steal a car. A probation officer who met with Mr. Rodriguez hours after his arrest found him washing his hair in urine and his cell was smeared with feces. She observed him put his head in the toilet, but noted that he was redirectable when she told him to stop.

Also during the morning following the alleged murder, a state forensic psychologist evaluated Mr. Rodriguez to determine whether he was competent to stand trial. She described him as having brown liquid dripping from his face and noted a brown puddle in his cell. He was agitated, moving rapidly, speaking rapidly, and his eyes were “looking around.” Mr. Rodriguez told the psychologist that he had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder at 8 years old, that he stopped taking his medications, and that he had a history of a significant head injury. He also reported hearing voices, some of which commanded him to do dangerous things. The psychologist concluded that he was psychotic at the time of the evaluation (i.e., the day after the murder), and she made a diagnosis of schizoaffective disorder.

An expert forensic psychiatrist hired by the defense also interviewed Mr. Rodriguez and diagnosed schizoaffective disorder, polysubstance use disorder, neurocognitive disorder, and posttraumatic stress disorder. The psychiatrist noted a history of suicide attempts, family history of mental illness, and no record of malingering in the state hospital records. Mr. Rodriguez described command hallucinations to the forensic psychiatrist, as well as use of heroin, cocaine, and marijuana 30 to 60 minutes prior to the victim knocking on his door requesting to purchase drugs for a friend. Mr. Rodriguez went to the victim's room, and the victim did not have the money to pay for the drugs. When Mr. Rodriguez turned to walk away, the victim allegedly hit him with a baseball bat. Mr. Rodriguez reported that he was afraid for his life and heard voices telling him to hit the victim because he was an enemy. Mr. Rodriguez testified that he had no memory of the attack itself.

In rebuttal, the state called a forensic psychiatrist who opined that Mr. Rodriguez did not show true symptoms of a psychotic disorder. The state's expert gave Mr. Rodriguez a diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder and substance use.

The judge instructed the jury that Mr. Rodriguez's statements to the psychologist and psychiatrists were not admissible for their truth and could be considered only as information on which the experts relied in reaching their opinions. The jury convicted Mr. Rodriguez of first degree murder on the theory of extreme atrocity or cruelty.

Ruling and Reasoning

In affirming Mr. Rodriguez's murder conviction, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled that the trial court did not err in determining that statements Mr. Rodriguez made to the doctors during the forensic interviews were not admissible for the truth of the matter asserted. The court reviewed the previous case law and rules of evidence in Massachusetts, including Commonwealth v. Comtois, 506 N.E.2d 503 (Mass. 1987) and Mass. G. Evid. § 803(4), which established that there is a hearsay exception that physicians may testify as to statements of past pain, symptoms, and conditions made to them for the purposes of diagnosis or treatment. The court also described Commonwealth v. Piantedosi, 87 N.E.3d 549 (Mass. 2017), which held that “[a]lthough an expert may formulate an opinion based on facts or data not admitted in evidence, but that would be admissible with the proper witness or foundation, ‘the expert may not testify to the substance or contents of that information on direct examination’” (Rodriguez, p 683).

The court rejected Mr. Rodriguez's argument that they should overturn previous case law and rule that the psychiatrist “should have been permitted to recite the defendant's statements of ‘past pain, symptoms, and conditions’ that were made to him and other doctors” (Rodriguez, p 683) during the course of their diagnosis of the defendant and that the statements should have been admitted for the truth of the matter. The court's reasoning for denying Mr. Rodriguez's argument was that the hearsay exception for statements made for the purposes of medical diagnosis or treatment did not apply where a defendant made the statements during a forensic interview to determine criminal responsibility.

The court summarized its logic in ruling that statements made during forensic evaluations are not admissible for the truth of the matter as follows: “The reason for these forensic interviews is to assess the defendant for a legal purpose: to determine whether the defendant meets the legal definition of a ‘mental illness or mental defect’ and therefore cannot be held criminally responsible for the crime charged. Therefore, the statements made during the course of these assessments do not carry the same inherent reliability as statements made to a professional for purposes of medical treatment or diagnosis” (Rodriguez, p 684).