Court-Martial Trial Practice Blog
Prof. Colin Miller begins,
Similar to its federal counterpart, Idaho Rule of Evidence 804(b)(3) provides an exception to the rule against hearsay for
A statement that:
(A) a reasonable person in the declarant’s position would have made only if the person believed it to be true because, when made, it was so contrary to the declarant’s proprietary or pecuniary interest or had so great a tendency to invalidate the declarant’s claim against someone else or to expose the declarant to civil or criminal liability; and
(B) is supported by corroborating circumstances that clearly indicate its trustworthiness, if it is offered in a criminal case as one that tends to expose the declarant to criminal liability.
So what corroborating circumstances are sufficient to establish the trustworthiness needed to admit a statement against interest under subsection (B). This was the question addressed by the Court of Appeals of Idaho in its recent opinion in State v. Blake, 2020 WL 6882112 (Idaho App. 2020).