Commonwealth v. Drayton

Defendant was convicted of murder in the first degree. The bulk of the evidence at trial derived from the testimony of a single witness, James Jackson. One and one-half years after Defendant’s conviction, another individual, Debra Bell, came forward, claiming in an affidavit that she was with Jackson using drugs and having sex in a bathroom at the time the shooting took place, and therefore, Jackson could not have seen the shooting. Defendant moved to a new trial on the ground of newly discovered evidence based on Bell’s affidavit. Bell died, however, before the judge acted in it. The judge denied the motion for a new trial, concluding that Bell’s affidavit was inadmissible hearsay. The Supreme Judicial Court remanded for an evidentiary hearing on Defendant’s motion for a new trial, holding that there was a substantial issue as to whether Bell’s affidavit fell within a narrow, constitutionally based exception to the hearsay rule that applies where otherwise inadmissible hearsay is critical to the defense and bears persuasive guarantees of trustworthiness. View "Commonwealth v. Drayton" on Justia Law