Supreme Court of the United States

“ And the thrust of the majority’s holding is that the so-called Bruton exception is—and must be—narrow: Bruton is a pesky deviation that requires the exclusion of otherwise admissible evidence (hence, the ease with which the majority contemplates dispensing with that precedent) .
That approach inverts the constitutional principles that govern this case. Under our well-established Sixth Amendment precedents, the Court’s analysis must, instead, start from the premise that the introduction of Stillwell’s inculpatory confession during the joint trial threatened Samia’s Confrontation Clause rights. ”

“ For most of our Nation’s history, longstanding practice allowed a nontestifying codefendant’s confession to be admitted in a joint trial so long as the jury was properly instructed not to consider it against the nonconfessing defendant. While some courts would omit the defendant’s name or substitute a reference to “another person” (or the like) , it is unclear whether any courts considered such alterations to be necessary as a categorical matter. ”

“ When the Government attempted to nonetheless introduce Stillwell’s inculpatory confession notwithstanding Samia’s inability to cross-examine him, it sought an exception from the Confrontation Clause’s exclusion mandate. Before today, this Court had never held that a limiting instruction, combined with a redaction that merely replaces the defendant’s name, sufficiently “cures” the constitutional problem. ”

“ Such statements, elicited from the defendant himself, are often some of the most compelling evidence of guilt available to a jury. By contrast, jurors may cast a critical eye on accomplice testimony—and, in particular, self-serving accomplice testimony like Stillwell’s that accuses another of the most culpable conduct. ”

“ There just isn’t much history helping the majority. See ante, at 1–3 (opinion concurring in part and concurring in judgment) . But assume for a moment to the contrary: Suppose with the majority that at some relevant time, courts conducting joint trials admitted unredacted co-defendant confessions subject only to limiting instructions. Ante, at 6–8. If that history controlled, Bruton itself would have been wrongly decided. The majority’s real views thus come into focus. The point of its opinion is not to distinguish the confession here from the one in Bruton. ”

“ A shows that, during a narrow historical period, some courts assumed and others expressly held that a limiting instruction sufficiently protected a codefendant from a declaration inadmissible on hearsay grounds. In suggesting anything more, the Court overclaims. That is unfortunate. While history is often important and sometimes dispositive, we should be discriminating in its use. Otherwise, we risk undermining the force of historical arguments when they matter most. ”

“ This Court has already made clear that the first fact relied on—that Stillwell’s confession did not use Samia’s name—is not dispositive. See supra, at 3–4. A confession redacted with a blank space, after all, also avoids naming the defendant; yet Gray held that it falls within Bruton’s scope. So today’s decision must rest on the second feature of the confession: that the placeholder used (e.g., “the other person”) was neither a blank space nor the word “deleted.” But that distinction makes nonsense of the Bruton rule. Bruton’s application has always turned on a confession’s inculpatory impact. ”

“ Now, defendants in joint trials will not have the chance to confront some of the most damaging witnesses against them. And a constitutional right once guaranteeing that opportunity will no longer. It will become, in joint trials, a shell of its former self. ”

“ Moreover, it would not have been feasible to further modify Stillwell’s confession to make it appear, as in Richardson, that he had acted alone. Stillwell was charged with conspiracy and did not confess to shooting Lee. Consequently, the evidence of coordination between Stillwell and Lee’s killer (whether Samia or not) was necessary to prove an essential element of the Government’s case. In addition, editing the statement to exclude mention of the “other person” may have made it seem as though Stillwell and Lee were alone in the van at the time Lee was shot. ”

“ So, even though Samia’s position in the van and shooting of Lee were relevant to the Government’s theory of the case with or without Stillwell’s confession, Samia argued that those statements would allow the jury to infer that he was the “other person” in Stillwell’s confession. ”

“ Other portions of Stouch’s testimony also used the “other person” descriptor to refer to someone with whom Stillwell had traveled and lived and who carried a particular firearm. During Stouch’s testimony, the District Court instructed the jury that his testimony was admissible only as to Stillwell and should not be considered as to Samia or Hunter. The District Court later provided a similar limiting instruction before the jury began its deliberations. ”

“ In this context, “the risk that the jury will not, or cannot, follow [the instruction] is so great, and the consequences of failure so vital to the defendant, that the practical and human limitations of the jury system cannot be ignored.” Id., at 135.
The Bruton rule applies even when an accusatory confession does not expressly name the co-defendant. Bruton, we have held, bars the use of confessions “that replace [] a name with an obvious blank space or symbol or word such as ‘deleted.’ ” Gray, 523 U. S., at 189. ”

“ While the Court “concede [d] that Richardson placed outside the scope of Bruton’s rule those statements that incriminate inferentially,” it explained that “inference pure and simple cannot make the critical difference, for if it did, then Richardson would also place outside Bruton’s scope confessions that use shortened first names, nicknames, [and] descriptions as unique as the ‘red-haired, bearded, one-eyed man-with-a-limp.’ ” Id., at 195. The Court elaborated:
“That being so, Richardson must depend in significant part upon the kind of, not the simple fact of, inference. ”

“ The crime was a gang assault involving six perpetrators, while only one other person was on trial with the confessing defendant. The “ [m] e and a few other guys” phrase thus did not point a finger directly at the co-defendant, as “the other person” phrase here did at Samia. The more relevant reference discussed in Gray was to the “white guy” in a trial with only one white defendant, as described above. Id., at 195; see supra, at 4. Gray left no doubt that the confession with that phrase should have been excluded—and for the same reason as the confession with “deleted.” ”

“ Contrary to the majority’s claim, Gray repudiates rather than supports the distinction adopted today. In holding that Bruton’s protections extend beyond confessions with names to confessions with blanks, Gray explained that what should matter is not a confession’s form but its effects. A jury, Gray noted, “will often react similarly” to the two kinds of confessions ”

“ And as the John-and-Mary examples make clear, a confession that swaps in a phrase like “the other person” for a defendant’s name may incriminate just as powerfully as one that swaps in a blank space. See supra, at 1–3. So the majority warps our Bruton precedent by categorically putting the two on opposite sides of the constitutional line. ”

“ Also, separate trials “randomly favo [r] the last-tried defendants who have the advantage of knowing the prosecution’s case beforehand.” Richardson, 481 U. S., at 210.
Samia offers, as an alternative, that the Government may choose to forgo use of the confession entirely, thereby avoiding the need for severance. But, this ignores the fact that confessions are “ ‘essential to society’s compelling interest in finding, convicting, and punishing those who violate the law.’ ” Ibid. And, as described above, Samia’s proposal is not compelled by the Confrontation Clause. ”

“ The confession largely corroborated the victim’s testimony and additionally described a conversation between Williams and Martin as they drove to the scene of the crime: “ [A] ccording to Williams, Martin said that he would have to kill the victims after the robbery.” Id., at 204. Following the confession’s admission, the trial judge instructed the jury not to use it against Marsh in any way, an instruction reiterated in the jury charge at the conclusion of trial. ”

“ The cited cases address the rules of evidence rather than the Confrontation Clause. Ante, at 6–8. On top of that, the two federal cases do not discuss the effectiveness of limiting instructions, much less any need for redaction. ”

“ Massachusetts, 557 U. S. 305, 313 (2009) . That conclusion follows from the text of the Sixth Amendment, which guarantees the right of the accused to “confron [t] ” “witnesses against him” (emphasis added) , not just those witnesses who “ ‘facially incriminat [e] ’ ” him, contra, ante, at 9–10. ”

“ And, our legal system presumes that jurors will “ ‘attend closely the particular language of [such] instructions in a criminal case and strive to understand, make sense of, and follow’ ” them. United States v. ”