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State v. James5/29/2002
e witness, the information she was relaying came from essentially unspecified sources. The State did not present any corroborating evidence, in the form of live testimony or an admission by James, to establish the reliability of James's girlfriend's reported statements to the Windham police or to guarantee the reliability of Officer Cox's statements. There was no testimony that Officer Cox personally observed the smashed windshield or torn tent. Additionally, James's girlfriend, the source of the hearsay, may have had reason to fabricate the incident, and her failure to later cooperate with the criminal prosecution makes the reliability of the reports of her statement all the more difficult to judge.
Zipps's hearsay testimony regarding the blood-alcohol test result also does not contain any guarantees of trustworthiness. The blood- alcohol test result is not corroborated by any live testimony, such as testimony by Officer Cox that he smelled alcohol on James's breath or observed any impairment typically associated with alcohol consumption. Nor was any corroborating evidence in the form of other hearsay presented to the court, such as a statement by the alleged victim that James consumed alcohol. See State v. Finch, 569 A.2d 494, 495 (Vt. 1989) (finding reliability where evidence from two hearsay sources was consistent and mutually supportive).
It is also unclear whether the source of the hearsay was Officer Cox, or a document such as a printout from an intoxilizer or certified results of a blood-alcohol test. Finally, Zipps herself undermines the reliability of the test results because she testified only that she "believed" the police obtained a 0.11% blood-alcohol test result and that she "believed" that all of the Windham police officers are trained and certified in the use of intoxilizer machines.
Because Officer Zipps's testimony does not contain sufficient indicia of reliability and was the only evidence presented by the State, the Superior Court erred in relying upon such evidence to find violations of James's conditions of probation.
The entry is: Judgment vacated.
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