Help Wanted

[RJNorton]

THANK YOU, John. Please recall that I began my question with saying that I have trouble with understanding the concept of hearsay. I did not realize how complex the subject was. Your efforts in explaining are most appreciated.

Hopefully you won't mind - I have another question along these same lines. Would the words of a dead man also come under an exception? For example, how about the conversation Cobb said he had with Booth? Cobb said Booth gave his real name. These were the words of a dead man - unchallenged in court. We accept Cobb's word on this as true, but all we have is Cobb's recollection of what a man, then dead, said.

Are Booth's words admissible in court due to an exception in the hearsay rule?

In 1992 I was on a jury in Illinois. A widow was suing her dead husband's doctor for malpractice. The trial lasted two weeks, and the judge would never allow the deceased man's oral conversations to be admitted as evidence. His written words, such as letters he wrote, were admitted, but not his oral words as heard by others. The judge was consistent in his rulings....written words, yes; oral words, no. Obviously we have two totally different situations here, but if this Illinois judge's rules were applied to the conspiracy trial, Booth's diary would have been admissible but not his conversations as reported by others.