Iowa v. Paredes

775 N.W.2d 554 (2009)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

D and Cassidy Millard are the parents of a young infant. D was twenty-four years old, Millard was sixteen years old, and the baby was two months old. The family was living in the home of D's sister, Wendy Jimenez. After being seen by a physician for what appeared to be a routine ear infection, the baby's condition deteriorated. Millard called for an ambulance to take the infant to a local hospital. Police officers arrived at the residence shortly thereafter. D was defensive, asking the officers, 'What are you doing here?' and declaring, 'This is not a domestic.' D remained at home while Millard accompanied the child to the hospital. Medical personnel diagnosed the baby with shaken-baby syndrome (SBS). At first, the symptoms of SBS are general irritability, excessive crying, and trouble feeding. These symptoms then progress to more severe problems, including periodic seizures. Medical personnel determined that the injury occurred sometime between late Friday and early Saturday morning. D and Millard both denied any knowledge of how the child was injured. They did admit, however, that they were the child's only caregivers during the period in question, except for a brief fifteen-minute period when D's sister cared for the baby. When D heard that supervised visits would not be necessary--he confessed claiming he caused the injuries. D claimed he was watching the child while Millard was outside smoking and shook the baby when it would not stop crying. He later performed a reenactment. D repeated the story to Detective Swank and Bollweg and signed a written statement detailing the incident and declaring his remorse. D asked Swank whether anyone ever testified falsely in order to protect someone else and whether the detective thought he had hurt the baby. Millard called a social worker, Susan Gail, with whom she had prior contact. When Gail asked Millard what had happened, Millard responded: She said she did not know, but her boyfriend (D) was in jail for it. She said that he did not do it, though. She then asked me if her diagnosis was Multiple Personality Disorder because sometimes she doesn't remember what she does. I asked her if she meant like the time she threatened to kill/stab me. (This was when she was in Valley Shelter 2 years ago.) She said yes, that's what I mean. She told me she knows D would not hurt the baby and hinted around that maybe she did it, but didn't remember. She told me that he cried all the time, and she just yelled at him to 'shut up', but never hit him. She then said that she had started spanking him lately, but that it did not hurt him since he had on a big diaper… She has been crying for a week because she does not want her boyfriend to take the fall for this. She said that he is not that kind of guy, not violent. She said that D didn't even take care of the baby that much. She kept saying, 'if I did it.' P filed a motion in limine to exclude Gail's testimony regarding her conversation with Millard as impermissible hearsay. D urged that he be allowed to question Detective Swank and DHS employee Bollweg about the memorandum, its contents, and their responses to it. D stated that he was not presenting the evidence for the truth of the matter asserted, but instead argued that the actions of Swank and Bollweg in response to the Gail memorandum revealed the existence of another suspect in the case. The district court concluded that the statements did not meet the hearsay exception for statements against interest under Iowa Rule of Evidence 5.804(b)(3). D was convicted and appealed.