State v. Lambert

705 A.2d 957 (1997)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

D, two months before turning eighteen, and William Page (Page), aged eighteen, were walking. Lambert was throwing rocks as the pair approached train tracks that run under an overpass. Gardiner, a homeless man who was living under the highway, apparently shouted at the teenagers. A confrontation ensued. D testified at trial that Page approached Gardiner and pulled out a BB gun that looked like a bullet-firing pistol. D testified that after having forced Gardiner to lie on the ground, Page directed D to find a rope with which Page then hog-tied the victim. The gun belonged to D rather than Page. D claimed that he was unaware that Page had it with him that night. Page's statements differed significantly from D's. Gardiner was the victim of a savage and brutal beating that resulted in his death. Both youths admitted delivering at least some of the blows that fell upon Gardiner. Major McCartney (McCartney) apprehended Page and D. The police had been given their names in connection with Gardiner's murder by several other young people who lived downtown. D and Page were charged by indictment with the murder of Gardiner. P presented a young witness named Joanna Rodrigues (Rodrigues), who testified regarding a conversation that took place among herself, D, Page, and a few other friends at an abandoned downtown warehouse. Page told the other youths that he and D had 'beat up the old guy that used to live under the bridge [because] they didn't like him.' Rodrigues testified that D said he had hit the victim in the head with a gun and that they said 'that one hit him in the face with the tube. It came out through his neck, and they hit him in the face with a gun a couple of times.' D objected to Rodrigues's testimony concerning both Page's statements and those that Rodrigues ambiguously attributed to D and Page collectively. The trial justice overruled Lambert's objections on the ground that the statements were adoptive admissions and were therefore properly admissible under Rule 801(d)(2)(B). D’s trial resulted in a jury verdict of second-degree murder and of committing a crime of violence while armed. D appealed.