State v. Johnson

Summary

The Ohio Second District Court of Appeals held that R.C. 2945.481 does not violate confrontation rights on its face, but the trial court erred by ordering child victims to testify outside the defendant's physical presence without making case-specific findings of necessity. The court found the confrontation error was not harmless beyond a reasonable doubt and remanded for a new trial on two aggravated-menacing counts and one domestic-violence count. The judgment was reversed in part and vacated in part.

Holdings

1. R.C. 2945.481(C)(1)(a) does not make remote testimony automatically mandatory without further judicial analysis. Before ordering testimony outside the courtroom under the statute, the trial court must comply with R.C. 2945.481(E) and make case-specific findings that the child is unavailable to testify in the defendant's physical presence for a statutory reason; this requirement also follows from Maryland v. Craig.
2. The confrontation violation was not harmless beyond a reasonable doubt as to the aggravated-menacing convictions involving Jane Doe and John Doe and the domestic-violence conviction involving Jane Doe. Those convictions had to be reversed and a new trial ordered.
3. The evidence was insufficient to support Johnson's aggravated-menacing conviction involving K.J. because the State failed to establish that K.J. subjectively believed Johnson would cause serious physical harm to her or the children.

Questions Presented

1. Whether the trial court violated Johnson's confrontation rights by allowing the child witnesses to testify outside his physical presence without making case-specific findings under R.C. 2945.481(E) and Maryland v. Craig.
2. Whether the confrontation error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt as to the convictions involving Jane Doe and John Doe.
3. Whether sufficient evidence supported Johnson's conviction for aggravated menacing involving K.J., including evidence that K.J. subjectively believed Johnson would cause serious physical harm to her or the children.

Disposition

reversed_and_remanded