Hiral M. Patel v. Connecticut

Whether a statement against penal interest—  made by an inmate/declarant who was moved into the cell of an inmate/informant, who was then outfitted by correctional officials with a hidden recording device and was directed by state police to question the inmate/declarant about a past criminal incident;  and which interrogation resulted in a “dual inculpatory” statement in which the inmate/ declarant inculpated himself and the petitioner in that past criminal incident;  and which statement was admitted in evidence at petitioner’s trial, with no opportunity for petitioner to confront the inmate/declarant— can ever qualify as a “testimonial” statement under Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (2004) and its progeny—notwithstanding Dutton v. Evans, 400 U.S. 74 (1970) and Bourjaily v. United States, 483 U.S. 171 (1987). And if so, whether petitioner’s confrontation rights were violated when the Connecticut Supreme Court, relying on Dutton and Bourjaily, ruled that such a statement was “nontestimonial,” without giving sufficient consideration to Michigan v. Bryant, 562 U.S. 344 (2011), which holds that the “primary purpose” test of Davis v. Washington, 547 U.S. 813 (2006) “requires a combined inquiry that accounts for both the declarant and the interrogator,” i.e., an inquiry that “look[s] to all of the relevant circumstances,” and that “examin[es] the statements and actions of all participants” to the interrogation, including “‘[t]he identity of [the] interrogator, and the content and tenor of his questions.’” (i)