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Bourjaily v. United States | 483 U.S. 171 (1987)

In Bourjaily versus United States, the United States Supreme Court pondered the nuances of the rules of evidence and the admission of hearsay statements in a case involving distribution of cocaine.

Angelo Lonardo arranged to buy a kilogram of cocaine from Clarence Greathouse and mentioned that his friend was interested in distributing it. Greathouse called the friend, William Bourjaily, to discuss the quality and price of the cocaine. Greathouse and Lonardo agreed that the sale would take place in a hotel parking lot, and that Lonardo would transfer the cocaine directly from Greathouse’s car to Bourjaily’s car.

Unbeknownst to Lonardo and Bourjaily, Greathouse was actually an FBI informant. He recorded his phone conversations with both Lonardo and Bourjaily. When Lonardo got to the parking lot for the drug transfer, FBI agents were waiting. They arrested both men the moment they moved the cocaine from one car to the other.

Bourjaily was charged with conspiring to distribute cocaine. At trial, the government introduced Lonardo’s telephone statements about a friend who would participate in the transaction.

The District Court found that the government had established by a preponderance of the evidence that there was a conspiracy between Lonardo and Bourjaily, and that Lonardo’s statements over the phone had been made in the course and in furtherance of the conspiracy. Those statements accordingly satisfied Rule 801.

Bourjaily argued that the court should’ve restricted its analysis to independent evidence other that the telephone statements. Co-conspirators’ out-of-court statements are considered unreliable until a conspiracy is shown, and should therefore not be usable to establish the existence of a conspiracy. This is the so-called bootstrapping rule, meant to prevent hearsay from lifting itself by its bootstraps to the level of evidence.

Bourjaily also claimed that his rights under the Sixth Amendment’s Confrontation Clause were violated because Lonardo didn’t testify at trial.

The district court found Bourjaily guilty. The United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit affirmed the district court’s ruling. The United States Supreme Court granted cert.

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