Commonwealth v. Verde

Supreme Judicial Court (May 19, 2005)

The Sixth Amendment confrontation clause does not require a laboratory technician who analyzed drugs seized in a criminal investigation to testify at trial in order for the drug certificate to be admitted into evidence.

The defendant was charged with trafficking cocaine. At trial, the Commonwealth introduced two certificates of analysis showing the purity and weight of the cocaine. In light of the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (2004), the defendant argued that the admission of the drug certificates of analysis denied him his constitutional right to confrontation because the chemist who analyzed the substances and prepared the certificates did not testify. Specifically, the defendant argued that the drug certificates amounted to "testimonial" hearsay statements and as such were barred unless the chemist was unavailable and the defendant had a prior opportunity to cross-examine the chemist.

The SJC held that the defendant's confrontation rights were not violated. The court noted that in Crawford, the Court suggested in dictum that a business or official record would not be subject to its holding. The SJC ruled that drug certificates are akin to a business or official record and therefore, "are well within the public records exception to the confrontation clause" and are not testimonial in nature. "The certificates of chemical analysis are neither discretionary, nor based on opinion; rather, they merely state the results of a well-recognized scientific test determining the composition and quantity of the substance."