Accommodations upheld have ranged from a live closed-circuit Craig television feed (where the defendant can watch the witness as she testifies and has realtime communication with counsel) to allowing the witness to sit angled to the side while on the stand and thus not face the defendant directly. On the spectrum of accommodations, placing an opaque, physical barrier between the defendant and witness is the most invasive to the face-to-face confrontation right. (Craig, 497 U.S. at supra, p. 851; 487 U.S. at pp. 1019-1020.) Coy, supra, Before only one California decision has upheld the use of an accommodation eliminating a defendant’s ability to observe witness demeanor, and that case involved a physically and mentally disabled witness who—according to the testimony of medical become suicidal if made to the defendant in court. (People professionals—would v. (2002) 102 Cal.App.4th 995 (Williams).) Here, the trial court opted for an Williams opaque physical barrier without even attempting to ensure the adult witness truly required it, and the majority, remarkably, finds no constitutional violation. In no other case has a court upheld an accommodation as invasive as the one used here on the basis of such slight evidence of necessity. Because I believe the record discloses a clear violation of Arredondo’s face-toface confrontation rights, and that violation was not harmless beyond a reasonable doubt, I would reverse the convictions on counts 3, 4, and 5—the counts for sexual assaults against F.R. However, because I concur with the majority’s conclusions regarding the remainder of Arredondo’s claims of error, I would otherwise affirm the judgment, leaving
Accommodations upheld Craig have ranged from a live closed-circuit television feed (where the defendant can watch the witness as she testifies and has realtime communication with counsel) to allowing the witness to sit angled to the side while on the stand and thus not face the defendant directly. On the spectrum of accommodations, placing an opaque, physical barrier between the defendant and witness is the most invasive to the face-to-face confrontation right. (Craig, supra, 497 U.S. at p. 851; Coy, supra, 487 U.S. at pp. 1019-1020.) Before only one California decision has upheld the use of an accommodation eliminating a defendant’s ability to observe witness demeanor, and that case involved a physically and mentally disabled witness who—according to the testimony of medical professionals—would become suicidal if made to the defendant in court. (People v. Williams (2002) 102 Cal.App.4th 995 (Williams).) Here, the trial court opted for an opaque physical barrier without even attempting to ensure the adult witness truly required it, and the majority, remarkably, finds no constitutional violation. In no other case has a court upheld an accommodation as invasive as the one used here on the basis of such slight evidence of necessity. Because I believe the record discloses a clear violation of Arredondo’s face-toface confrontation rights, and that violation was not harmless beyond a reasonable doubt, I would reverse the convictions on counts 3, 4, and 5—the counts for sexual assaults against F.R. However, because I concur with the majority’s conclusions regarding the remainder of Arredondo’s claims of error, I would otherwise affirm the judgment, leaving
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