Pharmacy Drug-Purchase Logs Admissible Through Police Officer Without Violating Confrontation Clause Because They Are Non-Testimonial Business Records

We have on numerous occasions in this blog traced the winding path of Confrontation Clause jurisprudence handed down by the Supreme Court in the last ten years, and interpreted to varying degrees of clarity and logic by the lower courts (see here, here, and here).

One category of evidence whose status is a continuing curiosity is that of business records. The seminal Supreme Court decision in the recent reformulation of Confrontation Clause analysis is Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (2004). Under Crawford and its progeny, most out-of-court statements, written or verbal, must be subject to cross-examination of the declarant at trial unless the statements are nontestimonial evidence, such as business records. Id. at 56. Again, in Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts, 557 U.S. 305 (2009), the Court held that business records are generally admissible...