{"id":1297,"date":"2014-02-07T14:42:37","date_gmt":"2014-02-07T20:42:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/?p=1297"},"modified":"2014-02-28T14:21:58","modified_gmt":"2014-02-28T20:21:58","slug":"video-recording-of-childs-testimony","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/home\/2014\/02\/07\/video-recording-of-childs-testimony\/","title":{"rendered":"Video Recording of Child&#8217;s Testimony"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p><script>(function(d, s, id) {\n  var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];\n  if (d.getElementById(id)) return;\n  js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id;\n  js.src = \"\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/all.js#xfbml=1\";\n  fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);\n}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));<\/script><\/p>\n<div class=\"fb-like\" data-href=\"http:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/2014\/02\/07\/video-recording-of-childs-testimony\/\" data-layout=\"standard\" data-action=\"like\" data-show-faces=\"true\" data-share=\"true\"><\/div>\n<h4>Entering the Child\u2019s Testimony into Evidence<\/h4>\n<p>A lawyer has a couple options when entering a child\u2019s testimony into evidence without calling the child to the witness stand. The lawyer may call the child\u2019s counselor to the witness stand, or the lawyer may videotape the child. To learn more about admitting the testimony of the child\u2019s counselors, see our prior post <a href=\"http:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/2013\/06\/18\/hearsay-exception-childs-testimony\/\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h4>Videotaping the Child: Requirement of Administering an Oath<\/h4>\n<p>The Amarillo Appellate Court recently affirmed a trial court\u2019s decision to strike from evidence a child\u2019s videotaped testimony. <a href=\"http:\/\/scholar.google.com\/scholar_case?q=No.+07-12-00035-CV&amp;hl=en&amp;as_sdt=4,44&amp;case=1615163882733702201&amp;scilh=0\">Nichol v. Nichol<\/a>, 07-12-00035-CV, 2014 WL 199652 (Tex. App.\u2014Amarillo Jan. 15, 2014, no. pet. h.). Although the trial court granted the father\u2019s \u201cMotion to Prerecord Testimony of the Child,\u201d the same court ruled the videotape to be \u201cinadmissible hearsay because no oath was administered and no preliminary questions were asked of the child which would indicate he understood his testimony was to be truthful.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Section <a href=\"http:\/\/www.statutes.legis.state.tx.us\/Docs\/FA\/htm\/FA.104.htm#104.003\">104.003(a)<\/a> of the Texas Family Code states that \u201cthe court may, on the motion of a party to the proceeding, order that the testimony of the child be taken outside the courtroom and be recorded for showing in the courtroom before the court, the finder of fact, and the parties to the proceeding.\u201d Implicit in the word \u201ctestimony\u201d is the requirement that an oath be taken. This is seen in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.courts.state.tx.us\/rules\/tre\/tre-all-010107.htm#rule603\">Rule 603<\/a> of the Texas Rules of Evidence: \u201cbefore testifying, every witness is required to declare that he will testify truthfully, by oath or affirmation administered in a form calculated to awaken the witness\u2019 conscience and impress the witness\u2019 mind with the duty to do so.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In the Nichol case, the father\u2019s attorney questioned the child without first administering an oath or having a discussion \u201cabout the issue of truthfulness.\u201d Because the child was not made aware of his duty to be truthful, the trial court did not err in excluding the videotaped testimony.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Entering the Child\u2019s Testimony into Evidence A lawyer has a couple options when entering a child\u2019s testimony into evidence without calling the child to the witness stand. The lawyer may call the child\u2019s counselor to the witness stand, or the lawyer may videotape the child. To learn more about admitting the testimony of the child\u2019s [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[58,30],"tags":[162,165,164,161,163],"class_list":{"0":"post-1297","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-amarillo-appellate-decisions","7":"category-children","8":"tag-104-003-texas-family-code","9":"tag-nichol-v-nichol","10":"tag-requirement-to-administer-oath","11":"tag-rule-603-of-the-texas-rules-of-evidence","12":"tag-videotapping-childs-testimony","13":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2efoE-kV","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1297","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1297"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1297\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1307,"href":"https:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1297\/revisions\/1307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billmcnamaralaw.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}