ALBERT OTTO v. STATE OF MARYLAND
Court of Appeals of Maryland, Hotten, June 21, 2018,
Doctrine of Completeness – After the State introduced jail call recordings of the defendant trying to get a witness to change her story, the defendant was not allowed to introduce irrelevant portions of the jail calls under the doctrine of completeness where they did not help “complete” the jury’s understanding of the recordings that were introduced.

(Judgment Only – Watts)

Facts:
Otto was charged with three counts of rape against the mother of his children.
While in jail, Otto made several recorded calls.
In one, he said “my best chance out of this is for my family to help her out because she, you know, if she helps recant all this stuff if, if, you know, she’s left in an entirely abandoned position right now too, then she’s just going to want to cooperate with the State to get the State’s assistance and that’s going to screw me…”
Other recordings showed Otto speaking with his mother about giving the victim money so that she would recant.
While awaiting trial, Otto married the victim in the case. The victim then took the stand and testified that “because of the fact that I am married to my husband, I can use that privilege and not to testify.”
At trial, the State introduced portions of the jail calls made by Otto to his mother.
Otto requested that other parts of the calls be allowed into evidence under the “doctrine of completeness,” but this was denied.
After hearing redacted portions of the jail calls, combined with testimony by Otto’s daughter, detectives, and other witnesses, the jury found Otto guilty of one count of rape.
Otto appealed, arguing that he should have been allowed to introduce non-redacted portions of the jail calls to so that the jury wouldn’t be “mislead” into thinking he was trying to make the victim change her story.

Held: The Court held that the trial judge was not wrong to keep out the remaining conversations, as they did not explain the statements used by the State.

Evidence – Doctrine of “Completeness” – In order to provide context, the common law doctrine of completeness ‘allows a party to respond to the admission, by an opponent, of part of a writing or conversation, by admitting the remainder of that writing or conversation.’

Evidence – Doctrine of “Completeness” – In order to be admissible under the “doctrine of completeness,” evidence must be:
(a) Relevant
(b) No more may be admitted than needed to put the admitted portion into context;
(c) The extra portion introduced can only be used to help understand the initial statement; it’s not evidence itself

Evidence – Doctrine of “Completeness” – Usually, an excerpt is admissible under the doctrine of completeness only if it’s part of one conversation or writing. However, in some cases a separate writing or conversation could be used to put a subsequent writing/conversation into context.

From the Case: Otto failed to explain how introducing the rest of the conversations “explains or interprets his statements that helping S.L and the children would motivate S.L to recant her statements incriminating him. Even if [Otto] meant that helping S.L. would cause her to recant at the time of the bond hearing, his statement still supports the State’s theory that he attempted to persuade a change in her testimony.”