Evidence Commons^™

After the Supreme Court’s ruling in Crawford v. Washington that a criminal defendant’s right to confront the witnesses against him is violated by the admission of testimonial hearsay that has not been cross-examined, lower courts have overturned convictions in which hearsay from children was admitted after child witnesses were either unwilling or unable to testify. A review of social scientific evidence regarding the dynamics of child sexual abuse suggests a means for facilitating the fair receipt of children’s evidence. Courts should hold that defendants have forfeited their confrontation rights if they exploited a child’s vulnerabilities such that they could reasonably …

Child sexual abuse (CSA) involving sexual contact between an adult (usually male) and a child has been reported by 20% of women and 5 to 10% of men worldwide (1–3). Surveys likely underestimate prevalence because of underreporting and memory failure (4–6). Although official reports have declined somewhat in the United States over the past decade (7), close to 90% of sexual abuse cases are never reported to the authorities (8).