Rule 805 Hearsay Within Hearsay

Maine Restyling Note [November 2014]

Maine Rule 805 and Federal Rule 805 are substantively identical, and therefore the Advisory Committee recommends adoption of the language of the restyled Federal Rule.

102 The “catch-all” provision, formerly Federal Rule 803(24), has been transferred to Federal

Rule 807, the residual exception.

Advisers’ Note to former M.R. Evid. 805

(February 2, 1976)

This rule covers hearsay within hearsay, sometimes called “totem pole” hearsay. It provides for a two-stage approach. If each part of the combined statement conforms to some hearsay exception it is all is admissible. The Federal Advisory Committee gives as an example a dying declaration which incorporates a declaration against interest by another out-of-court declarant. In contrast, a declaration itself within an exception cannot include a statement of another declarant which does not fall within an exception. An example is Johnson v. Lutz, 253 N.Y. 124, 170 N.E. 517 (1930) (information from a bystander incorporated in a police report not admissible; the bystander’s statement was inadmissible hearsay).