Section 23.74 Spontaneous Declarations and Excited Utterances

• Library: Criminal Practice 2012 Supp

D. (§23.74) Spontaneous Declarations and Excited Utterances

“Excited utterances” or “spontaneous declarations” are admissible if the declarant has been subjected to a startling event, if the statement is made before there is time to fabricate, and if the statement relates to the circumstance of the occurrence. State v. Mahone, 699 S.W.2d 60, 62 (Mo. App. E.D. 1985); State v. Pflugradt, 463 S.W.2d 566, 572 (Mo. App. W.D. 1971). The statement or utterance must be a reaction to the event itself and not to the intervention of the police. State v. Simmons, 734 S.W.2d 513, 514 (Mo. App. E.D. 1987). The essential test for the admissibility of such statements is spontaneity, Pflugradt, 463 S.W.2d 566, but each case will turn on its own facts; the statement does not need to be immediate but must be contemporaneous and “instinctive and spontaneous.” State v. Sutton, 454 S.W.2d 481, 487 (Mo. 1969). The event and the statement do not need to be simultaneous as long as the statement is provoked by the excitement of the event and the declarant is still under the control of that excitement...