Also known as: self-authenticate · self-authenticates · self-authenticated · self-authenticating · self authenticating
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A principle under which certain documents or records are treated as authentic on their face. No extrinsic evidence of genuineness is required for admission.
Sebastian Santos files a paternity action against Sylvia Santos seeking to establish parentage of their child. He offers a genetic testing report prepared by a certified laboratory. The report appears in a record and bears the signature under penalty of perjury of a laboratory designee. The court admits the report without requiring live testimony from the lab technician because the document satisfies the statutory criteria for self-authentication.
The prosecution in a drug case offers a laboratory certificate identifying a seized substance. The certificate bears an official seal and signature but the defense objects on confrontation grounds. The court requires the analyst to testify in person. Self-authentication under the evidence rules does not eliminate the constitutional need for live testimony.
In 2001 Boston police officers received a tip that a Kmart employee was engaging in suspicious activity involving repeated short trips in a blue sedan. Officers set up surveillance in the parking lot, observed the described sequence of events, detained the employee upon his return, and discovered four clear plastic bags containing a substance resembling cocaine. The officers then arrested the two men in the car, one of whom was petitioner Luis Melendez-Diaz. The officers placed all three suspects in a police cruiser. During the short drive to the police station the officers observed their passengers fidgeting and making furtive movements in the back of the car. After depositing the men at the station they searched the police cruiser and found a plastic bag containing nineteen smaller bags hidden in the partition between the front and back seats. The officers submitted the seized substances to the State Laboratory Institute of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, which was required by law to conduct chemical analysis upon police request. Analysts at the laboratory performed the tests on November 28, 2001, and prepared three certificates of analysis that reported the weight of the bags and stated that the substance was found to contain cocaine. Each certificate was sworn before a notary public by the analysts, as required under Massachusetts law, and reprinted the statutory provision making the certificates prima facie evidence of the composition, quality, and net weight of the narcotic analyzed. Melendez-Diaz was charged with distributing cocaine and trafficking in cocaine in an amount between 14 and 28 grams. At trial the prosecution introduced the bags seized from the codefendant and from the cruiser along with the three certificates. Petitioner objected to admission of the certificates, asserting that Crawford v. Washington required the analysts to testify in person. The trial court overruled the objection and admitted the certificates pursuant to the state statute. The jury found Melendez-Diaz guilty. He appealed, contending that admission of the certificates violated his Sixth Amendment right to be confronted with the witnesses against him. The Appeals Court of Massachusetts affirmed the convictions, relying on a prior decision of the Supreme Judicial Court that had held forensic analysts are not subject to confrontation. The Supreme Judicial Court denied review, and the United States Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseDocuments bearing an official governmental seal together with a proper signature are self-authenticating. Notarized documents accompanied by a certificate of acknowledgment also qualify. These categories eliminate the need for extrinsic proof of authenticity.
No. A report that is in a record and signed under penalty of perjury by a laboratory designee is self-authenticating under the Uniform Parentage Act. The statute expressly provides that such a report needs no further authentication.
No. Even when a document such as a laboratory certificate is self-authenticating under the evidence rules, the Sixth Amendment may still require the analyst to appear and testify. Self-authentication addresses only the authenticity foundation, not constitutional confrontation rights.
Yes. The rule looks to whether the document bears a seal purporting to be official. Courts accept high-resolution images or photocopies of seals when they purport to be those of a governmental entity or agency.
…certificate from the document's custodian stating that the copy is accurate. See, e.g. , Fed. Rule Evid. 902(4) (in order to be self-authenticating, a copy of a public record must be "certified as correct by the custodian"); Rule 902(11) (business record must be "accompanied by a written declaration of its custodian"). Under one…