RULE 806. ATTACKING AND SUPPORTING CREDIBILITY OF DECLARANT
Effective Date: 3/1/1990
Obsolete Date: 3/1/2014
If a hearsay statement, or a statement defined in Rule 801(d)(2)(iii), (iv), or (v), is admitted in evidence, the credibility of the declarant may be attacked, and if attacked may be supported, by any evidence which would be admissible for those purposes if declarant had testified as a witness.Evidence of a statement or conduct by the declarant at any time, inconsistent with the declarant's hearsay statement, is not subject to any requirement that the declarant may have been afforded an opportunity to deny or explain. If the party against whom a hearsay statement has been admitted calls the declarant as a witness, the party is entitled to examine the declarant on the statement as if under cross-examination.
Rule 806 was amended, effective March 1, 1990; March 1, 2014.
Rule 806 treats a declarant of hearsay evidence as any other witness by allowing the declarant's credibility to be attacked in accordance with the rules. One deviation is required, however, and that is that a declarant need not have been given an opportunity to deny or explain a statement inconsistent with the hearsay statement. This is because the inconsistent statement may well have been subsequent to the hearsay statement offered in evidence, precluding bringing it to the declarant's attention.
Rule 806 was amended, effective March 1, 1990. The amendments are technical in nature and no substantive change is intended.
Rule 806 was amended, effective March 1, 2014, in response to the December 1, 2011, revision of the Federal Rules of Evidence. The language and organization of the rule were changed to make the rule more easily understood and to make style and terminology consistent throughout the rules. There is no intent to change any result in any ruling on evidence admissibility.
SOURCES: Joint Procedure Committee Minutes of September 27, 2012, page 26; March 24-25, 1988, page 12; December 3, 1987, page 15; April 8, 1976, page 13; October 1, 1975, page 8. Fed.R.Ev. 806; Rule 806, SBAND proposal.
Cross Reference: N.D.R.Ev. 607 (Who May Impeach a Witness), N.D.R.Ev. 608 (A Witness's Character for Truthfulness or Untruthfulness), N.D.R.Ev. 609 (Impeachment by Evidence of a Criminal Conviction), N.D.R.Ev. 613 (Witness's Prior Statement).