Mass. R. Evid. 106
Mass. Guid. Evid. 106
Subsection (a). This subsection is derived from Commonwealth v. Aviles, 461 Mass. 60, 74 (2011). See Mass. R. Civ. P. 32(a)(4). "When a party introduces a portion of a statement or writing in evidence the doctrine of verbal completeness allows admission of other relevant portions of the same statement or writing which serve to 'clarify the context' of the admitted portion." Commonwealth v. Carmona, 428 Mass. 268, 272 (1998), quoting Commonwealth v. Robles, 423 Mass. 62, 69 (1996). "The purpose of the doctrine is to prevent one party from presenting a fragmented and misleading version of events by requiring the admission of other relevant portions of the same statement or writing which serve to clarify the context of the admitted portion" (citations and quotations omitted). Commonwealth v. Eugene, 438 Mass. 343, 351 (2003). "The portion of the statement sought to be introduced must qualify or explain the segment previously introduced" (citations and quotations omitted). Commonwealth v. Richardson, 59 Mass. App. Ct. 94, 99 (2003). See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Aduayi, 488 Mass. 658, 671-672 (2021) (police officer's question posed to defendant in recorded postarrest interview was necessary to understand defendant's response and should have been admitted under doctrine of verbal completeness); Commonwealth v. Kozubal, 488 Mass. 575, 585 (2021) (victim's text messages admissible under doctrine of verbal completeness to render defendant's statements comprehensible and to show that some of defendant's text messages were adoptive statements); Aviles, 461 Mass. at 74 (where defendant offered portion of victim's testimony describing touching of her buttocks, Commonwealth was properly permitted to offer testimony about touching of vaginal area, as both answers pertained to issue of where defendant had touched victim and were made during the same line of questioning). Contrast Commonwealth v. Amaral, 482 Mass. 496, 505 (2019) (statement of unidentified third party that did not clarify admitted portion of conversation between testifying witness and defendant properly excluded).
The doctrine "is limited in scope to instances where otherwise inadmissible hearsay on the same subject is necessary to prevent a presentation of a misleading version of events through admission of selected fragments of a single conversation or document." Commonwealth v. Steeves, 490 Mass. 270, 282 (2022). This requirement is not met where the statements sought to be admitted are temporally separate from the admitted statements. See Id. at 278 (recorded interview not part of "same conversation" as admitted statements where it occurred two hours later and was conducted by different investigators).
The decision as to when the remainder of the writing or statement is admitted is left to the discretion of the judge, but the "better practice is to require an objection and contemporaneous introduction of the complete statements when the original statement is offered." McAllister v. Boston Hous. Auth., 429 Mass. 300, 303 (1999). See Section 611(a), Mode and Order of Examining Witnesses and Presenting Evidence: Control by the Court. The party seeking admission of additional portions of a writing has the burden to identify those portions and explain how they clarify the context of the admitted statements. See Kozubal, 488 Mass. at 589 & n.6 (judge did not err by failing to admit entire school faculty handbook after excerpts on polices pertaining to child abuse and inappropriate sexual relations were admitted). Compare Commonwealth v. Thompson, 431 Mass. 108, 115, cert. denied, 531 U.S. 864 (2000) (doctrine not applicable to defendant's effort to admit alibi portion of statement that has nothing to do with portion of statement offered by Commonwealth), with Commonwealth v. Crayton, 470 Mass. 228, 230 (2014) (in prosecution for possession of child pornography, error to admit defendant's statement to police that he had been using a particular computer at library while excluding his contemporaneous denial that he had viewed child pornography on that computer).
Subsection (b). This subsection is derived from Commonwealth v. Ruffen, 399 Mass. 811, 813-814 (1987) ("The curative admissibility doctrine allows a party harmed by incompetent evidence to rebut that evidence only if the original evidence created significant prejudice."). See also Commonwealth v. Reed, 444 Mass. 803, 810-811 (2005) (court required to admit evidence); Burke v. Memorial Hosp., 29 Mass. App. Ct. 948, 950 (1990), citing Commonwealth v. Wakelin, 230 Mass. 567, 576 (1918).