Page:Samia v. United States.pdf/9

Rh the Government had elicited testimony that Samia and Stillwell coordinated their travel to the Philippines and lived together there. Samia noted that there was testimony that he had the type of gun that was used to shoot Lee. And, he emphasized that, in its closing argument, the Government argued to the jury that video evidence showing Hunter speaking about hiring two men to murder Lee was “admissible against all three defendants,” allowing the jury to infer that Samia and Stillwell were co-conspirators. Id., at 199. Finally, Samia argued that, while discussing Stillwell’s confession, the prosecution had recounted how Stillwell “described a time when the other person he was with [in the Philippines] pulled the trigger on that woman in a van that Stillwell was driving.” Ibid.

The Second Circuit rejected Samia’s view, holding that the admission of Stillwell’s confession did not violate Samia’s Confrontation Clause rights. Applying Circuit precedent, it pointed to the established practice of replacing a defendant’s name with a neutral noun or pronoun in a nontestifying codefendant’s confession. The Second Circuit also noted that its inquiry considered the altered confession separate from the other evidence that had been introduced at trial.

We granted certiorari to determine whether the admission of Stillwell’s altered confession, subject to a limiting instruction, violated Samia’s rights under the Confrontation Clause. 598 U. S. ___ (2022).

The Sixth Amendment’s Confrontation Clause guarantees the right of a criminal defendant “to be confronted with the witnesses against him.” As we have explained, this Clause forbids the introduction of out-of-court “testimonial” statements unless the witness is unavailable and the defendant has had the chance to cross-examine the witness previously. See Crawford v. Washington, 541 U. S. 36,