California, United States of America
The following excerpt is from People v. Power, F075750 (Cal. App. 2019):
"The crucial element in determining whether a declaration is sufficiently reliable to be admissible under this exception to the hearsay rule is ... not the nature of the statement but the mental state of the speaker. The nature of the utterance - how long it was made after the startling incident and whether the speaker blurted it out, for example - may be important, but solely as an indicator of the mental state of the declarant. [U]ltimately each fact pattern must be considered on its own merits, and the trial court is vested with reasonable discretion in the matter. [Citation.]" (People v. Farmer (1989) 47 Cal.3d 888, 903-904, overruled on other grounds in People v. Waidla (2000) 22 Cal.4th 690, 724, fn. 6; People v. Roybal (1998) 19 Cal.4th 481, 516.)
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