The new legislation responded to the Washington Supreme Court’s decision in State v. Aten, 927 P.2d 210, 130 Wn.2d 640 (1996). In that case Ms. Aten was convicted of manslaughter for suffocating an infant. Aside from her admission that she had held her hand over the child’s mouth and nose, the evidence did not distinguish between suffocation and accidental death by Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. The court reversed the conviction because it construed the corpus delicti rule to require the independent evidence that a crime had occurred to exclude non-criminal explanations.

Prosecutors complained that this decision made it nearly impossible to convict anyone for suffocating an infant. The legislature responded by adding a section to Revised Code of Washington 10.58. The new statute makes a criminal defendant’s statement admissible when 1) the alleged victim is dead or incompetent to testify, and 2) substantial evidence shows the defendant’s statement is trustworthy. The statute lists some of the factors bearing on the trustworthiness of such statements. One is whether the facts the statement asserts can be corroborated. Another is whether the statement itself was recorded.

The new law will likely be used also in sex abuse prosecutions where the alleged victim is too young to testify.