The Court continued in relevant part: Apart from notice-demand requirements, we also believe it worthwhile for the Legislature or the relevant Supreme Court Committees to explore means of abating the time and travel burdens upon nurses, chemists and other third-party witnesses who now will be constitutionally required to travel to municipal court for DWI trials. For instance, such bodies might explore the feasibility of remote video conferences at trials or de bene esse videotaped depositions, so that such witnesses need not physically appear in municipal courts late at night. Another possibility that can be considered is whether the scheduling or venues of DWI trials might be altered to minimize logistical burdens on medical providers and laboratory personnel, including the creation of special daytime court calendars to accommodate such witnesses. Again, we leave such innovations to the creative processes of legislation and rule-making.
In sum, we express our hopeful expectation that the new rules of confrontation announced in Crawford can be implemented in our State in a fashion that does not thwart the efficient and fair administration of justice in the municipal courts, nor impose excessive burdens on law enforcement personnel and medical providers.
Having accepted defendant’s contention that he was constitutionally entitled to confront the respective authors of the State Police lab reports and the blood sample certificate admitted at his DWI trial, we finally consider whether his conviction remains valid by virtue of the arresting officer’s independent observations of his apparent intoxication. For the reasons delineated at length by the Law Division judge, we agree that defendant’s conviction under N.J.S.A. 39:4-50 should be affirmed based upon those unrebutted observations.
The Court’s suggestion that testimony by video could be a basis to minimize the burden on witnesses would likely run afoul of the state and federal Confrontation Clause. The Confrontation Clause provides a defendant the right to “confront” adverse witnesses face-to-face. That core guarantee helps to ensure the integrity of the factfinding process by making it more difficult for witnesses to lie.
It is more difficult and less effective to cross-examining witnesses via video than it is to do so in-person. The right to face-to-face confrontation is violated when the complaining witnesses can avoid viewing the adverse party and adverse attorney while testifying. See Coy v. Iowa, 487 U.S. 1012 (1988).
