Background
On August 12, 2014, Eva Pena was injured while boarding a Rhode Island Public Transit Authority (RIPTA) bus at Kennedy Plaza in Providence. She alleged that the bus driver negligently closed the doors on her as she stepped aboard, causing her to fall and sustain severe injuries, including a leg wound and lasting mobility impairments. Pena filed suit in 2015, but passed away in 2019; her estate, administered by her son Galbin Fernandez, was substituted as plaintiff. The case did not reach trial until September 2024.
A central dispute at trial arose from testimony by RIPTA supervisor Todd Millard. Millard stated that at the scene he located a bystander who spoke Spanish and used her to communicate with Pena. Through this unidentified interpreter, Millard claimed Pena told him she had tripped—directly contradicting Pena’s own deposition testimony (taken through a certified interpreter) that the bus doors closed on her, and her son’s account of a phone call she made moments after the incident. Millard had not mentioned the interpreter in his incident report written the day of the event; he first disclosed her existence nearly five years later at his deposition. Plaintiff moved in limine to exclude Millard’s account of what the interpreter relayed, arguing inadmissible double hearsay, but the trial justice reserved and ultimately allowed the evidence. The jury returned a verdict for RIPTA.
Plaintiff moved for a new trial, arguing the interpreter testimony was improperly admitted. The trial justice denied the motion, candidly acknowledging the issue was novel and a “gray area” in Rhode Island law, and suggesting the Supreme Court was the proper forum for resolution. Plaintiff appealed.
The Court’s Holding
The Rhode Island Supreme Court reversed the denial of the new trial motion and remanded for a new trial, holding that the trial justice abused her discretion in admitting Millard’s testimony and report recounting what Pena allegedly said through the unidentified Spanish interpreter. Applying its own century-old precedents in State v. Epstein (1903) and State v. Terline (1902), the Court reaffirmed that testimony recounting a foreign-language speaker’s statements as relayed by an interpreter constitutes hearsay, because the testifying witness has no personal knowledge of what was actually said—only of what the interpreter told them.
The Court declined to adopt the “language conduit” or “agency” theories embraced by several federal circuits, which treat an interpreter’s translation as the original speaker’s own statement and thus not an additional layer of hearsay. The agency exception recognized in Terline was held inapplicable on these facts: the interpreter was recruited by Millard from among bystanders, not by Pena, and Pena never acknowledged the interpreter’s presence in her deposition or in her phone call to her son immediately after the incident. The Court further found the evidence lacked any indicia of reliability—the interpreter’s identity was unknown, her qualifications unverifiable, her existence uncorroborated, and Millard’s failure to note her in his same-day incident report weighed heavily against trustworthiness.
The Court also found the error was not harmless. Millard’s account that Pena said she tripped was the only evidence of its kind and stood in direct conflict with Pena’s deposition and Fernandez’s trial testimony. Because the erroneously admitted evidence was not cumulative and plainly bore on the central question of negligence, its admission affected the substantial rights of the parties and required a new trial.
Key Takeaways
- In Rhode Island, testimony recounting what a non-English speaker said through an unidentified, informal interpreter is hearsay and subject to exclusion; the Court reaffirmed Epstein and Terline rather than adopting the federal “language conduit” theory.
- The agency exception—under which an interpreter’s translation is attributed to the original speaker—does not apply when the interpreter was recruited by the adverse party and the original speaker never acknowledged or ratified the interpreter’s role.
- Reliability factors that courts may consider include: whether the interpreter is identified, their qualifications and language proficiency, any motive to distort, which party procured the interpreter, and the timing of disclosure—here, a nearly five-year gap between the incident and first disclosure of the interpreter’s existence weighed decisively against admission.
- An evidentiary error warranting a new trial must affect the substantial rights of the parties; where improperly admitted testimony is the only evidence of its kind and directly contradicts other trial testimony on the core issue, it is not harmless.
Why It Matters
This decision provides the first modern guidance from the Rhode Island Supreme Court on a question that has divided state and federal courts: whether an informal, unidentified interpreter creates an additional layer of hearsay when a witness testifies to what an interpreter told them a non-English speaker said. By anchoring its analysis in Rhode Island’s own precedents rather than importing the federal conduit doctrine, the Court signals that parties relying on interpreter-mediated statements bear a meaningful burden of establishing the interpreter’s identity, qualifications, and connection to the original speaker before such evidence will be admitted.
Practically, the ruling has significant implications for accident investigations and incident reports involving non-English-speaking individuals. First responders, supervisors, and others who routinely use informal bystander interpreters at the scene should document the interpreter’s identity and qualifications contemporaneously—or risk having the resulting statements excluded at trial as unreliable hearsay.