State v. Gove

The State of Wisconsin (State) seeks review of a court of appeals’ decision which reversed the conviction of Steven A. Gove. (Gove). Gove was convicted of first-degree sexual assault of a five-year-old girl (T.S.). The court of appeals concluded that Gove’s right to confrontation was violated when the trial court declared T.S. unavailable as a witness and allowed certain out-of-court statements to be introduced against Gove at trial. We conclude that Gove, by failing to object, waived any challenge to the trial court’s unavailability finding. We further conclude that consideration of the…