The Admissions Exception to the Hearsay Rule
Admissions, which in the broad sense refer to any statement made by a declarant and tendered as evidence at trial by the opposing party, are admissible as an exception to the rule against hearsay: R. v. Foreman (2002), 2002 CanLII 6305 (ON CA), 169 C.C.C. (3d) 489 , 62 O.R. (3d) 204 (C.A.) , citing J. Sopinka, S. Lederman and A. Bryan, The Law of Evidence in Canada , 2nd ed. (Markham, Ont.: Butterworths, 1999), at p. 291. The admissibility of an admission rests on the theory of the adversary system that what a party has previously stated can be admitted against the party in whose mouth it does not lie to complain of the unreliability of his or her own statements. As set out by the Supreme Court of Canada in R. v. Evans , [1993] 3 S.C.R. 653, 1993 CanLII 86 (SCC): (a) The admissions exception to the hearsay rule does not depend on a circumstantial guarantee of trustworthiness; (b) The judge must first be satisfied that there is some evidence ...