Rule 7.Admissibility of certain documents

Rule 7 removes a category of witness from family court.

What it does

Five kinds of document and written statement are admissible in evidence without requiring that the person or institution issuing them be present in court. No custodian, no records clerk, no treating physician called merely to authenticate.

The five

• a written statement of a child's school attendance, signed by a school principal or duly authorized school official;
• the school report card showing attendance, grades and other pertinent information — provided it is a report sent out at periodic intervals by the school, so a document produced for the litigation does not qualify;
• a physician's written statement showing that a patient was treated at certain times and the type of ailment;
• a written report of the Department of Social Services or another agency reporting a home investigation or any other report the court required — except where that agency is a party; and
• an employer's written statement of weekly or monthly wages for a given period, and W-2 statements, income tax returns and other reports of like nature.

The two limits worth noticing

The report-card provision requires a periodic report. The agency-report provision switches off when the agency is a party — which in an abuse or neglect case brought by the Department is precisely when its report matters most, and precisely when the other side has the strongest claim to cross-examine its author.

What it does not do

Rule 7 addresses who must appear, not whether the contents are otherwise admissible or how much weight they carry. Relevance and the rest of the evidence rules still apply, and Rule 21(f)(3) separately requires all evidence at a temporary hearing to comply with the South Carolina Rules of Evidence. What Rule 7 supplies is the foundation testimony a party would otherwise have to subpoena a school, a doctor's office or a payroll department to obtain.