Testimony un-compelled

HARRISBURG, Penn. — The Pennsylvania Superior Court ruled that the trial court should not have compelled a wife to testify and waive her spousal communications privilege in this case where her husband was killed in a “train accident” shortly after police came to his home; the couple’s former neighbor alleged that the husband had sexually assaulted her when she was between 5 and 11 years old. Their phone conversation about the police visit and allegations was protected as a “confidential marital conversation.”