US Supreme Court Building

The U.S. Supreme Court agreed Thursday to hear the state of Ohio's appeal in a case where a Cleveland man's conviction of child abuse was overturned.

(Pablo Martinez Monsivais/Associated Press)

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- The U.S. Supreme Court agreed Thursday to hear an appeal from Ohio in a case in which a Cleveland man's conviction for child abuse was overturned.

Prosecutors from Cuyahoga County appealed to the Supreme Court in May after the Ohio Supreme Court ruled against them in October 2013.

The case centers on whether a child's out-of-court statements to a teacher in response to the teacher's questions about potential child abuse qualify as statements subject to the Sixth Amendment's confrontation clause.

The case involved Darius Clark of Cleveland, who was convicted in 2010 of four counts of felonious assault, two counts of child endangering resulting in serious physical harm and two counts of domestic violence.

Prosecutors charged Clark in March 2010, saying he injured his girlfriend's 3-year-old boy and the boy's 22-month-old sister. Authorities were notified after teachers at the boy's day school saw his injuries and questioned him about who had hurt him.

At trial in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court, the young boy was found incompetent to testify, but the court permitted his statements to be admitted through testimony of the teachers.

Clark ultimately was sentenced to 28 years in prison.

The Ohio 8th District Court of Appeals overturned Clark's conviction, holding that the use of the boy's statements violated Clark's right to confront his accusers.

The Ohio Supreme Court, in a 4-3 ruling, agreed.

The court, in a decision written by Justice Terrence O'Donnell, said a teacher has a legal obligation to report actual or suspected cases of child abuse. As such, teachers act in a dual capacity as both an instructor and as an agent of the state for law enforcement purposes when questioning a child about a suspected abuse case.

In this case, O'Donnell wrote, the "teachers were 'shocked' by his injuries and immediately suspected child abuse; they separated [the boy] from other students and in a formal question-and-answer format, they sought facts ... to identify the person responsible."

Their purpose was information-seeking as agents of the law and the statements should have been excluded, O'Donnell wrote.