Short answer. Yes, if the conditions are met. A witness with no recollection of the facts may still testify from a writing they made, if they can swear it correctly stated the transaction when made — but the rule says such evidence must be received with caution.
What the law says
A witness may also testify from such a writing or record, though he or she retains no recollection of the particular facts, if he or she is able to swear that the writing or record correctly stated the transaction when made; but such evidence must be received with caution.
Rule 132, Section 16 — When witness may refer to memorandum. Read the full provision →
This is different from ordinary memory refreshing
Section 16 addresses two related but distinct situations. The first is a witness who refreshes their memory using something they wrote or recorded at the time, or while the fact was still fresh — after refreshing, the witness testifies from their own recollection, now jogged by the writing. Your situation is the second, different one: a witness with no remaining recollection at all, who would testify directly from the record itself rather than from a memory the record merely helped revive.
The specific requirement for testifying with no recollection
For this second situation, the article sets a specific condition: the witness may testify from the writing or record, though he or she retains no recollection of the particular facts, if he or she is able to swear that the writing or record correctly stated the transaction when made. The witness does not need to remember the underlying facts — they need to be able to vouch, under oath, for the accuracy of the record at the time it was made.
Why the rule builds in caution
Even where that condition is satisfied, the article adds a clear qualifier: such evidence must be received with caution. This reflects that testimony given this way is inherently weaker than ordinary testimony from present memory — the witness is vouching for a record's past accuracy rather than recounting events they actually recall, which is a meaningfully different, and less directly verifiable, kind of evidence.
What this means for your witness
If your witness genuinely cannot recall the details but is able to swear that what they wrote down accurately reflected the transaction at the time they wrote it, Section 16 does allow them to testify from that record rather than being excluded for lack of memory. The tradeoff is that the resulting testimony is treated as evidence to be weighed carefully, not evidence entitled to the same weight as a witness testifying from clear, present recollection.