Title: Com. v. Jarvis

State: pennsylvania

Issuer: Pennsylvania Supreme Court

Document:

482 Pa. 598 (1978) 394 A.2d 483 COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania v. Harvey G. JARVIS, Appellant. Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. Argued October 19, 1978. Decided November 18, 1978. *599 *600 F. Emmet Ciccone, Philadelphia, for appellant. Edward G. Rendell, Dist. Atty., Steven H. Goldblatt, Deputy Dist. Atty. for Law, Robert B. Lawler, Chief, Appeals Div., Gaile McLaughlin Barthold, Asst. Dist. Attys., Philadelphia, for appellee. Before EAGEN, C.J., and O'BRIEN, ROBERTS, NIX, MANDERINO and LARSEN, JJ. O'BRIEN, Justice. Appellant, Harvey G. Jarvis, was convicted by a jury of voluntary manslaughter and a weapons violation. Post-verdict motions were denied and appellant was sentenced to one to ten years' imprisonment for the voluntary manslaughter conviction, with a consecutive probationary term of five years for the weapons violation. This direct appeal followed.[1] The facts are as follows. On March 8, 1975, appellant was tending bar at Ed and Mickey's Chaise Lounge Bar in North Philadelphia. At various times during the day, the victim, *601 Ernest Harville, had been in the bar arguing with appellant about Selena Harris, who evidently had been seeing both men. During these arguments, the victim told appellant, "Either you're going to kill me or I'm sure as hell going to kill you." At approximately 11:00 p.m., appellant received a phone call from Ms. Harris telling him that Harville had been to her apartment with a gun stating that he was going to kill appellant. After receiving this call, appellant took a gun from behind the bar and placed it in his back pocket. Shortly thereafter, the victim arrived at the bar, but various patrons prevented him from entering. At that time, Ms. Harris called the bar and asked to speak with the victim. Harville was allowed to enter the bar and went into a phone booth. Since the victim appeared to have calmed down upon entering the bar, appellant approached the phone booth. As he approached the booth, he heard the victim state, "Here comes [Jarvis] now. I'm going to blow his . . . brains out." Because appellant thought that the victim was reaching for a gun, he pulled his own weapon and shot the victim three times. The victim died as a result of these wounds. Appellant first alleges that the trial court erred when it failed to instruct the jury on involuntary manslaughter. We do not agree with appellant for two reasons. The facts are as follows. When appellant was indicted, he was charged with murder, voluntary manslaughter, involuntary manslaughter and various weapons offenses. At the commencement of trial, appellant's counsel requested that the involuntary manslaughter indictment be consolidated with the other charges, "As I [defense counsel] intend to ask for a charge on involuntary manslaughter at the end of trial." The trial court, however, refused the motion for consolidation. Subsequently, appellant never requested that the trial court instruct the jury on involuntary manslaughter. Under these circumstances, we believe this claim has been waived. Pa.R.Crim.P. 1119 provides: As appellant neither submitted a written request for an involuntary manslaughter instruction nor objected to the court's failure to so charge, we believe this claim has been waived.[2] Appellant cites Commonwealth v. Moore, 463 Pa. 317, 344 A.2d 850 (1975) [opinion of the court by Justice (now Chief Justice) Eagen and by Justice O'Brien], to buttress his position that the court erred in not charging on involuntary manslaughter. There, we held that where evidence existed which would support a finding of involuntary manslaughter, it was error to refuse a motion to consolidate an involuntary manslaughter indictment with the other charges. In Moore, however, the defendant, in addition to requesting consolidation, specifically requested that the court charge the jury that involuntary manslaughter was a permissible verdict. In the instant case, no such request accompanied appellant's motion to consolidate. Further, the facts in this case would not support an involuntary manslaughter charge and appellant claimed to have shot the victim in self-defense. The Crimes Code provides: Since appellant presented no evidence of involuntary manslaughter, Moore is inapplicable, even dismissing appellant's failure to specifically request an involuntary manslaughter instruction. We thus find no error in the trial court's failure to charge on involuntary manslaughter. Appellant next cites five instances of alleged prosecutorial misconduct during the district attorney's closing remarks, claiming that any one of the five entitles him to a new trial. We will discuss each alleged instance of prosecutorial misconduct ad seriatim. The American Bar Association Standards Relating to the Prosecution Function and the Defense Function § 5.8 (Approved Draft 1971) provides: It is with these standards in mind that we must review appellant's claims of alleged prosecutorial misconduct. Commonwealth v. Cherry, 474 Pa. 295, 378 A.2d 800 (1977). *604 Appellant first argues that the prosecutor exceeded the bounds of permissible comment when he suggested that a certain Commonwealth witness was very credible. Appellant, however, neither objected to this remark nor included it in written post-verdict motions. Thus, the claim has not been preserved for appellate review. Commonwealth v. Blair, 460 Pa. 31, 331 A.2d 213 (1975); Commonwealth v. Clair, 458 Pa. 418, 326 A.2d 272 (1974). Appellant next complains of the prosecution's reference to a "love triangle" in the instant case. As the evidence presented at trial showed that Selena Harris had been seeing both appellant and the victim, we find no error in the prosecutor's use of the term. Appellant's next complaint concerns the following exchange: Appellant's objection is threefold. He first complains of the characterization of his testimony as that of a liar. He further objects to the use of both the terms "set up" and "scheme". We first believe that the claim concerning the prosecutor's reference to appellant as a liar has been waived. When counsel objected, the objection could have referred to either the "liar" comment or the use of the term "set up." By failing to specify that his objection went to the "liar" reference, we believe that portion of the claim is waived, especially since the court sustained appellant's objection. Cf. Commonwealth v. Glenn, 459 Pa. 545, 330 A.2d 535 (1974). The objection to the "set up" remark and the use of the term "scheme" has been preserved. As we stated in Commonwealth v. Stoltzfus, 462 Pa. 43, 61, 337 A.2d 873, 882 (1975): We do not believe that the prosecutor's remark that the killing was a "set up" and a "scheme" is of such a prejudicial nature as to require granting of a new trial.[4] Appellant next complains of the following portion of the district attorney's summation: We find nothing objectionable in the above-quoted portion of the prosecutor's closing. At trial, appellant called Dr. Robert Sadoff, a psychiatrist, who testified that appellant's trial testimony about the incident was the same as appellant had told Dr. Sadoff during his psychiatric examination. Specifically, Dr. Sadoff testified: When viewed with the doctor's testimony in mind, the prosecutor's comments told the jury no more than (1) the jury did not have to believe expert testimony simply because the expert was allowed to express his opinion, and (2) simply because Dr. Sadoff repeated appellant's trial testimony did not make that testimony any more credible. We can thus find no error in this portion of the prosecutor's closing. Finally, the district attorney told the jury: Appellant now complains of this remark, but since he neither objected to the remark at trial nor included it in post-verdict motions, this question has not been preserved for appellate review. Commonwealth v. Blair, supra; Commonwealth v. Clair, supra. Judgments of sentence affirmed. *608 POMEROY, J., took no part in the consideration or decision of this case. NIX and MANDERINO, JJ., concur in the result. [1] The weapons offense was appealed to Superior Court, which certified the appeal to this court. [2] Appellant submitted the following point for charge: "You have three possible verdicts: "(a) guilty of murder in the third degree; or "(b) guilty of voluntary manslaughter; or "(c) not guilty." [3] At the close of this prosecutor's argument and prior to the court's charging the jury, appellant moved for a mistrial on these grounds. The motion was refused. [4] When speaking about the three alleged errors in this group, we can see no prejudice to appellant. All three comments were part of the prosecutor's argument attempting to convince the jury that appellant was guilty of murder of the first degree. The jury evidently disagreed with the district attorney, as the verdict of guilty of voluntary manslaughter is consistent with a finding of an imperfect self-defense claim.