Opinion ID: 2559012
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Failure to request Kloiber charge

Text: Appellant next claims that direct appeal counsel was ineffective for failing to raise trial counsel's ineffectiveness for failing to request a cautionary instruction regarding N.M.'s identification testimony pursuant to Commonwealth v. Kloiber, 378 Pa. 412, 106 A.2d 820 (1954), cert. denied, 348 U.S. 875, 75 S.Ct. 112, 99 L.Ed. 688 (1954). Appellant alleges that N.M. wavered during cross-examination and then recanted her testimony that she actually saw appellant hit the victim, which appellant argues should have cast serious doubt on N.M.'s identification of him as the perpetrator. Appellant alleges that the trial court compounded the problem and manifested bias by questioning N.M. on re-direct examination, which appellant says improperly influenced N.M.'s testimony. Instead, appellant argues, the trial court should have sua sponte issued a Kloiber charge. [13] Appellant further contends that the lighting was poor at the time of the murder, as it was nighttime, and that N.M. was not well-positioned to see what actually happened. The Commonwealth responds that this claim is meritless because none of the established grounds for a Kloiber charge was met. The Commonwealth submits that appellant's claim is really an improper back-door challenge to N.M.'s credibility and is not within the ambit of Kloiber, which focuses on the circumstances of the out-of-court event and the actual physical ability of the witness to see and identify a defendant. The Commonwealth posits that N.M. plainly had an opportunity to view appellant, whom she knew well, during the length of the altercation, both when appellant was attacking her mother and when he was attacking her. The Commonwealth maintains that, even if the entirety of the assault was not in N.M.'s direct line of vision at every moment, the fact remains that she was close enough to see and identify appellant clearly during crucial moments in the ordeal. The Commonwealth adds that any uncertainty in N.M.'s testimony did not involve the identity of the attacker, but was limited to certain aspects of the ordeal. But, at no point, the Commonwealth emphasizes, was N.M. equivocal in her unfailing, repeated identification of appellant, whom she knew, as her mother's killer: to her neighbor, to the police, to her treating doctor, from a photographic array, at the preliminary hearing, and at trial. As there was no basis for a Kloiber instruction, the Commonwealth asserts, appellant cannot prove his layered claim of counsel ineffectiveness. The PCRA court agreed that the trial record here did not support a Kloiber instruction. The court noted that N.M. knew appellant personally prior to the incident, adding that because N.M. was also physically attacked during the incident, logic suggests that she must have been close enough to the perpetrator to recognize him. The court further noted that the record indicated that there was sufficient light in the apartment for an identification. The court added that at no time had N.M. ever indicated that someone else was responsible for the attack, nor had she wavered in her identification of appellant as the perpetrator. Thus, the court concluded, trial counsel was not ineffective for failing to request a Kloiber charge and direct appeal counsel was not ineffective for failing to raise trial counsel's ineffectiveness in this regard. Under Kloiber, a charge that a witness'[s] identification should be viewed with caution is required where the eyewitness: (1) did not have an opportunity to clearly view the defendant; (2) equivocated on the identification of the defendant; or (3) had a problem making an identification in the past. Commonwealth v. Gibson, 547 Pa. 71, 688 A.2d 1152, 1163 (1997) (citing Kloiber ). Where an eyewitness has had protracted and unobstructed views of the defendant and consistently identified the defendant throughout the investigation and at trial, there is no need for a Kloiber instruction. Commonwealth v. Dennis, 552 Pa. 331, 715 A.2d 404, 411 (1998). When the witness already knows the defendant, this prior familiarity creates an independent basis for the witness's in-court identification of the defendant and weakens ineffectiveness claims based on counsel failure to seek a Kloiber instruction. See Commonwealth v. Fisher, 572 Pa. 105, 813 A.2d 761, 770-71 (2002) (Opinion Announcing Judgment of the Court) (witness's in-court identification valid based on witness having known defendant for eleven years); Commonwealth v. [Freddie] Johnson, 433 Pa. 34, 248 A.2d 840, 841-42 (1969) (witness had known defendant for three years prior to robbery and murder; no trial court error in not issuing Kloiber instruction); see also Commonwealth v. [Clarence] Johnson, 419 Pa.Super. 625, 615 A.2d 1322, 1335-36 (1992) (witness knew defendant and had seen him on several occasions prior to murder; defendant not entitled to Kloiber instruction because witness's in-court identification was supported by independent basis). Appellant has not shown that any of the three disjunctive Kloiber circumstances was present here; thus, his underlying claim that counsel's performance was deficient lacks arguable merit. Although N.M. may not have witnessed the entirety of the attack upon her mother, particularly its grisly conclusion, she was present for enough of itincluding when she herself was also attacked by appellantto identify him as the perpetrator, especially since there is no disputing that she knew appellant already. [14] In addition, although N.M.'s testimony under cross-examination was uncertain as to some specific details of the killing, she never equivocated in her identification testimony, nor did appellant demonstrate any issue with N.M.'s prior identifications of him as the assailant. Furthermore, N.M.'s testimony established that she had protracted and unobstructed views of appellant during crucial parts of the attack, especially when she went to see what was happening to her mother and appellant attacked her. Any perceived weaknesses in N.M.'s testimony attributable to her tender years, the circumstances of the horrific experience, the subject matter, and her ability to recall details were matters of credibility for the jury as factfinder to decide; but those issues did not undermine N.M.'s actual physical ability to identify appellant at the time and place of the murder, so as to trigger the special identification testimony concerns underlying the Kloiber line of decisions. Accordingly, appellant's layered claim concerning the absence of a Kloiber charge fails.