Opinion ID: 2317503
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Finding of Guilt Pretrial Publicity

Text: Prior to trial, appellant filed a motion requesting a change of venue which was denied. He now contends that the death of the Verona policeman, Officer Zanella, and the events surrounding appellant's escape, arrest, and pending trial generated so much inflammatory publicity that he could not receive a fair trial in Allegheny County. This claim raises two questions: (1) whether the pretrial publicity was so prejudicial that only a change of venue could guarantee appellant a fair trial; (2) whether the precautions taken by the trial court and the conduct of the voir dire were sufficient to provide appellant a fair trial. The day after appellant's escape and the shooting of Officer Zanella, the media reported the events and mentioned Hoss as the individual who had escaped and allegedly shot Officer Zanella. During the next few weeks, the publicity intensified, first after the abducted Karen Malgott was released in West Virginia and identified appellant as the abductor, and second after the media emphasized police suspicions that Hoss had kidnapped a Mrs. Peugeot and her daughter [3] and a nationwide search for appellant had commenced. During this same time period, a television interview was conducted with a Mrs. Thompson, mother of the abducted Mrs. Peugeot. The period of intensive publicity lasted for about six weeks after appellant's escape. [4] On October 30, 1969, the trial court issued an order prohibiting any statements by counsel about any aspect of the case and also wrote letters to all the radio and television stations and the newspapers requesting an abatement of publicity so as not to prejudice appellant's right to a fair trial. From the record, it appears that the court's request was honored because the publicity abated and subsequent news reports were limited to a factual account of the procedural developments of the case. Courts have not been reluctant to intervene where inflammatory and prejudicial pretrial publicity has undermined the right of the accused to a fair trial. In Rideau v. Louisiana, 373 U.S. 723, 83 S. Ct. 1417 (1963), the United States Supreme Court found a denial of due process in a refusal to grant a change of venue where shortly after defendant's arrest a twenty-minute film showing portions of defendant's interrogation and his confession was aired over the local television stations. The film was broadcast three times in three days and the record indicated that sizeable number of the local population of 150,000 people saw the film. Three members of the jury stated on voir dire that they had seen the film but the challenges for cause to exclude them were denied. The Court held that due process of law in this case required a trial before a jury drawn from a community of people who had not seen and heard Rideau's televised `interview'. Id. at 727, 83 S. Ct. at 1420; see Irvin v. Dowd, 366 U.S. 717, 725-27, 81 S. Ct. 1639, 1644-45 (1961); cf. Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U.S. 333, 86 S. Ct. 1507 (1966); Estes v. Texas, 381 U.S. 532, 85 S. Ct. 1628 (1965). See also ABA Project on Minimum Standards for Criminal Justice, Standards Relating to Fair Trial and Free Press § 3.2 (Approved draft, 1966). The present case does not approach the dimensions of pretrial publicity found in Rideau and Irvin. In Rideau the entire community was exposed to a live transcription of the accused's confession. In Irvin, the barrage of newspaper accounts not only announced the accused's confession but repeatedly thereafter referred to the accused as the confessed slayer and reported all the details of the accused's offer to plead guilty. In addition, many editorials condemned his remorseless nature. The day before trial, another confession of the accused was reported. The effects of this pervasive publicity were shown by the voir dire; of the 12 jurors selected, 8 believed the accused to be guilty. In marked contrast, most of the publicity in the present case involved accounts of appellant's escape, descriptions of the crimes which were largely factual in nature, and the reports on the police efforts to apprehend appellant, as well as reports of the procedural developments of the case after appellant's arrest. The most damaging piece of publicity was the news report, which the FBI refused to confirm, that appellant had confessed. No text of the confession ever appeared in print. Another article, headlined Smart Guy Hoss Sees His Luck With Law Run Out, appeared in which a copy of appellant's FBI wanted poster was printed. The present case is similar to the facts involved in Commonwealth v. Swanson, 432 Pa. 293, 248 A. 2d 12 (1968), and Commonwealth v. Lopinson, 427 Pa. 284, 234 A. 2d 552 (1967). In Swanson, the arrest for armed robbery was preceded by a barrage of publicity (30 newspaper articles and 45 television newscasts in Cambria County  the scene of the crime) and the accused was even described as a punk, arrogant person. The involvement of the accused in other crimes for which he had not yet been tried was repeatedly referred to by the media. The accused was filmed walking the one and one-half blocks from the jail to his preliminary hearing and arraignment. We held in Swanson that because most of the reporting was factual in nature and the only potentially damaging publicity was the speculation by a television station as to the motive for the crime, the denial of change of venue was proper. 432 Pa. 293, 299-300, 248 A. 2d 12, 15-16 (1968). We cannot find that the pretrial publicity in this case so tainted the community of 1 1/3 million people as to make a fair trial impossible. We consider it significant that as in Swanson (9 months) and in Lopinson (7 months), there was a lengthy time period between the arrest and trial of more than five months. Furthermore, because of the court's use of control measures, which will be discussed shortly, the publicity was markedly abated during the interval from October 30, 1969 (the date of the court's order regarding publicity) up to the time of trial in March, 1970. In Swanson and Lopinson there is no indication that such extensive judicial controls were used. In the present case as in Swanson, none of the jurors selected stated on voir dire that they had formed opinions as to appellant's guilt. The trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying the change of venue motion. Commonwealth v. Swanson, 432 Pa. 293, 299, 248 A. 2d 12, 15 (1968); Commonwealth v. Richardson, 392 Pa. 528, 540, 140 A. 2d 828, 835 (1958). See also ABA Project, Fair Trial and Free Press, supra. Appellant's counsel submitted 83 proposed questions for voir dire of which only 27 were approved by the court. Appellant now contends that the trial court erred in refusing to approve all of the submitted questions. It is clearly established that the examination of jurors under voir dire is solely for the purpose of securing a competent, fair, impartial and unprejudiced jury. . . . Neither counsel for the defendant nor for the Commonwealth should be permitted to . . . ask direct or hypothetical questions designed to disclose what a juror's present impression or opinion may be or what his attitude or decision will likely be under certain facts which may be developed in the trial of the case. While considerable latitude should be permitted on a voir dire, the inquiry should be strictly confined to disclosing qualifications or lack of qualifications of a juror and whether a juror has formed a fixed opinion or may be otherwise subject to disqualifications for cause. Commonwealth v. McGrew, 375 Pa. 518, 525, 100 A. 2d 467, 470 (1953) (citations omitted); see Commonwealth v. Swanson, 432 Pa. 293, 299, 248 A. 2d 12, 15 (1968); Commonwealth v. Lopinson, 427 Pa. 284, 297-98, 234 A. 2d 552, 560-61 (1967). Furthermore, the only legitimate inquiry in this area was whether or not the juror had formed a fixed opinion in the case as to the accused's guilt or innocence. Commonwealth v. Swanson, 432 Pa. 293, 300, 248 A. 2d 12, 16 (1968); Commonwealth v. Corbin, 426 Pa. 24, 26, 231 A. 2d 138, 139 (1967). A review of the questions approved reveals that appellant had opportunity to gauge the amount of exposure of each venireman to the publicity in this case. [5] Once the extent of exposure was ascertained, it remained only to determine whether the veniremen had an opinion formed as to the guilt of the accused. Of the 138 jurors questioned on voir dire, only 26 stated they had formed an opinion as to the guilt of appellant. Significantly, in almost every such instance, the court sustained appellant's challenge for cause. Not one of the 12 jurors or 2 alternates selected stated that they had formed an opinion as to the guilt of appellant although all had heard of appellant through the media and about half were familiar with the kidnapping of the Peugeots. On this record, we cannot find an abuse of discretion by the trial court. Commonwealth v. Lopinson, 427 Pa. 283, 298, 234 A. 2d 552, 560 (1967). See also ABA Project, Fair Trial and Free Press, supra, at § 3.4 [6] . The precautions of the trial court, taken to control and minimize pretrial publicity, were reasonable and effective in seeking to guarantee appellant a fair trial. The court's request to counsel and the media to eliminate prejudicial publicity is in accord with Sheppard v. Maxwell and other authorities. [7]