Opinion ID: 2289965
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Whether the District Attorney Made Adverse Comment Upon Defendant's Refusal To Testify on the Merits of the Charges Against Him

Text: In his closing argument, the district attorney commented: But, there is the additional issue, of course the ultimate issue, of whether or not he did it and you heard him when he took the stand and you never once heard his attorney ask him whether he was responsible for the killing of George Koffke. And you never once heard his attorney ask him what he was doing on that particular evening. The appellant asserts that this is reversible error as an improper comment upon the accused's failure to testify. [6] There are two possible bases of support for such an assertion. The first is a Pennsylvania statute, the Act of May 23, 1887, P.L. 158, Section 10, 19 P.S. 631, which provides in part: [n]or may the neglect or refusal of any defendant, actually upon trial in a criminal court, to offer himself as a witness be treated as creating any presumption against him, or be adversely referred to by court or counsel during trial. The second basis is the decision of the United States Supreme Court in Griffin v. California, 380 U.S. 609 (1965), which held that the Fifth Amendment, by its application to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment, forbids either comment by the prosecution on the accused's silence or instruction by the court that such silence is evidence of guilt. The Act of 1887 has been generally construed to permit a comment by the court or district attorney that the Commonwealth's case is uncontradicted or undenied, but to forbid adverse reference to defendant's failure to take the witness stand or the drawing of an unfavorable inference therefrom. Commonwealth v. Bolish, 381 Pa. 500, 522, 113 A. 2d 464 (1955); Commonwealth v. Kloiber, 378 Pa. 412, 419, 106 A. 2d 820, cert. denied, 348 U.S. 875 (1954); Commonwealth v. Chickerella, 251 Pa. 160, 163, 96 Atl. 129 (1915); Commonwealth v. Smith, 186 Pa. Superior Ct. 89, 97, 140 A. 2d 347 (1958); Commonwealth v. Bova, 180 Pa. Superior Ct. 359, 362, 119 A. 2d 866 (1956). In a case decided subsequent to the United States Supreme Court's decision in Griffin v. California, supra , the Superior Court concluded that the Griffin holding comports with our interpretation of the Pennsylvania Statute. Commonwealth v. Reichard, 211 Pa. Superior Ct. 55, 233 A. 2d 603 (1967). That case involved an alibi defense to a charge of robbery, presented by two alibi witnesess on behalf of one defendant and none on behalf of the co-defendant. The district attorney, in his argument to the jury, stated, I ask you one thing, did you hear one word of denial? The court found that in light of the record this statement implied that the defendants themselves were the only one who could and should have denied the charges against them, and that the jury might reasonably infer from this statement that their failure to do so was evidence of their guilt. It accordingly held that the statement was adverse under the Act, as well as violative of the defendants' rights under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution. 211 Pa. Superior Ct. at 60. There is no need for us now to determine whether the Act of 1887 as interpreted by our decisions is fully equivalent to the federal anti-comment rule as interpreted by Griffin and other cases. A criminal defendant is entitled to the maximum protection afforded by either the federal or state standard. In the present case, as we have held, the appellant had made but a partial waiver of his constitutional privilege. The comment of the assistant district attorney certainly invited an adverse inference by the jury from the failure of the appellant to testify as to his innocence. [7] We think the assistant district attorney went too far, both under the Act of 1887 and under the Fifth Amendment proscription as enunciated in Griffin. So to hold, however, does not end consideration of this issue, for a new trial is not required if the error committed by the assistant district attorney was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18 (1967). The United States Supreme Court has recognized this limitation on Griffin in Anderson v. Nelson, 390 U.S. 523 (1968), and Fontaine v. California, 390 U.S. 593 (1968). In the former case the court held that: . . . comment on a petitioner's failure to testify cannot be labeled harmless error in a case where such a comment is extensive, where an inference of guilt from silence is stressed to the jury as a basis for conviction, and where there is evidence that could have supported acquittal. In both Anderson and Fontaine, the court noted the insufficiencies of the state's case and the likelihood that without the adverse comments the jury would not have returned guilty verdicts. The case before us stands in sharp contrast to Anderson and Fontaine. Here the comment was not extensive, no inference of guilt from silence was stressed to the jury, and there was no evidence that could have supported acquittal. The assistant district attorney's statement was lacking the vindictive qualities of those questioned in Griffin, Anderson and Fontaine, and must be viewed in light of the fact that here the defendant was in fact a witness, even though for a limited purpose. The only ground on which Camm could have been acquitted was not evidence of his innocence, for there was none, but a finding that the confession was involuntary. The facts stated in the confession, while subject to disbelief by the jury, were not put in issue in any way, and there was damaging circumstantial evidence in the form of a witness' testimony which was corroborative of the confession.