Opinion ID: 1993806
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: David Guy Baldwin, the undersigned.

Text: B) A woman, name and address presently unknown to me, except that I believe her first name to be either Loretta or Lola and her residence to be Seaside, who has reddish-brown hair, is approximately 30 to 35 years of age, is approximately 5 ft. 5 in. in height and about 125 to 130 lb. in weight. C) A man whose name and address is presently unknown to me, driving a 1953 or 1956 Mercury, who stopped and assisted me when my car broke down somewhere between Allentown and Trenton at about 7:00 A.M. Saturday morning, October 3rd, but whom I believe to be an employee at Thermoids. D) One or more service station attendants whose names and addresses I believe to be: Elmer Schappell, 3151 Broad Street, Trenton, New Jersey, and Elmer Huntington, 717 Trenton Road, Fairless Hills, Pennsylvania, who are employed at an Esso Station in the vicinity of the Broad Street Circle which is called the White Horse Circle, on Broad Street in Trenton, one of whom returned with me to my car and towed the same to the station and thereafter again towed the car into the City of Trenton. We note that the course of travel so specified would take the defendant on a route which would pass close by the scene of the murder, the scene being reached by a rather brief stretch of dirt road from the highway running from Allentown to Lakehurst. Defendant thereafter made a demand upon the State under R.R. 3:5-9(b) which reads: Within 10 days after receipt of such bill of particulars from the defendant, the prosecuting attorney shall, on written demand therefor, furnish the defendant or his attorney with a written bill of particulars stating the names and addresses of the witnesses upon whom the State intends to rely to establish defendant's presence at the scene of the alleged offense. The State did not respond. The reason was that defendant's demand was mislaid and did not reach the assistant prosecutor handling the case. Defendant made no pretrial motion to compel an answer, but rather drew attention to the subject for the first time when the State offered one of the hunters as a witness. None of the witnesses for the State in fact testified directly to the presence of defendant at the scene of the crime. The State's case was circumstantial. The issue arose on the third day of trial, a Wednesday. The prosecutor offered to permit the defense to examine at once the statements of the hunters. The trial court so ordered and directed that none of those witnesses should testify until the following Monday, to permit the defense to investigate them. Defense counsel at first declined to accept the statements but did take them the following day. The State urges with much merit that the alibi supplied by defendant in response to the demand was spurious. Alibi is a claim that defendant was elsewhere at the time of the crime and therefore could not have committed it. State v. Mucci, 25 N.J. 423, 431 (1957); 1 Wigmore, Evidence (3 d ed. 1940), § 136, p. 570. In calling upon a defendant to reveal a claim of that kind before trial, our rule is designed to avoid surprise at trial by the sudden introduction of a factual claim which cannot be investigated unless the trial is recessed to that end. State v. Garvin, 44 N.J. 268, 272-273 (1965). Our rule replaced a statute, R.S. 2:190-7, adopted in 1934. As the statement annexed to the legislative bill recited, the purpose of that act was to do away with the existing unfairness in criminal trials of a surprise alibi and at the same time to give defendant equivalent information as to the State's case. Tested in the light of the foregoing reason for the alibi rule, it is plain that defendant revealed nothing in advance of trial. He revealed nothing for at least two reasons. The first is that he disclosed nothing which could be investigated with profit. He described a route of travel which in and of itself was consistent with guilt unless the bill of particulars meant that his travel between the terminal points was uninterrupted. If the answer is read that way, then only two persons referred to in the bill of particulars could testify in support of that assertion. One would be the defendant who of course could not be interviewed. The other would be the woman described in item B, whose very existence has never been verified. So far as the record of the trial is concerned, she is no more than a phantom. Thus the bill of particulars revealed nothing of definitive value. But more importantly, the representation that the claim of alibi would be made at the trial was not fulfilled. No such claim was even asserted at the trial, and no witness testified in support of it. Defendant himself, the key to the alibi claim, did not take the stand. Thus the purpose of the alibi rule  to prevent a surprise at trial  was never met. In these circumstances it is difficult to accept seriously a claim that defendant was grievously hurt by the State's failure to list the witnesses it would produce to combat the proof he never presented. Further, the defense could readily have obviated the problem by a pretrial motion to compel the State to answer. The ultimate question, if one accepts defendant's disclosure as constituting an alibi, is whether our rule requires the State, upon a cross-demand, to disclose the names of witnesses who will implicate a defendant circumstantially rather than directly. R.R. 3:5-9(b), quoted above, requires the State to identify the witnesses upon whom it will rely to establish defendant's presence at the scene of the alleged offense, phrasing which may be less pervasive than, let us say, to establish defendant's guilt. In State v. Rogers, 30 N.J. Super. 239 ( Cty. Ct. 1954), it was held that the rule did not apply to circumstantial evidence. Defendant argues that State v. Driver, 38 N.J. 255, 288-290 (1962), is to the contrary. It is not, since it did not involve our alibi rule but rather an order expressly enjoining the State to name all witnesses it would rely upon to establish, directly or circumstantially, the defendant's presence at the scene of the crime. We need not, however, pass upon the meaning of the alibi rule. The State does not press the issue. It did not refuse to disclose any of its witnesses; the failure to answer was due to misdirection of the demand within the prosecutor's office. The point we make is that if the alibi rule does deal with circumstantial proof, defendant knew before trial that the State had not met his demand, but nonetheless he made no motion to compel compliance. Indeed defendant admits knowing of some of the potential witnesses. He knew about the soil studies, for, prior to trial, the materials were made available to the defense for expert study. Rather defendant seeks somehow to differentiate between the hunters and the other witnesses whose total testimony wove the web about him. The distinction has no substance. We are satisfied the defense had to know the State would rely upon other witnesses, and yet, despite the obvious proposition that quarrels as to discovery should be fought out prior to trial, the defense chose to sit back in the hope of gaining some advantage at trial. Still further, our rule does not compel the suppression of proof as the sole remedy for failure of either party to comply with it. R.R. 3:5-9(d) provides: If such bill of particulars is not furnished as required, the party in default may be excluded from presenting any evidence at the trial as to defendant's absence from, or presence at, respectively, the scene of the alleged offense, or the court may impose such conditions and grant such adjournment as the ends of justice may require. Here the trial court appropriately required the State to furnish copies of the statements of the witnesses at once and to withhold their testimony for some four days. Finally, we see no evidence of prejudice in fact and hence no basis for reversal even if there were error. See State v. Coleman, 46 N.J. 16, 28 (1965). Even at the time of argument before us, the defense was unable to point to any disadvantage. The defense suggested only that, had it known the State had found hunters who could offer the testimony we have already described, the defense might have circularized all licensed bow-and-arrow hunters (they exceed 21,000), in the hope, that someone might emerge with something. Under these circumstances, we see no basis for complaint.