Opinion ID: 1518087
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Invocation of the Privilege Against Self-Incrimination by the Witnesses McCabe and D'Ulisse

Text: The victim of the crime, Phillip C. Springbett, Jr., was shot while visiting at the Levittown, Pennsylvania home of George DuVal, the defendant-appellant, and his mistress, Marilyn D'Ulisse. It was the Commonwealth's theory that Springbett had traveled to Levittown to effect a reconciliation with his mistress, Joan McCabe, with whom he had recently had a falling out and who had temporarily taken up residence with the defendant DuVal and Miss D'Ulisse. According to the Commonwealth, relations between Springbett and Miss McCabe deteriorated still further during Springbett's visit and while all four persons were together in the kitchen in the late afternoon, Springbett struck Joan McCabe in anger. This action so infuriated DuVal that he fetched a .45 calibre service revolver from the bedroom, returned to the kitchen and shot Springbett in the chest. Answering a call for assistance placed by one of the two women, the local Rescue Squad appeared on the scene to find Springbett lying near death and to observe a man exiting the house and driving away. No member of the Rescue Squad was able to identify the defendant DuVal as that man. The murder weapon was found in a vacant lot along the road leading away from the DuVal/D'Ulisse residence. At the preliminary hearing, at the Grand Jury proceedings, and during a habeas corpus hearing concerning defendant's bail, the two women witnesses to the shooting testified. Originally their explanation had been that an unknown burglar had entered the house and had murdered Springbett. Later, before the Grand Jury, both of them changed their stories to that detailed above. Between the time of the Grand Jury testimony and the start of DuVal's trial, however, both women became concerned that perjury charges might be in the offing and they consulted a lawyer. That attorney contacted the assistant district attorney of Bucks County three or four days before the beginning of the voir dire. In a hearing held after the trial on defendant's motion to supplement the record, the assistant district attorney recounted the conversation as follows: [He (the attorney of McCabe and D'Ulisee)] came up to me and said, `I want you to know that I intend not to permit the girls to take the stand on trial.' I said, `Do you represent them?' Because it stuck in my mind that they were represented by another attorney at the time. I don't recall what [his] answer was, but I believe that I elicited from him that he had not yet entered his appearance for them. And I said that  I said to him that, `I don't know how to take what you're saying, because as I understand what you are saying, it is your intention that they not take the stand in the trial, but I do not know what their intention is, and I'll not know what their intention is, until their intention is tested.' And then I reminded him of the fact that I was aware of the fact that they had testified at the preliminary hearing, one of them had testified at the Grand Jury, and two of them had testified at a habeas corpus hearing. I said to him, in very clear terms, that as far as I was concerned, these young women had waived their privilege, but in any event, whether they would or would not invoke this privilege at trial, I would wait and have to abide that moment. The assistant district attorney then stated that he related the substance of the above quoted conversation to the district attorney. On the first day of the trial, the Commonwealth called Joan McCabe, at which time her lawyer (the same person who had previously spoken with the assistant district attorney) introduced himself to the court and entered an appearance on behalf of the witness, thereby eliminating whatever doubts may have existed in the mind of the district attorney as to whether in fact he represented Miss McCabe. When called to the stand, Miss McCabe would state nothing but her name and address, and to all else claimed her Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination. Out of the hearing of the jury, the trial judge decided that the witness had waived her privilege by testifying on prior occasions. The jury was returned and the witness was directed to testify. She refused, was declared in contempt of court, and was led off in the custody of the sheriff. Defense counsel made objection throughout. Miss Marilyn D'Ulisse was then called, the same attorney entered an appearance on her behalf, and the same events followed as with the witness McCabe. Miss D'Ulisse also was escorted from the courtroom by the sheriff. Again defense counsel made timely objection. We view the above as reversible error under our recent decision in Commonwealth v. Terenda, 451 Pa. 116, 301 A. 2d 625 (1973). [1] In that case it was held, in accord with the prevailing law in many jurisdictions, [2] that it is prejudicial error for a prosecutor to summon a witness to the stand in a criminal trial with foreknowledge that the witness intends to invoke a privilege against self-incrimination. The opinion in Terenda emphasized the risk that the jury would draw adverse inferences against the defendant; we take the present occasion to add further explanation as to why inferences drawn from a refusal of a witness who is not a defendant are improper. Although appellant frames his argument in terms of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, we note that no jurisdiction in which a procedure such as that set out above has been condemned as error has done so on constitutional grounds. Indeed, on the only occasion on which the Supreme Court of the United States has considered the propriety of such conduct, the Court emphasized that [n]o constitutional issues of any kind are presented, and that [a]ll . . . this case involves, in short, is a claim of evidentiary trial error. Namet v. United States, 373 U.S. 179, 185, 10 L. Ed. 2d 278 (1963). But see Pointer v. Texas, 380 U.S. 400, 13 L. Ed. 2d 923 (1965); Douglas v. Alabama, 380 U.S. 415, 13 L. Ed. 2d 934 (1965); Bruton v. United States, 391 U.S. 123, 20 L. Ed. 2d 476 (1968), where the Sixth Amendment right to confront witnesses, made applicable to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment, was held violated by procedures which permitted the jury to learn the substance of uncross-examined, extrajudicial statements of alleged co-felons. The prejudice to the defendant of statements placed before the jury which by their terms directly connect him with the crime (as in Pointer, Douglas and Bruton, supra) is of a different order from the prejudice present in the case at bar. Here the risk is not that the jury will misuse evidence which directly states that the defendant is the criminal, but rather that the jury will make improper inference from the mere refusal of the witness called to testify at all. Here, unlike Pointer, Douglas and Bruton, supra, the witnesses McCabe and D'Ulisse have made no statement, written or oral, before the jury that directly implicates DuVal; they have said nothing at all. Whether or not the error which we find to have occurred in this case is error under the federal constitution as well is a question which it is not necessary for us to reach on this appeal. It is clear beyond question that no inference can be taken against the person invoking the privilege. Griffin v. California, 380 U.S. 609, 14 L. Ed. 2d 106 (1965). Although it could be argued that under certain circumstances a refusal to testify on grounds of self-incrimination might have probative value in establishing an issue in a matter to which the witness was not a party, we have recently held that it is not permissible for either defense or prosecution to attempt to capitalize on such refusal. Commonwealth v. Greene, 445 Pa. 228, 285 A. 2d 865 (1971). Where it is the prosecutor who attempts to use such a device, there is a special vice: the inference to be drawn from the refusal to testify of the defendant's co-defendant, accomplice or associate has no probative value whatsoever in establishing the guilt of the defendant. It is rather an effort to cause the jury to think guilt by association. In the case at bar the appellant and the two women, McCabe and D'Ulisse, were known by the jury (evidence having been introduced to that effect) to have been present in the room in which Springbett was shot and killed. Accepting that these three persons were likely to be associated in the minds of the jury as a class, and accepting that McCabe and D'Ulisse may have had a criminal responsibility arising from the death of Springbett (because they invoked the Fifth Amendment), [3] it is a logical fallacy to infer that DuVal, the remaining member of the class, also must have a criminal responsibility for the death of Springbett; it would be as illogical to conclude that DuVal was a woman, a characteristic possessed by the other two members of the class. The procedure followed by the prosecution here and permitted by the lower court over objection is to be condemned, therefore, because without any justification apparent in the record it presented the jury with an irrelevant event (invocation of the privilege) from which the jury could make fallacious deductions prejudicial to the defendant and not subject to cross-examination. [4] The Commonwealth argues, however, as it did not in Terenda, supra, that it acted in good faith because it honestly believed that the claim of privilege of which it had been forewarned would not be legally sustainable, as the two women, according to the Commonwealth, had waived their privilege by testifying on prior occasions. [5] There are two answers to that contention: First : The Commonwealth's theory of waiver of the privilege against self-incrimination is directly contrary to the existing law of this State on the subject. Snyder Appeal, 398 Pa. 237, 157 A. 2d 207 (1960). [6] While that decision is not universally acclaimed, [7] it has not been the theory of the Commonwealth below or on appeal that the moment has come to reconsider it. In fact, the Commonwealth in its brief has not mentioned the case. Second : We disagree with those jurisdictions in which it is held that the prosecution may with impunity call before the jury a witness likely to be associated with the defendant in the minds of the jurors, knowing that a privilege against self-incrimination will be claimed and yet believing that the claim of privilege will be legally invalid. It is a simple matter for the prosecuting attorney to inform the court that a witness he intends to call will, to his knowledge, attempt to invoke a privilege against testifying, and obtain a ruling thereon. We note that such a procedure is proposed by the American Bar Association's Project on Standards for Criminal Justice: A prosecutor should not call a witness who he knows will claim a privilege not to testify, for the purpose of impressing upon the jury the fact of the claim of privilege. In some instances, as defined in the Code of Professional Responsibility, doing so will constitute unprofessional conduct. ABA, Standards Relating to the Prosecution Function and the Defense Function § 5.7(c), at 122-23. [8] In a comment to this section, the Project pointed out that if the prosecutor is informed in advance that the witness will claim a privilege and he wishes to contest the claim, the matter should be treated without the presence of the jury and a ruling obtained. Id. at 125. The witness' known intent to invoke the privilege coupled with the prosecutor's opinion that the testimony sought can be nevertheless compelled presents the risk that, as actually occurred twice in the case at bar, the witness might prove not only reluctant to testify but contumacious as well. If the fact of invocation of the privilege is, as we believe, irrelevant to the issues and prejudicial to the defendant, it is that much more prejudicial to permit the jury to observe that the recalcitrant witness (a person likely to be associated in the jurors' minds with the defendant) elects to remain silent notwithstanding the order of the court that he testify. In the case at bar it would have been a simple matter indeed, with the jury already removed from the courtroom, to determine whether the witnesses D'Ulisse and McCabe would continue to assert a privilege despite the contrary ruling by the court. Permitting the jury to return to the courtroom and then to observe first McCabe and then D'Ulisse being cited for contempt and marched out in the custody of the sheriff was prejudicial to the defendant. [9] We therefore hold that the prosecution, once informed that a witness intends to claim a privilege against self-incrimination, commits error in calling that witness to the stand before the jury where the witness is a person (co-defendant, accomplice, associate, etc.) likely to be thought by the jury to be associated with the defendant in the incident or transaction out of which the criminal charges arose. Whether or not the prosecution has a good faith belief that the assertion of privilege is legally invalid is irrelevant; that matter can be settled outside the hearing of the jury. [10] No cautionary instruction was given to the jury as to claim of privilege by the two witnesses, nor was any requested. The Commonwealth argues that the failure to make such a request precludes appellant from asserting the error we have previously held to have occurred. The Terenda opinion, supra, called ineffective the trial court's attempt to cure error of this sort by instructing the jury to disregard the fact that co-defendants had been called to the stand and had invoked the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. Whether or not prejudicial error can be cured by appropriate instructions can be answered only through an objective evaluation of the capability of the average juror to follow the instruction and thus refrain from misuse or use of evidence improperly admitted. See generally, Note, The Limiting Instruction  Its Effectiveness and Effect, 51 Minn. L. Rev. 264 (1956). Where an element of prosecutorial misconduct is present, as it is here and as it was in Terenda, we prefer to give the defendant the benefit of the doubt as to whether or not the error could have been cured by an instruction. We thus hold that the prejudicial error here involved was not waived by failure of defense counsel to request an instruction. It follows that appellant's conviction cannot stand, and that a new trial must be ordered.