Opinion ID: 1618817
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: right to counsel at photo line-up

Text: An out-of-court identification of the defendant by Steven Peters, a cabdriver who had taken a fare to the vicinity of the victim's house, was made on a photographic display conducted by the prosecution the night before trial was scheduled to commence. It was conducted without notice to or presence of defendant's counsel. The United States Supreme Court has held that the right to counsel does not extend to photographic line-ups. United States v. Ash, 1973, 413 U.S. 300, 93 S.Ct. 2568, 37 L.Ed.2d 619. Defendant invites us to construe our state Constitution to the contrary. We decline. A photographic display used during the prosecutor's pretrial interviews of witnesses simply is not a trial-like adversary confrontation requiring the assistance of counsel. No one would suggest that there is a right to defense counsel's presence during a prosecutor's witness interviews, though they are fraught with as many dangers for a defendant as are photo line-ups. We rely on cross-examination in the trial arena to deal with those dangers. The adversary mechanism of trial remains as effective for a photo display as for other parts of pretrial interviews. We are not unmindful of the Michigan cases holding that the right to counsel does not extend to photo displays. The position of the Michigan court, however, is not based on constitutional grounds but on the court's rule-making power. People v. Jackson, 1974, 391 Mich. 323, 217 N.W.2d 22.