Opinion ID: 2322573
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: The Tacit Admission

Text: At trial the Commonwealth introduced the testimony of two witnesses who stated that, shortly after the Caecilia Mannerchor Club burglary, they were riding in an automobile with appellant and Baurle. Both witnesses testified that they heard Baurle say something to the effect that he was going to burn his fingerprints off because they were all over the club, and both testified in answer to a question by the District Attorney that appellant made no reply to these comments. Defense counsel made timely objection to this testimony, although not on the precise ground now urged by appellant. It is clear that the evidence was offered as a tacit admission of Schmidt, and was thought by the Commonwealth to be admissible under Commonwealth v. Vallone, 347 Pa. 419, 32 A. 2d 889 (1943) and the long line of decisions upon which that case in turn relied. The doctrine of Vallone and its predecessors ran afoul of Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 16 L. Ed. 2d 694 (1966), where the Supreme Court of the United States set forth certain prophylactic rules applicable to custodial interrogations. In a footnote to that decision, the Supreme Court said the following: In accord without decision today, it is impermissible to penalize an individual for exercising his Fifth Amendment privilege when he is under police custodial interrogation. The prosecution may not, therefore, use at trial the fact that he stood mute or claimed his privilege in the face of accusation. Miranda, supra, 384 U.S. at 468 n.37 (emphasis added). Responding to this pronouncement in Commonwealth ex rel. Shadd v. Myers, 423 Pa. 82, 223 A. 2d 296 (1966), we held inadmissible Shadd's silence in the face of an accusation by a co-felon during a police interrogation. We denied retroactive application to the new rule, citing and discussing Johnson v. New Jersey, 384 U.S. 719, 16 L.Ed. 2d 882 (1966). In Commonwealth v. Dravecz, 424 Pa. 582, 227 A. 2d 904 (1967), we again condemned the practice of police officials' confronting a person in a custodial setting, reading a statement by another person implicating the interrogee in a crime, and then attempting to capitalize on the latter's failure to deny the accusation. Again we refused to give this principle retroactive application, holding that it need only be applied to those cases wherein the judgment was not finalized as of the date Miranda was announced. Dravecz, supra, 424 Pa. at 595 (concurring opinion of Mr. Justice EAGEN in which a majority of the Court joined). Since Schmidt's direct appeal from his conviction of murder was pending in this Court at the time that Miranda was announced, this allegation of error was available to him on his PCHA petition. Commonwealth v. Stevens, 429 Pa. 593, 240 A. 2d 536 (1968). Turning to the merits of this claim, the threshold question is whether the events narrated above do in fact constitute a tacit admission as proscribed by Shadd and Dravecz, supra. We think not. The statement attributed to Baurle referred only to his own fingerprints, not Schmidt's. The statement accused Schmidt of nothing; he was not the subject of the remark, and thus there was no reason for him to make any response. The evidence, therefore, lacked probative value in establishing the defendant Schmidt's participation in the Mannerchor Club crimes, and the trial court erred in overruling defense counsel's objection. Schmidt, however, can claim no relief from that error unless admission of Baurle's statement is a mistake of constitutional dimension rather than one of state evidentiary law. We note that the tacit admission complained of here differs in a crucial respect from those which we have heretofore found to be interdicted in Miranda : in Schmidt's case the alleged admission arose out of a conversation between individuals riding in a private automobile in the absence of any police authority whatever. In all our prior decisions the condemned admissions by silence arose in a custodial setting in the presence of police officers. [15] Only recently in Commonwealth v. Collins, 440 Pa. 368, 269 A. 2d 882 (1970), we reiterated the view that Miranda impinges on the tacit admission rule only where the refusal to speak occurs during police interrogation. In that case the defendant argued that permitting the jury to draw an inference of guilt from the fact of flight violated his constitutional rights under Miranda. We there said: Tacit admissions were barred because they violated an accused's Fifth Amendment right to remain silent in the face of police interrogation, a problem which has no analogy to the situation presented here. Flight, unlike silence in the face of police questioning, cannot be taken as an assertion of a constitutional right. Collins, supra, 440 Pa. at 372 (emphasis added). We therefore hold that Schmidt's claim of error in this respect, if indeed an admission by silence was involved, does not assert deprivation of a constitutional right. For reasons discussed earlier, it is not cognizable in a PCHA proceeding. Commonwealth v. Smulek, 446 Pa. 277, 284 A. 2d 763 (1971). Finally, in light of the overwhelming evidence of guilt contained in appellant's explicit confession, the Baurle statement was inconsequential. Thus, even were we to find constitutional error in the admission of the testimony complained of, it would be harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Chapman v. California, 386 U.S. 18, 17 L. Ed. 2d 706 (1967). Having reviewed the appellant's claims of error and having found the appellant not entitled to relief, we affirm the order of the lower court. The former Mr. Chief Justice BELL and the former Mr. Justice BARBIERI took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.