Court Opinion

ID: 9453382
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 18:11:27.557898+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:33:37.946263
License: Public Domain

*483TAMM, Circuit Judge
(concurring in part and dissenting in part):
I concur in the remand of the case for a determination of whether the defendant was prejudiced by the trial court’s refusal to allow inspection of the grand jury minutes. As I understand the teaching of Dennis v. United States, 384 U.S. 855, 86 S.Ct. 1840, 16 L.Ed.2d 973 (1966), there must be shown by defense counsel some specific need or purpose before the court is required to permit examination . of the, grand jury minutes. The need shown here was an inconsistency between a summary of the arresting officer’s grand jury testimony and his testimony at a preliminary hearing and the trial. Both the hearing and the trial testimonies showed defendant’s admission (of beating and robbing Jef-fries) as coming before the stolen vehicle check was made, but the grand jury summary showed it as coming after the check was made.1 Although it is a close question, I feel that on these facts the defendant made out the requisite need under Dennis.
I do not join the majority’s announcement of a “per se” rule — that in all eases involving police testimony about an oral confession the defendant shall have the right to inspect the grand jury minutes without being required to show a need for them. By eliminating the previous requirement that a need be shown, the rule will unnecessarily delay trial of the many criminal cases in which no need is present for allowing inspection. The Jencks Act grants defendants a right to discover the statements of prosecution witnesses2 and thus provides a strong tool for developing need. With such a tool available, it hardly seems unfair to require that a specific need for the grand jury minutes be demonstrated. I, accordingly, respectfully dissent from this portion of the majority opinion.

. The sequence was important because the trial judge ruled that under Miranda v. State of Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966), the defendant’s incriminating statements with respect to the unauthorized use charge would be admissible if made before the officer learned the car was stolen. While the admission went to the assault charge, it was also relevant to the unauthorized use charge because it tended to negate defendant’s alibi — that Jeffries had asked defendant to drive him home in his (Jeffries’) car.
The summary set out the events: A, B, C, D, but not: A occurred, then B occurred, then C occurred, etc. Record at 132. While this caused the trial judge to feel that the summary did not purport to state the events in the order in which they occurred, there is at least an implication that it did purport to so state them.

. Although grand jury minutes are excluded from its operation, Pittsburgh PlatGlass Co. v. United States, 360 U.S. 395, 398, 79 S.Ct. 1237, 3 L.Ed.2d 1323 (1959), the Act provides, inter alia: “After a witness called by the United States has testified on direct examination, the court shall, on motion of the defendant, order the United States to produce any statement (as hereinafter defined) of the witness in the possession of the United States which relates to the subject matter as to which the witness has testified.” 18 U.S.C. § 3500(b) (1964). See Reichert v. United States, 123 U.S.App.D.C. 294, 297, 359 F.2d 278, 281 n. 5 (1966).