Court Opinion

ID: 9530677
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:02:36.256483+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:12.804371
License: Public Domain

Hill, J.
(concurring in the result)—I concur in the result. It should be made clear that the court reporter’s notes have *68been lost* 1 and, consequently, the wealthiest defendant in the state could not procure a verbatim statement of facts. We are, therefore, not concerned with any handicap because of indigency, but only with the issue of whether the narrative statement of facts, which can be furnished, is adequate for the presentation of the appeal.
Like counsel for the appellant on this appeal, who was not present at the trial, I cannot say that the narrative statement of facts is adequate for the purposes of this appeal. Trial counsel for the appellant, who better than anyone else could have assisted present counsel and the trial court in the preparation of a narrative statement of facts adequate for the appeal, did not participate in that procedure. (This case points up the proposition that trial counsel should never be permitted to withdraw until a statement of facts has been prepared even though new counsel may be secured or appointed to conduct the appeal.)
While the majority seem to have taken the only course available under the circumstances, I am satisfied that in most cases with the resources available to the trial court an adequate narrative statement of facts can be prepared. We said in Glaser v. Holdorf (1958), 53 Wn. (2d) 92, 94, 330 P. (2d) 1066:
“ . . . When necessary, the court may call to its aid the litigants or even subpoena third parties to elicit necessary information in order that the statement of facts may be corrected. ...”
I would construe “third parties” to include attorneys, witnesses, jurors, court attaches, or anyone present during the trial.
Ott, C. J., concurs with Hill, J.

The court reporter’s statement is: “Upon search of my files for the stenograph notes of said trial, I have been unable to find them; . . . I have searched every conceivable place that I felt I might find them, but ... I have not been able to find them.”
This kind of situation would be obviated if court reporters would comply with RCW 2.32.200 which requires that such “notes shall be filed in the office of the clerk of the superior court where such trial is had.” They are not the private property of the reporter who takes them.