Court Opinion

ID: 9759377
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 00:14:31.152786+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:01.639982
License: Public Domain

*118ROBERTS, Justice,
dissenting.
The majority concedes that under either Commonwealth v. Garcia, 474 Pa. 449, 378 A.2d 1199 (1977) or Commonwealth v. Polimeni, 474 Pa. 430, 378 A.2d 1189 (1977), appellant would have been entitled upon request to an instruction on involuntary manslaughter. Nonetheless, the majority concludes trial counsel who failed to request an involuntary manslaughter instruction was not ineffective. I dissent.
The majority purports to find support in Commonwealth v. McGrogan, 449 Pa. 584, 297 A.2d 456 (1972). In my view, the majority reads McGrogan far too broadly. It is true that in McGrogan this Court rejected a claim trial counsel was ineffective in failing to request a voluntary manslaughter instruction, even though the appellant contended the Commonwealth’s case would support the charge. “[Cjounsel could have reasonably decided that the jury might find the Commonwealth’s evidence inconclusive and thus return a verdict of outright acquittal.” 449 Pa. at 590, 297 A.2d at 459. But crucial to McGrogan was the fact that “[t]he evidence of the Commonwealth, although substantial, was somewhat conflicting as to appellant’s conduct at the time of the slaying.” Id.
Here, by contrast, the record' establishes that the Commonwealth’s case against appellant, including eyewitness testimony, squarely subjected appellant to a conviction of murder. Indeed, as the majority points out, “[tjhere was also testimony that appellant had threatened the deceased on the night in question and on previous occasions.” Ante, 486 Pa. at 106, 404 A.2d at 380. Though trial counsel defended on the theory that the killing was accidental, and appellant so testified, any expectation of an acquittal on this record was unrealistic. Counsel’s decision to subject appellant to a contest on her credibility without asking the court to give the jury the permissible option to return a verdict on involuntary manslaughter had no “reasonable basis designed *119to effectuate his client’s interests.” Commonwealth ex rel. Washington v. Maroney, 427 Pa. 599, 605, 235 A.2d 349, 352 (1967). Appellant should be granted a new trial.
I must also express my disagreement with the majority’s assertion that exclusion of evidence seized in violation of the provisions of Pa.R.Crim.P. 2008(a) depends only on the relationship of the • violation of the reliability of the evidence seized. Rule 2008(a) requires police to make a copy of the affidavit in support of probable cause and an inventory of the property seized readily and immediately available to the accused. This rule not only permits defendants to determine in the early stages of criminal proceedings how or whether to pursue a claim that the evidence seized should be suppressed. It also has the beneficial and administratively wise effect of eradicating the need for utilization of court time in discovery motions and continuances to provide time for the defense to study the affidavit and inventory once it is obtained. Where the rights of an accused to suppress evidence illegally seized are prejudiced by violation of Rule 2008, exclusion of the evidence is required regardless of its otherwise reliable nature. This is, indeed, the mission of our Rule.