Court Opinion

ID: 9712498
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 04:55:09.117428+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:12.537421
License: Public Domain

ROBERTS, Justice,
dissenting.
Today the majority proclaims that former elected public officials guilty of corruption in office are to receive, from public funds, lifetime retirement benefits of thousands of dollars each month, notwithstanding the public officials’ breach of their obligation to perform their duties of office with fidelity. This decision, which awards public funds to *214those who have abused their public office for private gain, at the expense of the Commonwealth’s citizens whose trust has been breached, is a malignancy that attacks every principle of honesty and decency in government. I dissent.
Appellee Henry Cianfrani, former member of the State Senate and Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, pled guilty to charges that, while a State Senator, he placed “ghost” employees on the Senate payroll, and accepted bribes to exert his influence as a Senator upon state-funded schools in favor of candidates for admission. In all, appellee pled guilty to 110 federal offenses, including one count of racketeering, 101 counts of mail fraud, four counts of obstruction of justice, and four counts of income tax evasion. Appellee Robert Bellomini, former member of the State House of Representatives and Chairman of the House Transportation Committee, was found guilty of the charge that, while in office, he extorted $5,000 from two companies seeking contracts with the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board for the storage, handling, and delivery of liquor shipments for northwestern Pennsylvania. Both appellees were sentenced to terms of imprisonment.
Appellees have already received a return of all contributions which they made to the retirement system. Thanks to the majority’s decision, appellee Cianfrani will also receive approximately $910 of public funds per month for the rest of his life. Appellee Bellomini will receive approximately $750 of public funds per month for the rest of his life. Additionally, both will receive comprehensive lifetime health care coverage, to be paid from public funds.
The majority’s decision to award retirement benefits to appellees despite their crimes in office reaches far beyond the facts of these cases. The decision will serve to confer substantial benefits on several other convicted public officials whose claims to entitlement to full retirement benefits are presently pending before this Court.* Even more dis*215turbing is the majority’s pronouncement that it is now constitutionally impermissible for the Commonwealth’s legislative and executive branches to withhold publicly funded retirement benefits from those public servants convicted of governmental corruption. Because the majority has grasped for constitutional grounds to support its result, the majority has immunized public employees convicted of dishonesty in office from legislative control. Like appellees, members of the majority’s special class would receive full retirement benefits, despite their crimes.
The majority’s creation of a class of public employees unaccountable to the citizens of the Commonwealth for a breach of the duty to perform faithfully is the height of unreason and irresponsibility. For inherent in common decency and honest government is the absolute prohibition against the use of public money to reward with lifetime pensions former public officials convicted of dishonesty and corruption in governmental service. Indeed, this Court has consistently recognized the relationship between faithful performance and the right to retirement benefits. More than four decades ago, this Court stated:
“The various retirement acts adopted in this Commonwealth .. . have as their purpose, not the bestowal of a gratuity upon governmental officeholder, but compensation for extended and faithful services performed, and to be performed, on behalf of the governmental body and the public.”
Haldeman v. Hillegass, 335 Pa. 375, 385-86, 6 A.2d 801, 808 (1939). Accord, Rockwell v. York County Retirement Board, 405 Pa. 406, 413, 175 A.2d 831, 835 (1961); David v. Veitscher Magnesitwerke Actien Gesellschaft, 348 Pa. 335, 342, 35 A.2d 346, 349 (1944). We have recognized that the basis of *216retirement benefits “is neither charitable nor benevolent; they are founded on faithful, valuable services actually rendered to the Commonwealth over a long period of years.... ” Busser v. Snyder, 282 Pa. 440, 454, 128 A. 80, 85 (1925). “[T]he government and municipalities are interested in the faithful and effective discharge of duty by public servants .... [A] fund judiciously administered is an effective way to secure service of the highest type.” Retirement Board of Allegheny County v. McGovern, 316 Pa. 161, 169, 174 A. 400, 405 (1934) (emphasis added).
By directing the payment of full retirement benefits, the majority effectively grants specific performance to appellees of a “contract” steeped in appellees’ own criminality. Until today, in no area of the law has specific performance been granted to a party who has tainted the contract with illegality.
The law of Pennsylvania has long embraced the common-law rule that one in the private sector who has breached a duty to discharge his responsibilities with fidelity is subject to a forfeiture of compensation. See, e.g., Peniston v. John Y. Huber Co., 196 Pa. 580, 46 A. 934 (1900) (properly discharged agent “forfeited by his misconduct” any claim to final lump-sum payment pursuant to employment contract); Weinstein v. Union Trust Co. of Pittsburgh, 313 Pa. 280, 169 A. 101 (1933) (“faithless” trustee “ ‘forfeited the right to any compensation, whether as commissions or otherwise’ ”). Accord, Restatement (Second) of Trusts § 243 (1959); Restatement (Second) of Agency § 456 (1958). Such a forfeiture “is not in the nature of an additional penalty for the breach of trust .... ” Rather, forfeiture is based upon the fact that the breaching party “has not rendered or has not properly rendered the services for which compensation is given.” Restatement (Second) of Trusts, supra, at Comment a.
Surely appellees are subject to no lesser standard than persons in the private sector who have breached an obligation to discharge their duties with fidelity. As public officials, appellees unquestionably were “bound to perform with fidelity.” Commonwealth v. Evans, 74 Pa. 124, 140 (1873) *217(public officer entrusted with receipt of public money subject to forfeiture of commissions for failure to account). Indeed, upon their commencement of public service as legislators, appellees took the following oath of office:
“I do solemnly swear that I will support, obey and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of this Commonwealth and that I will discharge the duties of my office with fidelity.”
Pa.Const. art. VI, § 3. Where, as here, a public official has breached the obligation to perform his duties with fidelity, and abused the trust of his office for personal gain, the breaching official has no right to retirement benefits.
The majority not only ignores the prior decisions of this Court but also rejects out of hand the decisions of other jurisdictions which have held faithful performance to be an implied condition of eligibility for retirement benefits. The theory that “historically” these jurisdictions have deemed pension rights to be “gratuities,” rather than “vested obligations” as in Pennsylvania, cannot withstand analysis. In reaffirming the view that a public servant is impliedly obliged to have rendered faithful performance as a prerequisite to the receipt of retirement benefits, the Supreme Court of New Jersey recently made clear that the concept of “vesting” is an integral part of New Jersey law. Masse v. Public Employees’ Retirement System, 87 N.J. 252, 432 A.2d 1339 (1981). The Court of Special Appeals of Maryland has observed that the requirement of faithful performance “is language of contract law. It does not comport with the arbitrary right of unilateral withdrawal upon which the gratuity principle is founded.” City of Frederick v. Quinn, 35 Md.App. 626, 632, 371 A.2d 724, 727 (1977). And in State ex rel. Fox v. Board of Trustees, 148 W.Va. 369, 135 S.E.2d 262 (1964), where the Supreme Court of West Virginia recognized the implied obligation of faithful performance, the Court stated that a public employee’s right to a pension plan “vests” only upon the performance of all conditions of eligibility. 148 W.Va. at 373, 135 S.E.2d at 264.
Thus the requirement of faithful performance expressed in the Forfeiture Act cannot be dismissed as incompatible *218with the concept of “vesting” embodied in Pennsylvania law or as ex post facto legislation. To the contrary, the Forfeiture Act codifies the time-honored, common-law condition of faithful performance which, like other conditions such as age and years of service, a holder of public office has always been obliged to satisfy to become eligible for retirement benefits. As this condition would apply to all public officials even if it had not been codified by statute, the Forfeiture Act has in no respect abridged the Constitutions of the United States or of this Commonwealth. Rather, the majority has abridged the unquestionable authority of the Legislature to codify a longstanding and salutary principle of the common law, a principle essential to a responsible and accountable system of government.
It is a sad day, indeed, when a majority of this Court accords to public officials convicted of governmental corruption retirement benefits that are rightfully accorded only to faithful, honest public servants. By refusing to distinguish between those with honorable and those with dishonorable service, the majority erects, at public expense, a monument to personal greed and corruption in public office which affronts all the faithful public servants and taxpaying citizens of the Commonwealth. This shameful monument should not be permitted to stand.
LARSEN, J., joins in this dissenting opinion.

See Buretto v. State Employees’ Retirement Board, No. 80-2-317; Heller v. State Employees’ Retirement Board, No. 80-3-634; Shelton v. State Employees’ Retirement Board, No. 80-2-287; Miller v. State *215Employees’ Retirement Board, No. 80-2-277 (J. 8 of 1981, petition for reargument pending); Fineman v. State Employees’ Retirement Board, No. 80-2-278 (J. 8 of 1981, petition for reargument pending). The lifetime benefits to be paid from public funds to Fineman alone total $1876.23 per month. See Fineman v. State Employees’ Retirement Board, 498 Pa. 103, 112 n.*, 445 A.2d 88, 92 n.* (1981) (Roberts, J., joined by Larsen & Kauffman, JJ., in support of reversal).