Court Opinion

ID: 9626954
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 08:29:07.340236+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:06:37.251157
License: Public Domain

SAYLOR, Justice,
concurring.
I respectfully disagree with the majority’s conclusion that prosecution witness George Barbosa was not available for cross-examination by Romero’s counsel. In this regard, I note that Barbosa’s refusals to answer questions occurred during his direct examination by the Commonwealth. On cross-examination, however, Barbosa provided answers which, although punctuated by equivocations and memory lapses, were generally responsive to the questions posed by defense counsel. Indeed, Romero’s counsel was able to elicit helpful testimony from Barbosa that suggested a motive for fabricating his prior inculpatory statement (Barbosa testified that police had told him that Romero had implicated him in the murder). Accordingly, I would hold that Romero’s rights under the confrontation clause were not violated, and that the admission *20of Barbosa’s prior extrajudicial statement did not violate the evidentiary rule of Commonwealth v. Brady. See generally United States v. Owens, 484 U.S. 554, 559, 108 S.Ct. 838, 842, 98 L.Ed.2d 951 (1988)(stating that the confrontation clause “guarantees only ‘an opportunity for effective cross-examination, not cross-examination that is effective in whatever way, .and to whatever extent, the defense may wish’” (citations omitted)).
Thus, I would not reach the difficult question of whether, for purposes of a harmless error analysis, evidence of an inculpatory eyewitness statement is merely cumulative of the testimony of others, none of whom was an eyewitness to the crime, particularly where such testimony is that of a co-conspirator and a jailhouse informant.
Chief Justice FLAHERTY joins this Concurring Opinion.