Court Opinion

ID: 9645944
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 21:40:46.487843+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:33.299156
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion by
Mr. Justice Roberts :
I am compelled to dissent from the patently anomalous result produced by the majority’s opinion today.
Appellant was charged in two separate indictments with two separate and distinct robberies. Notwithstanding his timely motion for severance of these offenses, appellant was tried for both robberies in one *203tidal. The majority, in its opinion, concludes that although “evidence of each of these particular crimes would not have been admissible in a separate trial for the other,” it was not error for the trial court to deny appellant’s timely motion for severance, and to try these offenses in a single trial.
This result is both illogical and untenable. As the majority concedes, due to the potential for prejudicing the jury, “evidence of one crime is inadmissible against a defendant being tried for another crime because the fact of the commission of one offense is not proof [with certain limited exceptions] of the commission of another.” See Commonwealth n. Foose, 441 Pa. 173, 272 A. 2d 452 (1971). Thus, the majority would not have permitted evidence of the first robbery, here, to be introduced at a single separate trial for the second robbery, because of potential prejudice to the defendant. Yet the majority does allow, by its decision today, evidence of doth crimes to be admitted in a single joint trial. It is inconceivable that the prejudice inherent in admitting evidence of one robbery at a separate trial of the second robbery dissipates simply because both robberies are joined for a single trial. Indeed, the opposite would appear to be more likely. It would be both anomalous and contradictory to permit consolidation of two crimes in one trial when evidence of one crime would not be admissible at a trial of the other crime if tried separately. Since the same danger of prejudice inhers in both situations, the defendant should be granted separate trials when he requests it.
Moreover, as the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia stated in Drew v. United States, 331 F. 2d 85, 88 (D.C. Cir. 1964), prejudice inures to the defendant in this type of situation because a “jury may use the evidence of one of the crimes charged to infer a criminal disposition on the part of *204the defendant from which is found his guilt of the other crime or crimes charged,” or the “jury may cumulate the evidence of the various crimes charged and find guilt when, if considered separately, it would not so find.”
The more logical and certainly the more just rule is that where, as here, a defendant is charged with two separate and distinct offenses, so dissimilar that it Avould be prejudicial error to admit evidence of one offense at a separate trial of the other, that defendant should have, on timely motion, an absolute right to severance of the offenses. The American Bar Association’s Standards Relating to Joinder and Severance categorically supports this vieAV by prowling for an absolute right to severance in cases of this nature. “Whenever two or more offenses have been joined for trial solely on the grounds that they are of the same or similar character, the defendant shall have a right to a severance of the offenses(Emphasis added.) American Bar Association Project on Minimum Standards for Criminal Justice, Standards Relating to Joinder and Severance, §2.2 (Approved Draft, 1968).
This rule would not eliminate the discretion of the trial judge to grant severance upon timely motion by the defendant. It would, however, restrict the exercise of that discretion to situations where the offenses involved were similar enough to meet the “other crimes” test, or where such offenses arose out of the same transaction, occurrence, or episode. Compare Commonwealth v. Campana, 452 Pa. 283, 304 A. 2d 432 (1973).
Indeed, a review of the relevant case law convinces me that this rule is, in fact, to a great extent, being followed today. Thus, where offenses joined in a single trial have a common scheme, plan, or design sufficient to meet the other crimes test, or arose out of the same criminal transaction, occurrence, or episode, courts have found no abuse of discretion in denying a defendant’s *205motion for severance. See, e.g., Bradley v. United States, 433 F. 2d 1113 (D.C. Cir. 1969); United States v. Lee, 428 F. 2d 917 (6th Cir. 1970), cert. denied, 404 U.S. 1017, 92 S. Ct. 679 (1972); Baker v. United States, 401 F. 2d 958 (D.C. Cir. 1968), cert. denied, 400 U.S. 965, 91 S. Ct. 367 (1970); Commonwealth v. Patrick, 416 Pa. 437, 206 A. 2d 295 (1965). However, where the crimes have been separate and distinct, it has been held prejudicial error to deny defendant’s motion for severance. See, e.g., Gregory v. United States, 369 F. 2d 185 (D.C. Cir. 1966), cert. denied, 396 U.S. 865, 90 S. Ct. 143 (1969); Cross v. United States, 335 F. 2d 987 (D.C. Cir. 1964); Drew v. United States, supra.
Accordingly, the two robberies, here, being separate criminal occurrences or episodes, appellant’s timely pretrial motion for severance should have been granted.
Mr. Justice Nix and Mr. Justice Mandseino join in this dissenting opinion.