Court Opinion

ID: 9640812
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 17:15:55.363685+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:33.027088
License: Public Domain

NIX, Justice,
concurring.
I agree with today’s majority opinion awarding a new trial for the appellant. Unlike the majority, I would rest this conclusion upon a finding that the record fails to support an effective waiver by a juvenile suspect. Commonwealth v. McCutchen, 463 Pa. 90, 343 A.2d 669 (1970).1
Appellant was fifteen years old when he was interrogated at a police station regarding the murder with which he was later charged. Although he was apparently advised of his Miranda rights, this Court has said:
[T]he administering of Miranda warnings to a juvenile, without providing an opportunity to that juvenile to consult with a mature, informed individual concerned primarily with the interest of the juvenile, was inadequate to offset the disadvantage occasioned by his youth. The new rule appreciates that the inexperience of the minor affects not only his or her ability to understand the full implication and consequences of the predicament but also renders the judgment inadequate to assess the spectrum of consideration encompassed in the waiver decision. It was therefore reasoned that the impediment of immaturity can only be overcome where the record establishes that the youth had access to the advice of an attorney, parent, or other *472interested adult and that the consulted adult was informed as to the constitutional rights available to the minor and aware of the consequences that might follow the election to be made.
Commonwealth v. Smith, 472 Pa. 492, 498-99, 372 A.2d 797, 800 (1977) (footnote omitted).
Accord, Commonwealth v. Barnes, 482 Pa. 555, 394 A.2d 461 (1978); Commonwealth v. Lawson, 478 Pa. 200, 386 A.2d 509 (1978); Commonwealth v. Lee, 475 Pa. 314, 380 A.2d 371 (1977); Commonwealth v. Jamison, 474 Pa. 541, 379 A.2d 87 (1977); Commonwealth v. Graver, 473 Pa. 473, 375 A.2d 339 (1977); Commonwealth v. Harvell, 473 Pa. 418, 374 A.2d 1282 (1977); Commonwealth v. Gaskins, 471 Pa. 238, 369 A.2d 1285 (1977); Commonwealth v. Lee, 470 Pa. 401, 368 A.2d 690 (1977); Commonwealth v. Hailey, 470 Pa. 488, 368 A.2d 1261 (1977); Commonwealth v. Webster, 466 Pa. 314, 353 A.2d 372 (1976); Commonwealth v. Stanton, 466 Pa. 143, 351 A.2d 663 (1976); Commonwealth v. Chaney, 465 Pa. 407, 350 A.2d 829 (1975); Commonwealth v. Smith, 465 Pa. 310, 350 A.2d 410 (1976); Commonwealth v. Riggs, 465 Pa. 208, 348 A.2d 429 (1975); Commonwealth v. McCutchen, supra, Commonwealth v. Starkes, 461 Pa. 178, 335 A.2d 698 (1975); Commonwealth v. Roane, 459 Pa. 389, 329 A.2d 286 (1974).
It is also clear that the primary aim of the McCutchen rule is to provide the juvenile suspect with an adult who is sensitive to the juvenile’s legal position and concerned with advising the youth as to his best interests under the circumstances. This responsibility is not discharged merely by the adult instructing the juvenile to “tell the truth to the police.” This is so even where the advice is supplied by a parent. As the Court stated in the Smith case:
It was never the intention to exclude the requirement of interest simply because the consulting adult was a parent of the minor. To the contrary, it was assumed that the relationship would assure the requisite concern for the welfare of the minor. However, that assumption does not justify the creation of an irrebuttable presumption of interest by a parent. Where, as here, the disinterest of *473the parent is graphically demonstrated, it is clear that [the father] was not the interested adult envisioned in the rule. If the adult is one who is not concerned with the interest of the minor, the protection sought to be afforded is illusory and the procedure fails to accomplish its purpose of offsetting the disadvantage occasioned by the immaturity.
Commonwealth v. Smith, 472 Pa. at 500, 372 A.2d at 801 (footnote omitted).
In the present case the record reveals that appellant’s father “was not the interested adult envisioned in the rule.” Id. The detective who elicited appellant’s confession testified that there was a clear “conflict” between the father and appellant, so great that “the two wouldn’t come together physically except for a small period of time.” The detective further testified that “it was so obvious that there was something between the father and the son, it wasn’t a normal father and son relationship . . .. [H]is father wouldn’t go in the room with the kid. I mean I couldn’t understand it.”
Appellant’s father was not in the same room with appellant during the interrogation. The detective was forced to shuttle back and forth between the interrogation room and the room where appellant’s father was throughout the questioning. The detective testified to the following sequence of events. At 7:28, when appellant was advised of his constitutional rights by the detective, appellant’s father was not present. The detective left appellant at 7:39 and advised the father that appellant was a suspect. At 7:41, appellant’s father returned with the detective and told appellant to tell the truth. This instruction was given by the father to his son, without any attempt to ascertain his son’s version of the events and without ascertaining in what manner the son might be implicated by discussing the case at this point. Appellant’s father then again left his son alone with the detective. Appellant told the detective there were things he didn’t want his father to know and tried to get the detective *474to promise not to tell him. At 7:48, the detective left the room and told appellant’s father that his son didn’t want him to know certain things. The father replied by saying that it would all come out in court anyway. The detective returned to the interrogation room at 7:51 and continued his questioning. At 7:54, he left the room and asked appellant’s father if appellant would cover up for someone, to which the father replied either “no” or that he didn’t know. At 7:56, the detective returned to the interrogation room, and, during his questioning, appellant orally admitted to committing the murder. The detective left the room at 8:06 and told the father that appellant had confessed. Upon the detective’s return to the interrogation room at 8:15, he found appellant writing a poem on a piece of paper. The detective asked him to write his version of the murder, to which appellant agreed. The detective again left the room and when he returned, appellant had written out his confession. This confession was later entered against him.
The detective’s testimony clearly shows that appellant’s father was insufficiently interested in appellant’s legal interests and that appellant was denied the kind of consultation with an adult that is a prerequisite to a' valid waiver of Miranda rights. It is difficult to understand how the juvenile’s rights could be properly safeguarded by an adult who refused to be in the same room with the juvenile during the interrogation and where the rapport between the two was obviously strained. While it is always an appropriate admonition to tell the truth to one who has made an informed decision to give a statement, that was not the question that the consultation was designed to consider. Rather, the question was the advisability of the accused’s participation in a custodial interrogation. It is clear that the father in this instance made no attempt to seek from his son the necessary information required to make an intelligent judgment as to this question. Absent such information, he was clearly not equipped to provide the guidance that the rule envisions.

. In view of my approach to this case, there is no occasion for me to discuss the applicability or the soundness of the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in North Carolina v. Butler, - U.S. -, 99 S.Ct. 1755, 60 L.Ed.2d 286 (1979.)