Court Opinion

ID: 9628103
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 09:07:44.490286+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:06:48.173412
License: Public Domain

RICHARDSON, J.
I respectfully dissent. Relying upon the California Constitution, the majority holds that suspects facing preindictment or prearraignment identification lineups are entitled to the selection or appointment, presence and assistance of counsel. The majority thereby unnecessarily extends the right of counsel beyond the requirements of the federal Constitution as interpreted by the United States Supreme Court. (See Kirby v. Illinois (1972) 406 U.S. 682 [34 L.Ed.2d 411, 92 S.Ct. 1877].) In my view, Kirby affords a sound basis for confining the right to counsel to lineups which occur after the defendant has been formally charged with a crime.
The majority ignores the forceful reasoning of Justice Stewart’s plurality opinion in Kirby which carefully explains the significance of the filing of formal charges in the context of right to counsel: “The initiation of judicial criminal proceedings is far from a mere formalism. It is the starting point of our whole system of adversary criminal justice. For it is only then that the government has committed itself to prosecute, and only then that the adverse positions of government and defendant have solidified. It is then that a defendant finds himself faced with the prosecutorial forces of organized society, and immersed in the intricacies of substantive and procedural criminal law. [¶] It is this point, *107therefore, that marks the commencement of the ‘criminal prosecutions’ to which alone the explicit guarantees of the Sixth Amendment are applicable. [Citations.] [¶] In this case we are asked to import into a routine police investigation an absolute constitutional guarantee historically and rationally applicable only after the onset of formal prosecutorial proceedings. We decline to do so. Less than a year after Wade and Gilbert were decided, the Court explained the rule of those decisions as follows: ‘The rationale of those cases was that an accused is entitled to counsel at any “critical stage of the prosecution,” and that a postindictment lineup is such a “critical stage.”’ (Italics supplied.) [Citation.] We decline to depart from that rationale today by imposing a per se exclusionary rule upon testimony concerning an identification that took place long before the commencement of any prosecution whatever.” (Pp. 689-690 [34 L.Ed.2d, pp. 417-418], fn. omitted.)
The People represent, and defendant does not contest, that the Kirby rule has been adopted by the following 37 states: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, and Wisconsin. Of those states examining the question, only four apparently have not accepted the rule. Thus, the statement in the majority opinion that “A majority of state court decisions follow Kirby ...” (ante, p. 96, fn. 5) is a considerable understatement.
A criminal investigation is not a criminal prosecution. Nonetheless, rejecting the decision in Kirby, the majority holds that a prandictment lineup is a “critical stage” of criminal proceedings, by reason of the “unreliability of eyewitness identification of strangers” and the “dangers that improper, inadvertent or deliberate suggestion at a lineup will irradicably influence identification testimony.” (Ante, p. 92.) Such factors, however, do not warrant our departure from Kirby. Unreliable identifications can occur whether or not counsel is present. Moreover, any abuse of identification procedures, including improperly suggestive lineups, may be fully reviewed under applicable due process standards. (Kirby, 406 U.S. at pp. 690-691 [34 L.Ed.2d at p. 418]; Stovall v. Denno (1967) 388 U.S. 293 [18 L.Ed.2d 1199, 87 S.Ct. 1967].) As stressed by the high court in Kirby, “Stovall strikes the appropriate constitutional balance between the right of a suspect to be protected from prejudicial procedures and the interest of society in the prompt *108and purposeful investigation of an unsolved crime.” (P. 691 [34 L.Ed. 2d, pp. 418-419].) We err in again deliberately tilting this balance against the People.
In the present case, complete photographs of the lineup and its participants (both front and side views) were taken and were made available to defense counsel at trial. The victims had told police officers that the suspects were a black and an Hispanic. Accordingly, the officers displayed at the lineup six blacks and six Hispanics to the witnesses, who marked their identifications upon cards supplied for that purpose. The procedures employed here certainly help to reduce the danger of suggestion at the lineup.
The presence of counsel at a lineup affords no absolute protection against unreliable or suggestive identifications. In the words of one commentator, “A review of the role of counsel at lineups indicates the limited nature of the services he can perform. In fact, there are some indications that a lawyer’s presence may hinder the effective use of the lineup as an investigatory technique.” (Read, Lawyers at Lineups: Constitutional Necessity or Avoidable Extravagence? (1969) 17 UCLA L.Rev. 339, 394, italics added.) Indeed, considerable doubt exists as to the proper function of the suspect’s counsel at a lineup, and “it would appear that defense counsel has no affirmative right to be active during the course of the lineup.” (People v. Williams (1971) 3 Cal.3d 853, 860 [92 Cal.Rptr. 6, 478 P.2d 942] [dis. opn., by Mosk, J.]; see also Read, supra, at pp. 362-367.)
Given the passive role played by counsel at a lineup, it is not surprising that the vast majority of state courts have followed Kirby. There is a manifest need for the prompt and efficient identification of suspects following commission of a crime. Investigative leads may open and close very fast. The majority’s new rule necessarily will cause needless and perhaps critical delays in this identification process. The suspect may not have counsel or he may be slow in selecting counsel. Once chosen, there may be financial or other complications in retaining counsel. Counsel may be on vacation or for varied reasons otherwise engaged. The majority’s rejection of Kirby cannot but delay criminal investigations, and the delay may well be very appreciable. Meanwhile, this phase of the investigation grinds to a halt. Although the majority purports to recognize that “exigent circumstances will justify proceeding without counsel,” (ante, p. 102), harried police personnel busily engaged *109in an ongoing investigation are further shackled because they may well be unable accurately to determine whether or not a true “exigency” exists. This can further complicate and prolong law enforcement procedures without a reciprocal compensating benefit.
I have previously expressed my views concerning the propriety of selective reliance upon provisions of the California Constitution to avoid otherwise applicable decisions of the United States Supreme Court interpreting identical, or substantially similar provisions of the federal Constitution. (E.g., People v. Disbrow (1976) 16 Cal.3d 101, 118-121 [127 Cal.Rptr. 360, 545 P.2d 272] [dis. opn.].) I do not repeat those views here.
The court’s Kirby rule is supported not only by the great weight of authority, but by common sense as well. The majority’s departure from Kirby is unnecessary and unwise. I would affirm the judgment of conviction.
The petitions of both parties for a rehearing were denied November 19, 1981.