Court Opinion

ID: 9699060
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 20:08:47.9974+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:46.111262
License: Public Domain

Hall, J.
(dissenting). I am in accord with the view expressed in the dissenting opinion of Justice Pkoctok that pretrial disclosure of the testimony of a witness before the grand jury is not permissible in this State on the bases of both precedent and policy with respect to grand jury secrecy. It may be added that the policy was deliberately established on the foundation of precedent, in 1948, when this court adopted what is now B. B. 3 :3-7: “The requirements as to secrecy of proceedings of the grand jury shall remain as heretofore.” In the context of this case, this would only permit discovery of the witness’ testimony, at trial, for use in cross-examination of him (or, if a defendant were charged with false swearing before the grand jury, pretrial inspection of his own testimony before that body). As the comment to this rule in the Tentative Draft (1948), p. 38, states, the federal regulation (Federal Buie of Criminal Procedure 6(e), 18 U. S. C. A.) is more lenient. Even so, no federal case is cited which goes as far as the majority. If we are to change the policy, it should be done, not by going beyond the rule in a particular case as here, but by amending it after full review and reevaluation of the many considerations involved.
Moreover, to me, the underlying question here is really the broader and more significant one of the extent to which pretrial discovery should be allowed a criminal defendant. *229The implications of the majority opinion seem far-reaching in two directions: first, the right to examine, in advance of trial, the testimony of any or all witnesses before the grand jury, which is the real issue in this case; and second, the cognate right to inspect statements of witnesses obtained by the prosecutor. While the latter issue is not directly presented, the rationale of the majority could well serve as a springboard when it is again urged.
Here, too, we are concerned with a rule, B. B. 3:5-ll quoted in the majority opinion, which declares policy and fixes limits and, again, ought not to be enlarged on an ad hoc, case by case, basis. This court so said as to this very rule in State v. Johnson, 28 N. J. 133, 143 (1958). Adopted in 1953 as our initial venture in this vexing field, it does not, in my opinion, authorize the discovery here permitted either in letter or spirit. The testimony of a witness is obviously not a tangible object or paper obtained from or belonging to the defendant or a statement or confession made by the defendant. And it can hardly be said to be within the intendment of “designated books, tangible objects, papers or documents obtained from others” when the rule expressly excepts from that classification “written statements or confessions.” Calling the testimony “a view of the scene of the crime,” as the majority does in seeking to analogize the situation to inspection of a physical object, seems to me a rather transparent disguise. The characterization cannot change the essential nature—it is still the grand jury testimony of a witness, which is not within the permissive scope of B. B. 3:5-ll.
To probe deeper than the matter of rule limitations, this defendant expressly grounded his application on the broad proposition that, regardless of our rule, a defendant should be entitled to examine before trial the testimony of every grand jury witness in every case “to prepare his defense” and “to provide defendant an equal opportunity for a full and fair presentation of the available evidence which is now unilaterally available to the State.” While the majority *230directly deals only -with a ease of subornation of false swearing before the grand jury, the implications of its reasoning seem to me equally applicable to any other criminal situation so as to permit any defendant pretrial access to all grand jury testimony. Nor, under the rationale, do I perceive any solid basis for distinction between grand jury testimony of witnesses and statements given by them to the prosecutor.
The main thread inferentially running through the majority opinion is that the interests of justice require (to use the criterion of the rule) pretrial inspection of a witness’ grand jury testimony whenever the defendant presents the possibility that some factual or legal defense might be developed from the testimony given. It is hard to imagine a ease where a defendant could not make this broad showing. The majority, to me, indicates that such meets a defendant’s obligation to demonstrate a “particularized need” and that the burden is thereby shifted to the State to demonstrate why the inspection should not be granted. While, of course, the decision does not explicitly go this far, the future trend in that direction seems foreshadowed. In addition, this view clearly appears to reverse what I have understood to be the proper approach in any criminal discovery matter where the legal discretion of the trial judge is involved.
It goes without saying that this concept of the majority as I view it would automatically expand criminal pretrial discovery in this State very greatly. Whether this result is desirable is a much mooted subject throughout the country, with many angles. Eor a comprehensive review of the numerous aspects, see Goldstein, “The State and The Accused: Balance of Advantage in Criminal Procedure,” 69 Yale L. J. 1149 (1960). In Johnson (28 N. Jat p. 143), this court said in effect that we would not go beyond B. R. 3 :5-ll without fuller experience with its practical operation (including that of the implementing cases to that date) and without more information with *231respect to experience in other jurisdictions where the practice is more liberal, to be thoroughly studied and explored at a judicial conference. No such study or exploration has been had. Without it, I am not willing to depart from the present limits of our law and start along the road the instant decision seems bound to take us. My personal reconsideration, necessarily a limited one, of the many-sided problems leads to the present conclusion that further enlargement of pretrial discovery is too fraught with the possibility of grave damage to the public interest in too many eases and not necessary for fair treatment of the criminal defendant in most situations. This seems especially true in those types of crimes closely affecting the public interest where law enforcement has not been effective, including governmental corruption, into which class the case at bar falls, and organized or gang lawlessness, in which it is common knowledge that trial perjury and intimidation of witnesses are at least prevalent.
Looking more specifically at this particular situation, even on some broad basis of “particularized need” and apart from the present rule I fail to see where this defendant makes a showing sufficient to warrant the exercise of a trial judge’s discretion in his favor. The allegedly false testimony relied upon is set forth verbatim in the indictment. When questioned at oral argument, his counsel gave the impression that he wanted the inspection primarily to look for indications of retraction of the testimony and admission of its falsity by the witness later on in the same examination. This would not be enough to wash out the criminality of the witness, State v. Kowalczyk, 3 N. J. 51 (1949), and equally insufficient to absolve the defendant of subornation if it were proved that he corruptly procured the witness to so testify in the first instance. (At common law, subornation was a separate crime because it was considered a more serious offense than the perjury itself. Perkins, Criminal Law (1957), 393-395.) Even if the rule of Kowalczylc were otherwise, proof of defendant’s *232solicitation of the witness to testify falsely would warrant conviction under this indictment for attempted subornation. Perkins, op. cit., 395.
I therefore vote to reverse that part of the order of the trial court which is appealed from.
For affirmance—Chief Justice Weintraub, and Justices Jacobs, Fbaitcis and Schettiho—4.
For reversal—Justices Pbootob and Hale—2.