Court Opinion

ID: 9518906
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 01:04:48.500046+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:38:26.099402
License: Public Domain

J. H. Gillis, P. J.
(dissenting). I cannot agree because I do not believe the trial judge could properly conclude that the 4 questions (as contained in the majority opinion) could not have possibly tended to incriminate the defendant.
The correct standard for the compulsion of testimony is, I believe, as stated in Hoffman v. United States (1951), 341 US 479 (71 S Ct 814, 95 L Ed 1118); also an appeal from a conviction of criminal contempt for asserting the privilege in response to a grand jury inquiry. The Court held, in reversing, (341 US at 488):
“In this setting it was not ‘perfectly clear, from a careful consideration of all the circumstances in the case, that the witness is mistaken, and that the answer [s] cannot possibly have such tendency’ to incriminate [citations omitted].” (Emphasis supplied.)
*500The Supreme Court was faced wdth a similar dilemma of weighing the social necessity of the desired testimony against the protection of the right against self-incrimination. At 341 US 489, 490, the Court states:
“For these reasons we cannot agree with the judgments below. If this result adds to the burden of diligence and efficiency resting on enforcement authorities, any other conclusion would seriously compromise an important constitutional liberty. ‘The immediate and potential evils of compulsory self-disclosure transcend any difficulties that the exercise of the privilege may impose on society in the detection and prosecution of crime’ United States v. White, 322 US 694, 698 [64 S Ct 1248, 88 L Ed 1542, 152 ALR 1202] (1944).”
The Court then quoted with approval the opinion by Mr. Justice Brandeis in McCarthy v. Arndstein (1924), 266 US 34, 42 (45 S Ct 16, 69 L Ed 158):
“If Congress should hereafter conclude that a full disclosure * * * by the witnesses is of greater importance than the possibility of punishing them for some crime in the past, it can, as in other cases, confer the power of unrestricted examination by providing complete immunity.”
Hoffman has been expressly cited as applicable to the States. Malloy v. Hogan (1964), 378 US 1 (84 S Ct 1489, 12 L Ed 2d 653).
In the present case, the “setting” is one of “tending to incriminate” when all the circumstances are considered. Cf. Emspak v. United States (1955), 349 US 190 (75 S Ct 687, 99 L Ed 997). It is especially relevant to consider that although armed with the power to immunize defendant from prosecution (In re Colacasides [1967], 379 Mich 69) the grand juror chose not to do so. It is from there a short jump to the not wholly unreasonable conclu*501sion that the reason immunity was not granted was that the grand juror was attempting to furnish links in the chain of incriminatory evidence against the witness himself. When viewed in this light, even borderline or threshold questions appear all the less innocuous.
“It [the fifth amendment privilege] reflects many of our fundamental values and most noble aspirations : our unwillingness to subject those suspected of crime to the cruel trilemma of self-accusation, perjury or contempt.” Murphy v. Waterfront Commission of New York Harbor (1964), 378 US 52, 55 (84 S Ct 1594, 12 L Ed 2d 678).
A second basis on which I dissent is that even if defendant could constitutionally be punished for criminal contempt, he may not be so punished under CLS 1961, § 767.5 (Stat Ann 1954 Kev § 28.945), the provisions of which section are quoted at page 497 of the majority opinion. The legislature has cre'ated a penalty in this statute, but only while granting an accused certain rights as well.
The right provided by the statute is the contemnor’s right to “appear before such judge to purge himself of such contempt.” To my mind, the liability created by this statute is conditioned upon the existence of the stated right, and that liability cannot attach where the right is extinct or nonexistent.
In this case, defendant was convicted after expiration of the term of the grand jury. There was no way in which he could have exercised his right to appear and offer to purge.
I would reverse.