Court Opinion

ID: 9766245
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 04:37:56.794759+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:20.593444
License: Public Domain

MANDERINO, Justice
(dissenting).
I dissent. Both Knight and Powell are entitled to a new trial because of the prejudice created by allowing the interrogating police officer to state that in his opinion both defendants “ . . . knew what they did . knew when they did it . [and] knew what they were doing . . .” The majority opinion concludes that this witness, a witness not qualified as a psychiatric expert, should nevertheless be allowed to express an opinion as to a defendant’s mental capacity because the expression of such an opinion was justified on grounds of “necessity and convenience.” While I have grave doubts as to the validity of such a rule, even if we were to accept it as the law of this Commonwealth, the result reached by the majority would remain in error. As acknowledged by the majority opinion, the mental capacity of each defendant was clearly at issue in this case. Before it could reach a verdict, the jury had to decide at least two questions concerning the defendant’s respective *78mental capacities: first the jury had to decide whether or not the defendants possessed the requisite degree of sanity to be guilty of criminal homicide at all; if the jury concluded that the defendants were sane, and therefore capable of committing a criminal homicide, it still had to decide whether or not the defendants possessed sufficient mental capacity to form the intent to commit murder in the first degree. While it is true, as stated by the majority opinion, that the testifying police officer did not say specifically that, in his opinion, appellants “knew the nature and consequences” of their actions nor did he state they knew the “difference between right and wrong,” his expression of opinion as to their mental capacities came sufficiently close to intruding upon the jury’s exclusive function of making these determinations that it should not have been allowed into evidence.
The majority concludes that the “rule of convenience and necessity” was satisfied in this case because the testifying officer merely used a “shorthand version” of expressing his total observations, “all of which may not [have been] easily expressed as separate and distinct factual observations . . . .” The majority continues, however, to state that prior to the making of the statement in question, the testifying police officer “stated the observations he had made which led him to conclude as he did.” Having thus stated what he observed while questioning the defendants, the issue of whether or not the defendants had requisite mental capacity was adequately presented to the jury for its decision, and no “rule of convenience” was served by allowing the officer to state his conclusion as to their mental capacities. For this reason alone the officer’s conclusion should not have been allowed into evidence.
Additionally, however, the officer’s opinion was not “necessary” in the instant appeal. The majority states that “it would have been very difficult for the officer to express the demeanor, degree of coherence, and other *79such factors which form the basis of his opinion in a sufficiently clear manner to enable the jury to have the full benefit of the officer’s observations without the use of an opinion.” This statement is at odds with the purpose of the criminal process. It is the duty of the prosecution, through its witnesses and evidence, to establish facts upon which a jury may make its determination. The prosecution should not be allowed to use opinion evidence simply because the subject is difficult to prove. Police officers are experienced in testifying in court and often are called upon to give factual descriptions of a person’s demeanor; of a person’s coherence or lack of coherence; of a person’s difficulty or lack of difficulty in walking or standing, or in performing various other functions. There was therefore no need for the officer here to state his opinion as to the mental capacity of the defendants.
Because I would reverse the judgment of sentence and remand for a new trial on this issue alone, I do not now discuss the other allegations of error raised in this appeal.