Court Opinion

ID: 9646137
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 12:50:16.34661+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:05:29.519424
License: Public Domain

*618JUSTICE SAYLOR
CONCURRING.
Respectfully, I take issue with the majority’s assertion that it is not clear that challenged commentary by the district attorney during his closing speech concerning the preliminary hearing testimony of Braheem Jackson was improper. See Majority Opinion at 1039 n. 9. Certainly a prosecutor is not always bound to ignore contextual implications of an out-of-court statement arising in light of other trial evidence, see generally Richardson v. Marsh, 481 U.S. 200, 208, 107 S.Ct. 1702, 1708, 95 L.Ed.2d 176 (1987), and therefore, in this case for example, to disavow that the evidence demonstrated that Appellant was the person to whom Jackson was referring in accusatory references couched (before the jury) in terms of “this guy.” A prosecutor may not, however, after a trial court has assiduously redacted accusatory references, directly attribute the accusation to the redacted witness statement. Yet this is precisely what occurred here, when the district attorney, in various permutations during his closing argument, indicated that “Braheem Jackson said, Richard Mitchell had a gun, he gave it to McCrae.” N.T., Nov. 21, 2000, at 177; see also id. at 125, 156, 163-64. Whether this breach was intentional or not, it violated both the letter and the spirit of the trial court’s directive and therefore should be recognized as improper. This is particularly the case where admission of Jackson’s preliminary hearing testimony containing the statements was secured, inter alia, on the district attorney’s representation to the trial court that “I submit to the Court that the redactions that I have ... undertaken in this case are sufficient to protect the defendant^ i.e., Appellant].” N.T., Nov. 17, 2000, at 180.
While the above reference to Jackson’s testimony occurred during summation of the Commonwealth’s case against Appellant’s co-defendant, it should be noted that the district attorney also disregarded the trial court’s instructions to the effect that Jackson’s testimony was not to be used against Appellant in his summation of the Commonwealth’s evidence against
*619Appellant. Specifically, this occurred in the district attorney’s rebuttal of Appellant’s claim to a lesser degree of culpability than first degree murder. In this regard, the district attorney stated that Appellant should be judged by his actions, including that, immediately prior to the killings, he
turned and asked for a gun, a lethal weapon, the one weapon in this country responsible for probably killing more people than any other, a weapon which he even himself admitted he knows is capable, oh, yes, quite capable of killing.
He asked for a loaded operable gun....
N.T., Nov. 21, 2000, at 147. Since the only evidence of record suggesting that Appellant affirmatively asked for a firearm just before the killings derived from Jackson’s preliminary hearing testimony, see N.T., Nov. 17, 2000, at 244-267, this line of argumentation had no place in the district attorney’s closing vis-á-vis Appellant, in light of the trial court’s repeated instructions.
On the broader legal points involved, while I agree with the majority that the United States Supreme Court’s specific holding in Bruton v. United States, 391 U.S. 123, 88 S.Ct. 1620, 20 L.Ed.2d 476 (1968), is not controlling here, I would not apply as categorical an approach to the Sixth Amendment principles underlying Bruton as the majority seems to apply. In particular, I would not exclude the possibility that such principles might render cautionary instructions insufficient to prevent the possibility of spillover prejudice in some larger set of circumstances analogous to, but not overlapping with, those before the United States Supreme Court in Bruton.
Concerning the disposition of this case, ultimately I agree with majority that the district attorney’s transgressions of trial court directives do not entitle Appellant to a new trial, as the general incriminatory aspect of Jackson’s preliminary hearing testimony was cumulative of the overwhelming evidence demonstrating Appellant’s participation in the killings. It is a closer case, in my view, with respect to the district attorney’s argument related to Jackson’s reference to Appel*620lant’s request for a gun immediately prior to the killings in terms of its potential effect on the jury’s determination concerning the degree of Appellant’s culpability. However, in light of the strength of the inference of Appellant’s intent arising from the use to which overwhelming evidence demonstrated that he put the firearm, as well as the trial court’s repeated instructions, I agree with the majority’s ultimate finding of harmlessness.
Chief Justice CAPPY and Justice NIGRO join this concurring opinion.