Court Opinion

ID: 9648566
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 14:27:00.928084+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:02.976989
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion by
Mr. Justice Roberts:
During the course of the Commonwealth’s case in chief, one of the Commonwealth’s witnesses, Elmer *417Troup, testified that he did not know whether appellant had cocked his gun before proceeding in the victim’s direction. The prosecuting attorney pleaded surprise, and the trial court permitted him to cross-examine Troup and to read in the jury’s presence Troup’s prior written statement indicating that he had seen appellant cock his weapon.
The majority dismisses this concededly erroneous procedure on the theory that the gun cocking question was relevant only to the issue of deliberateness and that the jury in finding appellant guilty of voluntary manslaughter must of necessity have harbored at least a reasonable doubt that appellant had shot the victim with deliberateness.
The fact remains, however, that Troup’s prior written statement that appellant had cocked his gun prior to the shooting indicated to the jury that appellant was a culpable and blameworthy individual notwithstanding the technical irrelevance of this bit of evidence to the manslaughter charge. For this reason I cannot share the majority’s confidence that the reading of Troup’s statement in the presence of the jury was harmless error.
Accordingly, I dissent.
Mr. Justice Eagbn joins in this dissent.