Court Opinion

ID: 9699573
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 20:34:21.988032+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:53.364862
License: Public Domain

*610ROBERTS, Justice
(concurring).
In my view, “ ‘ “[e] violence of other offenses may be received if relevant for any purpose other than to show a mere propensity or disposition on the part of defendant to commit the crime.” ’ ” Commonwealth v. Brown, 462 Pa. 578, 594, 342 A.2d 84, 92 (1975) (concurring opinion), quoting Commonwealth v. Boykin, 450 Pa. 25, 33, 298 A.2d 258, 262 (1972) (concurring opinion of Roberts, J., joined by Jones, C. J.). The evidence of appellant Borschell’s participation in prior burglaries of other private homes was relevant for permissible purposes. The heart of the Commonwealth’s evidence of appellant’s complicity in the Washick robbery consisted of the testimony of three persons reciting statements made to them by appellant indicating that he had “master-minded” the Washick crime. An obvious question, likely to occur to the jury and to affect their evaluation of the weight of the testimony of the three witnesses, was why appellant would make incriminating admissions to innocent acquaintances. This question was answered when the witnesses were permitted to testify that they were in fact not innocent acquaintances but appellant’s confederates in prior burglaries. Explaining how and why the witnesses learned of what they testified about is surely a relevant purpose distinct from showing appellant’s burglarious disposition.
Furthermore, I am not persuaded that the risk of prejudice to appellant outweighed the probative value of explaining to the jury how and why the witnesses acquired their information. See Commonwealth v. Brown, supra (concurring opinion); compare Commonwealth v. Terry, 462 Pa. 595; 603; 342 A.2d 92, 96 (1975) (dissenting opinion). Finally, in my view, if evidence of other offenses is admitted, “the defendant is entitled upon request to a limiting instruction charging the jury that it is not permitted to draw the inference from the evidence of other offenses that the defendant by character was *611predisposed to commit the crime charged.” Commonwealth v. Brown, supra, 462 Pa. at 578, 342 A.2d at 84 (concurring opinion). Appellant received such an instruction in this case.*
Accordingly, I concur in the result.

 “Members of the jury, the fact that the defendant has perpetrated burglaries, howsoever many there are he did, it does not follow that therefore he committed this burglary. Therefore, you will not consider that this man has committed this burglary because he committed other burglaries.”