Court Opinion

ID: 9544466
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:55:48.937021+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:13:03.032198
License: Public Domain

Bashara, P.J.
(dissenting). I respectfully disagree with the majority holding that People v Beavers, 393 Mich 554; 227 NW2d 511 (1975), should be extended to include participant recording rather than the more limited participant monitoring upon which Beavers was based.
As to the cases cited by the majority from the Court of Appeals, namely, People v Taylor, 93 Mich App 292; 287 NW2d 210 (1979), People v Perry, 91 Mich App 79; 282 NW2d 14 (1979), and People v Hall, 88 Mich App 324; 276 NW2d 897 (1979), I decline to follow their reasoning. Instead, I would rely on the reasoning of Judge Danhof’s dissent in People v Hall, supra, and People v Dubose, 91 Mich App 633; 283 NW2d 644 (1977).
People v Beavers, supra, relied on the dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Harlan in the plurality decision of United States v White, 401 US 745; 91 S Ct 1122; 28 L Ed 2d 453 (1971). Parenthetically, I feel that the Beavers Court’s reliance on Justice Harlan’s opinion was misplaced. However, he did make clear that there is a significant distinction between the defendant’s assumption of risk that a participant to a conversation may later repeat it, verbally or via a recorder, and the simultaneous monitoring of a conversation by unknown people who are not a party to the conversation.
Beavers was a participant monitoring case. It was based upon the proposition that only those who are a party to the conversation can hear and repeat it. Those facts can be distinguished from the case at bar where the recording was not simul*405taneously transmitted to third parties who later testified to the conversation. See Lopez v United States, 373 US 427; 83 S Ct 1381; 10 L Ed 2d 462 (1963), and People v Drielick, 400 Mich 559; 255 NW2d 619 (1977), cert den 434 US 1047; 98 S Ct 893; 54 L Ed 2d 798 (1978).
Based upon the foregoing, I would affirm defendant’s conviction.