Court Opinion

ID: 9762486
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 02:25:27.177396+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:34.977525
License: Public Domain

ZAPPALA, Justice,
concurring.
I agree with the majority’s holding that the typewritten police report of the state trooper’s interview with the victim did not satisfy any of the requirements established in Commonwealth v. Lively, 530 Pa. 464, 610 A.2d 7 (1992). The state trooper had testified that the police report was prepared from his verbatim record of the victim’s statements made on a notepad during the interview. The majority concludes that the police report was not a contemporaneous verbatim recording of the victim’s statements, stating that, “The notepad, which was the contemporaneous verbatim recording, was not produced at trial.... ” I must disagree with the intimation that the trooper’s notes would have been admissible as substantive evidence if preserved for use at trial.
In Commonwealth v. Brady, 510 Pa. 123, 507 A.2d 66 (1986), we abandoned a longstanding rule that prior inconsistent *327statements of a non-party witness could not be used at trial as substantive evidence to prove the truth of the matters asserted therein. Prior to that decision, such prior inconsistent statements were admissible only for the limited purpose of impeaching the credibility of the witness. We reversed our position and held that otherwise admissible prior inconsistent statements of a witness in a judicial proceeding, who is available for cross-examination, may be used as substantive evidence.
In Brady, the defendant was convicted of second degree murder, burglary, and criminal mischief for the stabbing death of a security guard. The defendant’s girlfriend, Tina Traxler, gave a statement to the police on the day of the homicide. The statement, which was tape-recorded, identified the defendant as the perpetrator of the crimes. Traxler told the police that she and the defendant had climbed a fence surrounding a manufacturing plant and entered the plant through a side door. They were confronted by the security guard while attempting to pry open a dollar-bill change machine. The guard was fatally stabbed in the ensuing struggle.
Traxler recanted the tape-recorded statement when called as a witness for the Commonwealth at trial, although she admitted that she voluntarily gave the statement to the police. She testified that neither she nor the defendant had entered the plant on the day of the murder. The Commonwealth was allowed to introduce the tape-recorded statement as substantive evidence over the objection of defense counsel and the jury was instructed that the statement could be considered for that purpose.
We held that the tape-recorded statement was properly admitted as substantive evidence because the statement was rendered under highly reliable circumstances and the witness was subject to cross-examination during the trial. We did not address in detail, however, what circumstances would be deemed “highly reliable” so as to render a prior inconsistent statement admissible as substantive evidence.
*328In Commonwealth v. Lively, 530 Pa. 464, 610 A.2d 7 (1992), we refined our holding in Brady and limited the circumstances in which a prior inconsistent statement may be introduced as substantive evidence. The Superior Court had approved the use of prior inconsistent statements of three witnesses as substantive evidence during the defendant’s trial on charges of first degree murder and possession of an instrument of crime. At trial, each of the witnesses failed to implicate the defendant in the charges. The Commonwealth was permitted to introduce evidence that shortly after the murder one witness told a police officer that she had seen the defendant commit the crime; that a detective had prepared a memorandum referring to a statement by a second witness that he had seen the defendant during the incident; and inconsistent statements that a third witness had given in a signed, written statement to the police and during a preliminary hearing.
The Superior Court had concluded that our holding in Brady did not require that a prior inconsistent statement be either recorded or verbatim. We rejected this interpretation, stating
In an effort to ensure that only those hearsay declarations that are demonstrably reliable and trustworthy are considered as substantive evidence, we now hold that a prior inconsistent statement may be used as substantive evidence only when the statement is given under oath at a formal legal proceeding; or the statement had been reduced to a writing signed and adopted by the witness; or a statement that is a contemporaneous verbatim recording of the witness’s statement.
530 Pa. at 471, 610 A.2d at 10. Under this standard, the police officer’s testimony relating to a statement given to him by a witness and another witness’s statements included in a memorandum prepared by a detective were not properly admitted as substantive evidence. The signed, written statement and preliminary hearing testimony of the third witness satisfied the standard and were properly admitted.
*329The limitations on the rule developed in Brady were intended to ensure that the prior inconsistent statement was in fact made by the witness. If the Commonwealth is to be allowed to introduce a prior inconsistent statement as substantive evidence to prove that the defendant committed the crime, there should be no dispute as to whether the statement was ever made. A statement given under oath at a formal legal proceeding and a written statement signed and adopted by a witness eliminate the possibility that a collateral issue will arise at trial as to whether the witness made the statement. The witness, of course, may offer an explanation as to why the prior inconsistent statement is untrue or inaccurate.
In order to ensure that the same degree of reliability has been established when the statement is a contemporaneous verbatim recording of the witness’s statement, the “recording” of a statement must be an audiotaped or videotaped recording. By suggesting that the Lively standard would be met by introducing an officer’s notepad which is claimed to include the verbatim statement of a witness, the majority has interjected a degree of unreliability into the use of a statement as substantive evidence of the crime. In that instance, a witness could challenge whether a statement attributed to him was actually made, or whether the statement was recorded verbatim. The possibility of these unnecessary collateral issues should be eliminated when the statements are to be used as substantive evidence.
FLAHERTY, CAPPY and CASTILLE, JJ., join this concurring opinion.