Court Opinion

ID: 9739564
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 20:17:39.920591+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:30:23.913605
License: Public Domain

DeBRULER, Justice,
dissenting.
In this case, the trial judge sought to maintain a balanced approach in superintending pre-trial discovery between the defense and the prosecution. When the second set of counsel took over the defense and procured a broad discovery order, the judge granted a protective order to the prosecution, which in substance would have required the second set to first exhaust the potential of contact with the first set as a source of information. The first set had inspected the prosecutor's files, which included the items of which the prosecution now claims in this court that the second set should not get a copy. The second set returned to court and procured an order that three police reports, identified by naming the police officers who made them and by the date they were made. These reports had been inspected by the first set of defense counsel while being maintained under the control and possession of the prosecution. Instead of asking for a new protec*1149tive order to limit the use of such copies at trial to reasonable and lawful purposes, the prosecution sought to strike the order in toto. If as the majority believes, possession by defense counsel of copies of these documents, as distinguished from knowledge by defense counsel of the content of the documents gained through their actual inspection, provides an intolerable potential for harassment and abuse of police officer witnesses during cross-examination, surely, protective orders and in-trial rulings by the presiding trial judge are the proper means for dealing with that potential, and not writs of mandate and prohibition by the state supreme court. This writ should be denied because relator did not seek the plainly adequate legal remedy of a protective order from the respondent court, which would have provided a record of litigation focusing upon the issue of whether a copy injures state interests, while inspection does not.
This writ should also be denied because Relator has failed to establish a prima facie case here. Such was his certain duty. State ex rel. Crumpacker v. LaPorte Circuit Court (1975), 264 Ind. 27, 338 N.E.2d 261. Absent here from the showing are the form, nature, and intended uses of "police reports." Counsel for the parties at the trial level and before us at hearing appear to know about police reports. Four justices of this court feel confident in their information about police reports. However, the record leaves me in the dark, and on this basis alone, I must vote to deny the writ.
This writ should not be granted through application of the work product doctrine. That doctrine protects the machinations of lawyers and their legal staffs, not law enforcement officers engaged in their day to day filed work. Furthermore, law enforcement officers in Indiana are of mature age and skilled in their profession. Many have a college education or its equivalent. At this point in time, all have received basic training at the Law Enforcement Academy which includes courses in its curriculum which teach the proper manner of testifying and presenting evidence in court. They are trained observers and know the difference between fact and opinion. In short, they are professional witnesses who are paid to do that work for us. They are better prepared than most folks to deal with efforts by lawyers to embarrass or harass them in court through cross-examination. I cannot but believe that law enforcement officers would agree that they do not need special protection against being taxed in court during cross-examination with their own formal written statements regarding a case. I would not grant this writ on the basis of the work product doctrine, because that doctrine was not intended to provide protection for day-to-day police reports, and at this day in age the police don't need that special level of protection anyway.
HUNTER, J., coneurs.