Court Opinion

ID: 9746793
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-27 14:38:32.81943+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:25:16.914276
License: Public Domain

PAPADAKOS, Justice
concurring.
I join the Majority Opinion because its use of the phrase “miscarriage of justice” is expressive of, and synonymous with, the standard of “prejudice” enunciated in Commonwealth v. Pierce, 515 Pa. 153, 527 A.2d 973 (1987). A miscarriage of justice, like prejudice, can only occur where it is demonstrated that a particular omission or commission was so serious that it undermined the reliability of the outcome of the proceeding. Where a conviction can be shown to result from a breakdown in the adversary process, the conviction rendered is unreliable. Such a conviction is obviously prejudicial to the defendant and, if allowed to stand, is a miscarriage of justice.
*515I write separately to emphasize that “prejudice” and “miscarriage of justice” are one in the same, lest the bar think that a new standard is being announced today.