Court Opinion

ID: 9758764
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 23:44:16.85789+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:55.552064
License: Public Domain

WICKERSHAM, Judge,
dissenting:
I would hold that the lower court incorrectly rejected the evidentiary offer of the photocopy in this case and, accord*155ingly, would reverse the order below dismissing the prosecution.
The court below dismissed the speeding prosecution “because the Commonwealth was not prepared to introduce a certificate of timing device accuracy as required by law.” Lower ct. op. at 3. This conclusion was based upon two separate grounds: (1) the photocopy of the certificate of accuracy was not admissible under 42 Pa.C.S. § 6109(b), and (2) Trooper Algatt could not provide sufficient identification of the document to satisfy 42 Pa.C.S. § 6108(b). I would hold that, on the facts stated, the photocopy was sufficiently identified and was admissible pursuant to 42 Pa.C.S. § 6109.
The sole issue on this appeal is whether the prosecution must fall because a photocopy of a document, rather than the original, was offered to prove an element of the case. There is no question raised about the substance of the document, the certificate of timing accuracy. The testing of the stopwatch was done by Leitzel’s Jewelry, which was designated as an official testing station by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, pursuant to 75 Pa.C.S. § 3368(d).
The photocopy of the certificate established that on October 19, 1981, Leitzel’s had tested the stopwatch used to clock appellee. The citation issued to appellee on November 10, 1981 was well within the sixty day testing period prescribed by section 3368(d). No issue has been raised and no suggestion made that the proffered photocopy somehow differed from the original document.
Section 6109 of Title 42 provides, in pertinent part, as follows:
If ... any department or agency of government, in the regular course of business or activity, has kept or recorded any memorandum [or] writing ... of any act, transaction, occurrence or event, and in the regular course of business has caused any or all of the same to be recorded, copied or reproduced____[s]uch reproduction, when satisfactorily identified, is as admissible in evidence as the *156original itself in any judicial ... proceeding, whether the original is in existence or not.
42 Pa.C.S. § 6109(b).
The offer of proof made by the Commonwealth below would have shown the procedure whereby the photocopy of the certificate was received by Trooper Algatt and ultimately produced in court. When an authorized testing station tests and certifies a stopwatch, the certificate of accuracy is sent to the Pennsylvania State Police Bureau of Patrol in Harrisburg. Because any given stopwatch in any aircraft is used to clock speeders in conjunction with many different state police stations or barracks, the Bureau of Patrol sends a photocopy of the certificate of accuracy to each station that needs it. It was in this manner that Trooper Algatt received the photocopy of the document certifying that Leitzel’s had tested the stopwatch on October 19, 1981. The proffered testimony would have clearly satisfied all of the essential requirements for admissibility of the photocopy pursuant to 42 Pa.C.S. § 6109(b).
The only requirement on which an issue exists is that of the identification of the copy. Section 6109(b) allows reproductions to be admitted only “when satisfactorily identified.” I would hold that “satisfactory identification” need not be actual testimony that the copy is a true and correct copy. The procedures in the present case provide an appropriate link between the original document and the photocopy. The procedures showing the legitimacy of the copy were explained to the court below. Absent some suggestion that the document or its contents differed from the original, the document should have been accepted by the court as proof pursuant to 75 Pa.C.S. § 3368(d).
The lower court also reasoned that the document had to be “identified by a qualified witness” pursuant to 42 Pa.C.S. § 6108(b) to be admissible as a business record. Section 6108 creates an exception to the hearsay rule for business records. See Commonwealth v. Visconto, 301 Pa.Super. 543, 448 A.2d 41 (1982). Such a hearsay exception would be superfluous for the certificate of stopwatch accuracy, how*157ever, because the Vehicle Code provides a specific hearsay exception for the certificate in section 3368(d). See also Commonwealth v. Gernsheimer, 276 Pa.Super. 418, 419 A.2d 528 (1980) (in speeding prosecution, section 3368(d) takes preference over general requirements of Official Documents Law). Thus, the Commonwealth need not have met the requirements of section 6108(b), which it never invoked.
For these reasons, the order of the trial court dismissing the citation was error. I would accordingly reverse.