Court Opinion

ID: 9693505
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 16:45:27.197814+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:19:47.214381
License: Public Domain

Dethmers, C. J.
(concurring). I concur in reversal but am not in accord with reasoning advanced by Mr. Justice Boyles for reversal as to defendant Skrzycki. In my view it was not reversible error to deny his motion to strike testimony concerning physical facts and admissions made by Mm at the scene of the accident, on the sole ground that the witness who gave it, police officer Lutz, had, before taking the witness stand, refreshed his recollection thereof by reviewing the official police report and his own notes, both prepared by him at the time of the accident.
The following facts are to be noted: (1) Officer Lutz testified at the outset that he had a personal, independent recollection of this accident; (2) he testified that he had prepared the notes and police report at the time of the accident; (3) the notes and report were not received in evidence and Lutz did not read therefrom or use them on the witness stand *173but merely refreshed his recollection by reviewing them before coming to the witness stand; (4) defense counsel made no objection to his testimony in this connection when it came in, and, on the contrary,, facilitated it by questions and suggestions of his own at the time; (5) on cross-examination defense counsel asked officer Lutz whether he could forget the-contents of his report and notes and still have some-independent recollection of the subject and, after-receiving an affirmative reply, directed him to testify on the basis of his present recollection, irrespective-of the report and notes, and thereafter elicited from him testimony pretty well confirming his claim of' independent recollection on crucial points; (6) after Lutz’s testimony concerning the physical facts and. defendant’s admissions at the scene of the accident had all come in without defense objection, the motion was made to strike any testimony based on a recollection refreshed by the notes and report without further identifying the testimony thus to be stricken, and without suggesting how the court or jury might single out and determine what portion of the mass of1 testimony theretofore adduced without objection, had been based on independent recollection and what portion on refreshed recollection. Under such circumstances, defendant Skrzycki was scarcely in a position to complain of the ruling of the trial court-even if it were to be conceded that all of the officer’s-testimony based on a refreshed recollection was-, barred by statute.
Had timely and proper objection been made, however, to such portions of Lutz’s testimony as were-based on refreshed recollection, it is my view that-such objections should, nevertheless, have been overruled. PA 1949, No 300, § 624 (CL 1948, § 257.624 [Stat Ann 1952 Rev § 9.2324]), makes unavailable-for use in any court action “the reports required by this chapter,” being chapter 6, Michigan vehicle-*174code, PA 1949, No 300. The reports required in that chapter are those to be made by drivers of vehicles involved in accidents and by garage keepers under certain circumstances. The chapter contains no requirement that reports of accidents be made by police officers as such. The only duty imposed upon police officers in this connection is the requirement, contained in PA 1949, No 300, §§ 621, 622 (CL 1948, §§ 257.621, 257.622 [Stat Ann 1952 Rev §§ 9.2321, 9.2322]), that officers receiving the aforementioned reports shall “forward the same to the commissioner of State police on forms to be prescribed by him.” Accordingly, the bar to use in any court action provided in PA 1949, No 300, § 624 (CL 1948, § 257.624 [Stat Ann 1952 Rev § 9.2324]), has no application to the notes or reports made, as in the instant case, by the investigating police officer.
If the mentioned statutory bar did apply to the police report and notes here used by the officer witness to refresh his recollection, such use would not be violative of the statute nor render the officer’s testimony incompetent. This general subject has been considered heretofore by this Court in Delfosse v. Bresnahan, 305 Mich 621; Baumgarten v. Tasco, 312 Mich 161; Heiman v. Kolle, 317 Mich 548; Trafamczak v. Anys, 320 Mich 653; Germiquet v. Hubbard, 327 Mich 225; and Jakubiec v. Hasty, 337 Mich 205. In Delfosse the defendant made the statutory report to the chief of police, which was excluded by the trial court as privileged under the statute. This Court held, however, that it was proper to permit the chief of police to testify concerning physical facts at the scene of the accident, as observed by him. No question of use of the statutory report for refreshing the officer’s recollection was involved, but, from the decision, it may be concluded that the making of the statutory report by the driver of a vehicle to a 'police officer does not seal the lips of the latter to *175prevent his testifying concerning facts' observed by him at the scene of the accident. In Baumgarten it was not a report required by tbe statute, but, as bere, tbe police report wbicb was involved. There, police officer Reiman, who admitted on tbe witness stand tbat be bad no present, independent knowledge or recollection on the subject, testified tbat be bad prepared tbe report and “tbat whatever be wrote down on tbe report was true or be would not have put it there.” This Court held admissible “tbe testimony of witness Reiman when be testified from tbe use of tbe exhibit (police report) as to what defendant Heller told bim about tbe collision.” In Heiman tbe defendant bad made tbe report required by tbe statute to officer Morin containing an admission damaging to tbe defendant. There was no attempt to introduce tbe report in evidence nor does it appear whether tbe officer used it to refresh bis recollection as a witness. Tbe case is significant bere, however, in tbe respect tbat this Court there held (1) tbat it was competent for tbe police officer to testify, as witness for tbe plaintiff, concerning admissions of tbe defendant contained in tbe latter’s statutory report to tbe officer; (2) tbat admission of such testimony does not contravene tbe purpose of tbe bar of tbe statute; and (3) tbat it was not tbe purpose of tbe latter to keep admissions made by defendant to police officers from the ears of tbe court or jury. Trafamczalc involved tbe statutory report made by tbe defendant in tbat case to a deputy sheriff. There, tbe deputy, as witness for plaintiff, was permitted to examine said report for tbe purpose of refreshing bis recollection. In answer to questions propounded to bim on tbe witness stand be read from tbe report a statement indicating a damaging admission made to bim by defendant. It was clear that tbe witness bad no recollection to be refreshed. In tbat case, this Court recognized that tbe use to wbicb. the re*176port was being put was not that of r'efreshing the witness’s recollection, but of incorporating it, in effect, into the evidence, contrary to statute; and, accordingly, it was pointed out that Delfosse and Heiman were distinguishable because there the witnesses whose testimony had been challenged had properly been permitted to testify, as here, to matters within their own knowledge or recollection. It was held that the granting- of a motion to strike the testimony served to cure the error. In Germiquet the statutory report made by plaintiffs’ driver to a deputy sheriff was involved. Testifying for defendant the deputy admitted that he had no independent recollection with reference to the statement made to him by plaintiffs’ driver, that the report did not refresh his memory, and that his actual knowledge was limited to the fact that he had taken the report. When asked on the witness stand what plaintiffs’ driver had told him about how the accident happened, the deputy referred to the statutory report and testified therefrom concerning a damaging admission made by plaintiffs’ driver. This, like in Trafamcgak, clearly circumvented the bar of the statute. In so holding we made point of the fact that no question of use of the report for the purpose of refreshing- the witness’s recollection was involved inasmuch as the deputy had no recollection to be refreshed. We there stated that Baumgarten is authority for the proposition that it is “settled law that under proper circumstances a record of a past recollection, authenticated by proof, is competent,” if not barred by statute. We also pointed out that it may fairly be inferred that in the Baumgarten Case this Court did not consider the police report there involved to be a report required by the statute and thus subject to its bar. Under the announced “settled law” in Germiquet and Baumgarten the police report and notes here involved, not being- barred to *177court use "by the statute, would, in the absence of an independent recollection by the witness, have been competent to be received in evidence, if authenticated by proof, as in Baumgarten, to be true records of a past recollection. In Jakubiec this Court held that it was not error for the trial court to prohibit a police officer witness from refreshing his recollection from an accident report prepared by another police officer. Inasmuch as the report was not authenticated by proof as being a true record of a past recollection, and particularly not of the witness in question, I have no quarrel with the statement of this Court in Jakubiec that “The report itself is not available as evidence.” Citation therein of the statute as authority therefor seems to me, however, to have been in error for the reason that the bar of the statute has no application to reports made by police officers. By the same token the citation therein of Trafamcsak was ill advised inasmuch as the report involved in the latter was the statutory report made by the defendant to a deputy sheriff and not, as in Jakubiec, a report made by a police officer. Had the police report in Jakubiec been authenticated, by proper proof, as a true record of a past recollection of the witness on the stand, as in Baumgarten, then, under our holding in Baumgarten and in Germiquet, it would have been necessary to hold it competent.
An examination of our previous holdings discloses, then, that except for language in Jakubiec, which I deem inadvertent and decline to follow although in accord with its decision, we have adhered to the position that the statute in question does not bar a police officer from testifying concerning physical facts observed by him or admissions made to him by drivers of vehicles at the scene of an accident and that police reports of accidents are not barred by the statute for use as evidence or refreshing a witness’s recollection.
*178Inasmuch as the judgment, joint against both defendants, is set aside, for error, as against Ritchie, it seems to me, for reasons set forth and approved in Grimshaw v. Aske, 332 Mich 146, it should be set aside also as to Skrzycki. Accordingly, I concur in reversal and granting a new trial to both defendants, with costs.
Adams, Btjtzel, Carr, and Reid, JJ., concurred with Dethmers, C. J.