Court Opinion

ID: 9455786
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 19:33:19.219262+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:34:44.050371
License: Public Domain

ELY, Circuit Judge
(concurring):
While I concur in the majority’s opinion, I must record my concern over the prosecution’s failure to allow reporting and transcription of the grand jury’s proceedings. Misgivings arise because the prosecution, by its deliberate conduct, established a basis for suspicion that it demeaned itself by engaging in a “eat and mouse game” wherein grave personal rights were at stake. I have never been able to accept the proposition that while extensive discovery promotes the cause of justice in civil controversies, any right to discovery on the part of a defendant in a criminal case must be severely curtailed. In the light of the relative gravity of the possible consequences of the ultimate disposition of civil and criminal proceedings, the disparity of treatment is at best inexplicable and at worst intolerable. It is not fair, I think, that the Government may use whatever notes it can take at a grand jury hearing while avoiding, by the simple expedient of not allowing a court reporter into the hearing, any possible duty of delivering a transcript of the proceedings to the affected defendant.1
I am aware that the Supreme Court has stated that federal courts may not order production of grand jury transcripts for inspection by defendants in the absence of a showing of “particularized need.” Pittsburgh Plate Glass Co. v. United States, 360 U.S. 395, 400, 79 Sup.Ct. 1237, 3 L.Ed.2d 1323 (1959). But I also know that the later and fairer trend is toward the even-handed use of such transcripts. See Dennis v. United States, 384 U.S. 855, 86 S.Ct. 1840, 16 L.Ed.2d 973 (1966); United States v. Youngblood, 379 F.2d 365 (2d Cir. 1967). The reasons for the newer trend are apparent, since none of the traditional justifications for grand jury secrecy exist with any great degree of persuasiveness after the grand jury has performed its function. Goldstein, The State and the Accused: Balance of Advantage in Criminal Procedure, 69 Yale L.J. 1149, 1184 (1960); Developments in the Law — Discovery, 74 Harv.L.Rev. 940, 1057 (1961).
In Dennis the Supreme Court noted this trend and observed :
“These developments are entirely consonant with the growing realization that disclosure, rather than suppression, of relevant materials ordinarily promotes the proper administration of criminal justice.”
*669384 U.S. at 870, 86 S.Ct. at 1849. The Court also remarked:
“In our adversary system for determining guilt or innocence, it is rarely justifiable for the prosecution to have exclusive access to a storehouse of relevant fact. Exceptions to this are justifiable only by the clearest and most compelling considerations.”
384 U.S. at 873, 86 S.Ct. at 1851. Thus, I foresee the time," in the not very distant future, when federal grand jury transcripts will be available to defendants as a matter of right, with, of course, appropriate safeguards. Since 1897, those under indictment in California have been accorded this right (Cal. Penal Code § 925), and I am not aware that California’s procedure has significantly impeded the enforcement of its criminal laws. Nor, I believe, has there been any serious protests by prosecuting authorities in certain federal districts wherein those indicted by federal grand juries have routinely received a transcript of the pertinent grand jury proceedings. Notwithstanding all of this, I agree that the appellants here made no such showing as was made by the defendants in Dennis', consequently, I must, at this time, yield to the compulsion of controlling precedent.

. Judge Oliver J. Carter, one of the judges concerned with this case in the court below, apparently shares some of my views. Although he ruled that he was not, in the circumstances, empowered to order the production of the desired transcript, he expressed his personal view that transcripts of grand jury proceedings should be made available to those indicted as a result of such proceedings.