Court Opinion

ID: 9764465
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 03:23:53.306777+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:57.179828
License: Public Domain

McEWEN, Judge,
dissenting:
The author of the majority opinion has, in his customary fashion, provided so persuasive an expression of view upon this trying issue that one can hardly be resolute in dissent, *402particularly since I wholeheartedly concur with the conclusion of the majority that there is ample evidence upon which to sustain the homicide convictions of appellants. Nonetheless, I must respectfully depart the company of my eminent col-, leagues who find that the trial court properly instructed the jury that the failure to perform a civil contract, though simple omission alone, is sufficient to meet the voluntary act requirements of Section 301 of the Crimes Code.
The majority quite correctly observes that “appellants’ culpable conduct, according to the evidence, was not limited merely to an omission to act. It consisted, rather, of an affirmative course of conduct calculated to deprive Kly of the food and medical care which was otherwise available to him and which was essential to continued life. It included efforts to place Kly beyond the ability of others to provide such needs.” Thus, while I would grant appellants a new trial, it is to be emphasized as certain and sure that appellants are not entitled to an arrest of judgment since a reading of even the limited portions of the record available to this Court discloses sufficient evidence to support a finding by the jury that appellants’ omission (failure to perform the contract) would not have resulted in the death of Joseph Kly except for the voluntary acts of the appellants, including the removal of their victim, Joseph Kly, to a remote area of Scott Township where he did not have access to a phone, store, or friends, and the active concealment of his whereabouts from those who might otherwise have assisted him. Cf. Commonwealth v. Skufca, 457 Pa. 124, 321 A.2d 889 (1974); Commonwealth v. Smith, 389 Pa.Super. 606, 610, 567 A.2d 1070, 1072 (1989); Commonwealth v. Kominsky, 240 Pa.Super. 532, 361 A.2d 794 (1976).
Section 301(b) is by its very terms applicable only where the basis of responsibility is “an omission unaccompanied by action____” 18 Pa.C.S. § 301(b). Since my reading of the record reveals ample evidence of intentional acts, if not for the charge of the court, I would find that the provisions of Section 301 of the Crimes Code present no obstacle to the conviction of appellants for the offenses charged including criminal homi*403cide. See and compare: Commonwealth v. Smith, supra at 610, 567 A.2d at 1072.
The attorney for the Commonwealth, however, while relating in his brief to this Court that appellants “not only ... fail[ed] to provide Mr. Kly with proper care, food and shelter they had agreed to, but, additionally, they took deliberate steps to prevent others from doing so”, presumably deemed it strategically prudent to refrain in the trial court from arguing that those deliberate acts were sufficient to establish liability for criminal homicide and thereby render the provisions of Section 301(b)(2) irrelevant in this prosecution. See and compare: Commonwealth v. Skufca, supra; Commonwealth v. Youngkin, 285 Pa.Super. 417, 427 A.2d 1356 (1981). As a result, one of the issues which this Court must now decide is whether appellants are correct when they argue that the charge to the jury contained error since Pennsylvania law does not permit a finding that a breach, by omission, of a civil contract will suffice as an “act” for purposes of criminal liability where the duty to act arises only by virtue of the contract and not under a statute or other ordinance or regulation. After intense and concerned reflection, I find myself obliged to agree that the trial court erred when it instructed the jury that appellants could be found guilty of criminal homicide based solely upon a finding of a breach by omission of an oral contract.
The theory of the Commonwealth at trial was that the failure of appellants to fulfill the alleged civil contract to provide food, shelter, personal and medical care to Mr. Kly was alone sufficient to support a finding of first and/or third degree murder.1
*404Section 301(b)(2) of the- Crimes Code provides, in relevant part:
Liability for the commission of any offense may not be based on an omission unaccompanied by action unless ... a duty to perform the omitted act is otherwise imposed by law. (Emphasis added).'
18 Pa.C.S. § 301(b)(2).
“An omission to act may create criminal culpability under our Crimes Code even though the law defining the offense, as here, requires an ‘act’ where, ‘a duty to perform the omitted act is otherwise imposed by law.’ 18 Pa.C.S. § 301(b)(2).” Commonwealth v. Cardwell, 357 Pa.Super. 38, 44, 515 A.2d 311, 314 (1986), allo. denied, 515 Pa. 573, 527 A.2d 535 (1987). The precise issue thus becomes whether the legislature intended that a “contractual duty” constitutes a “duty imposed by law” for purposes of ascertaining whether conduct is criminal. While I share the desire of the prosecutor and the jury that appellants must not escape responsibility for their horribly inhuman and criminally culpable conduct, I cling to the view that an appellate court is not free tó reshape the intention or revise the language of the Crimes Code. Rather, our constitutional obligation is to implement the intent and -comply with the direction of the legislature.
While the Attorney General argues that a finding of criminal responsibility based upon a breach of a contractual duty would be “consistent with principles established in common law,” our legislature has, with the enactment of the Crimes Code, abolished common law crimes, 18 Pa.C.S. § 107(b), and *405evidenced as well a departure from reliance upon principles of common law in the Crimes Code.
Nor do I find support in Pennsylvania case law for this argument advanced by the Commonwealth. It is true that this Court has upheld convictions for endangering the welfare of children, 18 Pa.C.S. § 4304, in at least four instances based upon a knowing violation by omission of a parent’s duty of care for a minor child. See: Commonwealth v. Cardwell, supra; Commonwealth v. Barnhart, 345 Pa.Super. 10, 497 A.2d 616 (1985); Commonwealth v. Morrison, 265 Pa.Super. 363, 401 A.2d 1348 (1979); Commonwealth v. Humphreys, 267 Pa.Super. 318, 406 A.2d 1060 (1979). Similarly, this Court in Commonwealth v. Howard, 265 Pa.Super. 535, 402 A.2d 674 (1979) upheld the involuntary manslaughter conviction of a mother who had failed to protect her child from physical abuse inflicted by the mother’s paramour. However, all of the cases which our research has yielded involved, where liability is based upon a failure to act, the parent-child relationship and the statutory imposition of duties upon the parents of minors. Moreover, our Supreme Court in Commonwealth v. Konz, 498 Pa. 639, 450 A.2d 638 (1982), while acknowledging that an omission is alone sufficient where “there exists a requisite status of relationship between the parties, as is present in the relationship of parent to child,” Id. at 644, 450 A.2d at 641, reversed this Court and discharged the defendant wife who had been convicted of involuntary manslaughter in connection with the death of her husband. The Supreme Court discharged the defendant wife after rejecting “the holding of the Superior Court that the marital relationship gives rise to an unrestricted duty for one spouse to summon medical aid whenever the other is in a serious or immediate need of medical attention.” Commonwealth v. Konz, supra at 644, 450 A.2d at 641. In the instant case, where there was no “status of relationship between the parties” except landlord/tenant, a failure to perform a civil contract cannot alone sustain a conviction for third degree murder.
While a minority of other jurisdictions have sustained convictions for involuntary manslaughter under similar circum*406stances, see: State v. Brown, 129 Ariz. 347, 631 P.2d 129 (1981); Davis v. Commonwealth, 230 Va. 201, 335 S.E.2d 375 (1985), Anno, Homicide by withholding food, clothing or shelter, 61 ALR3d 1207 (1975), the function of this Court is to interpret and apply the provisions of the criminal law in accordance with the intent of the legislature of Pennsylvania. My review of case law from this and other jurisdictions as well as our legislature’s use of the phrase in other sections of the Crimes Code2 and in a number of other statutes3 has persuaded me that the legislature, in employing the phrase “imposed by law”, intended that the phrase denote duties specifically imposed by a statute, ordinance or administrative regulation, and not duties voluntarily assumed by private individuals.
Thus, it is that I dissent.

. Although a detailed Request for Bill of Particulars was timely filed by appellants, no reply is contained in the record nor does the docket reflect that the Commonwealth ever filed a response. The Commonwealth charged, in the informations filed against appellants, that they, inter alia:
"did unlawfully and feloniously kill and slay one Joseph J. Kly, age 92 years old, with malice"
in violation of 18 Pa.C.S. § 2503(c); and
*404"did cause the death of one Joseph J. Kly, age 92 years old, as a direct result of the doing of. an unlawful act in a reckless and grossly negligent manner” (emphasis supplied)
in violation of 18 Pa.C.S-. § 2504; and
"did recklessly engage in conduct which placed and may have placed another person in danger of death and serious bodily injury in that [they] did fail to provide Joseph J. Kly, a person entrusted to [their] care and control, with adequate life sustaining food, liquids, medicine, nourishment, clothing, and care which resulted in the death of the said Joseph J. Kly”
in violation of 18 Pa.C.S. § 2705.

. 18 Pa.C.S. § 102(a)(5); 18 Pa.C.S. § 303(d); 18 Pa.C.S. § 307(1)(2); 18 Pa.C.S. § 307(c)(2).

. Commonwealth Attorneys Act, Act of October 15, 1980, P.L. 950, No. 164, § 205, as amended, 71 P.S. § 732-205(d); Act of April 9, 1929, P.L. 177, art. VIII, § 803, 71 P.S. § 273; Act of July 15, 1957, P.L. 901, § 303, as amended, 53 P.S. § 41303(2); The Act of June 23, 1931, P.L. 932, art. XVII, § 1708, as amended, 53 P.S. § 36707; The Act of June 13, 1967, P.L. , No. 21, art. 3, § 323, 62 P.S. § 323; The Act of June 3, 1937, P.L. 1333, art. II, § 201, 25 P.S. § 2621(f).