Court Opinion

ID: 9755250
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 20:31:34.425441+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:05.583971
License: Public Domain

MONTEMURO, Judge,
dissenting:
Although I concur in the ultimate result reached by the majority in this case, i.e., the grant of a new trial, I dissent with regard to the determination of the second issue.
I agree with the legal principles cited by the majority concerning the appellant’s right, when cross-examining a prosecution witness, to admit evidence of bias. However, I disagree with the majority’s conclusion that the evidence which the appellant seeks to admit supports the inference of *571bias on the part of the victim. It is the majority’s position that the victim may have testified for the Commonwealth in the hope that she could avoid an action to revoke her probation/parole.1 If this were the classic bias situation in which an individual, who is facing criminal prosecution, offers to testify against a criminal defendant, whom the Commonwealth is prosecuting in order to gain favorable treatment or in the hopes of receiving favorable treatment, I would have no trouble finding an inference of bias. However, the facts of the instant case clearly distinguish it from the classic bias situation in two distinct ways. First, the prosecution witness in the instant case is the victim. Unlike a third party prosecution witness, whose sole reason for testifying is the lure of favorable treatment from the Commonwealth on pending charges, the victim is an interested party. She was the target of the crime. Furthermore, she has the power to initiate or preclude charges from being brought against the appellant. This is an important difference. If the complainant wanted to insure that her probation/parole would not be revoked, all she had to do was not report the rape. The sole reason the violation surfaces is because she reported the rape. If anything, the evidence of the complainant’s probation/parole violation strengthens the complainant’s testimony. Here is a woman who immediately after being raped reports it even though she knows that she has violated her probation/parole and the violation will be exposed once the rape is reported. I fail to see how the violation of her probation/parole creates bias. In order to bring this case within the outer reaches of a true bias situation, the facts would have to be altered so as to reflect a report of the rape after the probation/parole violation is discovered. Unlike the classic biased prosecution witness, the victim under the unaltered facts of the instant case receives no benefit at the time she reports the crime, for her misconduct has yet to be discovered. This *572brings me to the second point I wish to make. Unlike the third party prosecution witness, whose illegal conduct has placed him in his predicament, the victim’s conduct in the instant case is a technical violation. Such technical violations are handled by the Board of Probation and Parole. Since such matters are dealt with by the Board of Probation and Parole, the Commonwealth is not in a position to promise leniency. Therefore, the motivation to report the rape to the police and to testify for the Commonwealth, which is necessary to support the inference of bias, does not arise from the hope that favorable treatment will be extended by the District Attorney’s Office, because the District Attorney’s Office has no ultimate control over the decisions of the Probation and Parole Board. For these reasons, I would affirm the trial court’s actions in denying the admission of this evidence.
Likewise, I disagree with the majority’s position that the victim may have testified for the Commonwealth in the hope that she could curry favor with the Commonwealth with regard to the pending disorderly conduct charge. The flaw in this supposition becomes apparent when the events are placed in there proper time frame. The rape occurred on June 2, 1987 and was immediately reported by the victim. Two weeks later, the victim testified against the appellant at his preliminary hearing. A week before the trial, the victim was charged with disorderly conduct. In that the victim’s trial testimony did not substantially differ from that which she gave at the preliminary hearing, I fail to see how the disorderly conduct charge creates bias. For surely the disorderly conduct charge comes too late in time to influence the victim’s preliminary hearing testimony. Therefore, I would affirm the action of the trial court in denying the admission of this evidence. Neither the parole violation evidence, nor the disorderly conduct evidence, supports an inference of bias such as to warrant the grant of a new trial.
For these reasons, I would vacate the sentence and remand for retrial. However, unlike the majority, I would *573hold that the evidence of the victim’s probation violation and disorderly conduct charge is inadmissible.

. The record is unclear whether the complainant was facing revocation of her parole, probation, or both. In any event, the basis of the revocation was the fact that she had been drinking on the night of the rape.