Court Opinion

ID: 9765489
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 04:03:46.70271+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:10.396831
License: Public Domain

PAPADAKOS, Justice,
dissenting.
I dissent from the Majority’s conclusion that Thomas Talbot’s in-court identification of Appellant was not permissible because it was not supported by an independent basis. From my review of the record, sufficient evidence exists to support the conclusion that Talbot’s in-court identification was not tainted by the suggestiveness of the preliminary hearing identification, because Talbot had an independent basis of recognizing Appellant. Commonwealth v. James, 506 Pa. 526, 486 A.2d 376 (1985).
While Talbot had an opportunity to view the Appellant at the time of the crime for only a few seconds, the lighting was adequate, the Appellant was only a few feet away from Talbot and Talbot looked directly into Appellant’s face. Talbot’s attentiveness during the crime was very good and he indicated that he burned Appellant’s face into his memory. His level of attentiveness was confirmed when, two weeks after the crime, he was able to identify Gentry and Miller (the other participants at the crime) from seeing them on the street. That Talbot’s initial description of Appellant was vague does not detract from his reliability because Talbot kept insisting to the police that he could identify the perpetrators if he saw them and when the police drove him around the area of the crime, he did spot and identify two of the perpetrators. Talbot also exhibited definite certainty in all his identifications of Appellant. Talbot testified that he was “absolutely positive” that Appellant was the one who took his wallet. Finally, the six weeks between the crime *231and the first opportunity to see Appellant was not so long that Talbot’s memory would be impaired.
Under these circumstances, it seems to me that, in spite of the inherent suggestiveness of any preliminary hearing identification, independent factors exist in this case which can support a conclusion that Talbot’s identification had an independent basis because of his observations at the time of the crime.