Court Opinion

ID: 9536896
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:09:06.03635+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:55:29.324319
License: Public Domain

McQUADE, Justice
(concurring).
I concur in the result reached by the majority. However, I disagree with several statements in the majority opinion and I ■think that certain facts recited therein but passed over in relative silence deserve further comment. The main areas of concern in this concurrence, in the order in which treated by the majority opinion, are: (1) motion for change of venue; (2) interview of prosecution witnesses by appellant’s counsel; (3) non-disclosure during hearing on probation of pre-sentence investigation report. They will be discussed in that order.
(1) Concerning the motion for change of venue, the majority states that presented on appellant’s behalf were affidavits of eighteen “persons representative of the community at large to the effect that appellant could not receive a fair and impartial trial in the southeastern Idaho area.” Such proof certainly demanded a proper counter-showing by the state. But the state’s response was frivolous. It was a meaningless counter-attack to rebut a random sample of prejudice with a numerical count of the group sampled. A proper counter-showing should have itself been representative of the. temper of the community.
If we assume that appellant did have a fair trial, then abuse of discretion in refusal to change venue becomes harmless. But as a matter of sound judicial administration the critical point of time is before trial, not after. However the voir dire is not part of the record on this appeal and, especially in light of the absence of additional information to support the motion during voir dire, sufficient prejudice to require change of venue does not appear.
(2) Regarding the interview of prosecution witnesses by appellant’s counsel, the district court correctly recognized appellant’s right that they not be shielded from pre-trial questioning on appellant’s behalf. However, the court did not go far enough in protection of that right: appellant’s counsel should not have been merely permitted to interview the prosecution’s witnesses if they chose to talk with him; rather the prosecution should have been ordered to produce its witnesses, under reasonable precautions, for such an interview.
*474Moreover, the conduct of the deputy-prosecuting attorney was a violation of even the limited order for production of the witnesses. The court told both counsel that:
“I think it would probably be a little easier for Mr. McDermott to make the arrangements to talk to them in his office instead of your trying to talk to them because probably they wouldn’t even talk to you if you approached them.”
But the prosecuting attorney did not clearly advise witnesses that the interviews were to be in his office; nor did he speak personally with the prosecutrix, age fifteen, who testified that she would have agreed to such an interview in the prosecuting attorney’s office; nor did he clearly indicate to two other witnesses that appellant’s counsel had asked to speak to them and that the interviews would- be in the office of the prosecuting attorney — both testified that had they known the circumstances, they would not have obj ected to such interviews. Nevertheless, the deputy prosecuting attorney then wrote to appellant’s counsel that- in accordance with the court’s instructions he had contacted the witnesses who said they did not wish to talk to him, appellant’s counsel.
In evaluating the conduct of the deputy prosecutor with respect to easing access to prosecution witnesses by appellant’s counsel, the following colloquy is enlightening. Appellant’s counsel, in asking to interview the prosecution witnesses, told the court:
“[W]e want to have as much information available as possible in order to prepare a complete defense for this man. This is the purpose of my motion.”
To which the deputy prosecuting attorney replied:
“If the court please, his client is the one that got into this thing — .”
(The court immediately disapproved this statement). The deputy prosecuting attorney did not follow the court’s instructions. Nevertheless, he then misrepresented that he had done so but that the witnesses refused to see appellant’s counsel even under the court instructed arrangements. However, the record does not show that such conduct prejudiced appellant’s rights with respect to the evidence admitted against appellant.
A prosecuting attorney, as representative of a just sovereign, has professional obligations to treat the accused fairly and impartially.1 The dilatory conduct revealed by this record may not be condoned. The court arranged the manner of interview.
(3) With respect to the district court’s refusal to permit appellant or his attorney an opportunity during his hearing for probation to examine the presentence report, I disagree with the majority opinion’s statement of “the better rule” governing such disclosure.
Initially, I point out that the standard presented in State v. Grady, 89 Idaho 204 at 213, 404 P.2d 347 at 353 (1965), and discussed in State v. Edelblute, 91 Idaho 469 at 477, 424 P.2d 739 at 747 (1967), has been preserved, notwithstanding the majority opinion’s intimation that it has been discarded. The purpose of permitting the applicant for probation to examine an investigation report is of course to give him “an opportunity to ‘explain and defend adverse matters.’ ” State v. Edelblute, supra, quoting from State v. Grady, supra. But the majority opinion in the present action feigns to “modify these rulings” by giving the trial judge discretion whether to disclose the full contents of an investigation report, while leaving the judge “obligated,” where full contents are not disclosed, “to give the defendant sufficient information concerning adverse matters contained therein so that the defendant may be in a position to offer intelligent refutation.” Obviously this is merely reformulation — a change in procedure, but no alteration of the pertinent *475standard of protection laid down in State v. Grady, supra, and State v. Edelblute, supra.
Next, I suspect that this “better rule” will only create confusion and require the trial judge who withholds full contents to take extraordinary pains to guarantee that the prospective probationer does receive '“sufficient information concerning adverse matters contained therein,” because in absence of a strong showing to the contrary, we must assume on review of a denial of probation, in order fully to protect the applicant’s rights, that any investigation report contents that interpretably are adverse to the applicant have influenced the trial judge. If parts of a presentence investigation report were properly confidential, there would be reason for the new procedure announced by the majority today. But such is not the case. To the contrary, any information that cannot stand the light of inspection by the prospective probationer, is not worthy of the judge’s consideration. Cf. Note, Right of Criminal Offenders To Challenge Reports Used In Determining Sentence, 49 Colum.L.Rev. 567, 570-572 (1949).
And there is no sound reason to require the trial judge to make full disclosure of the report when it is used as a basis for aggravation or mitigation of sentence, but not when it is used as a basis for denial of probation. As against withholding or suspension of sentence, probation differs only in degree from mitigation or aggravation.

. Cf. State v. Spencer, 74 Idaho 137, 258 P.2d 1147 (1953); State v. Bush, 50 Idaho 166, 295 P.2d 432 (1930); State v. Harness, 10 Idaho 18, 76 P. 788 (1904).