Court Opinion

ID: 9650216
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 15:27:08.471519+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:19.047269
License: Public Domain

NIX, Justice,
dissenting.
In dismissing this frivolous and dilatory appeal the majority notes that interlocutory order was being entertained at this point on the authority of Commonwealth v. Bolden, 472 Pa. 602, 373 A.2d 90 (1970). In Bolden, supra, this writer, joined by my brother, Mr. Justice O’BRIEN, urged the Court to reconsider the wisdom of a rule which provided a blanket approval of immediate appellate review of clearly interlocutory appeals simply because the complaint was framed in terms of a double jeopardy violation. Commonwealth v. Bolden, supra, 472 Pa. at 652, 373 A.2d at 114. In the dissent we stressed the reasons supporting the long standing and jurisprudentially accepted rule that appellate review should follow final orders, judgments and decrees of the court below:
“The reasoning supporting the view that appeals should be taken only from final orders is not predicated upon whim but rather is founded upon the belief that truncated treatment of issues would be inefficient and time-consuming and more importantly would be likely to prejudice one or both parties to a controversy. Sullivan v. Philadelphia, 378 Pa. 648, 107 A.2d 854 (1954). To permit the interruption of an ongoing judicial proceeding prior to final judgment would invite an indefinite number of appeals, causing extensive delay and having a disruptive effect on the continuity of the action. Cobbledick v. United States, 309 U.S. 323, 60 S.Ct. 540, 84 L.Ed. 783 (1940).” Id. at 653-54, 373 A.2d at 115 (Nix, J., dissenting).
*212This instant appeal illustrates our concern. The abortion of the first trial occurred on July 13, 1977 and this matter has been diverted from the commencement of the second trial for over a year and one half on the flimsy pretense that the appellant’s double jeopardy rights had been offended. The authority for the requirement, in this state, that jeopardy does not attach until the jury is empanelled and sworn, is legion. Crist v. Bretz, 437 U.S. 28, 98 S.Ct. 2156, 57 L.Ed.2d 24 (1978); Serfass v. United States, 420 U.S. 377, 388, 95 S.Ct. 1055, 43 L.Ed.2d 265 (1975); Commonwealth v. Bolden, supra, 372 Pa. at 625, 373 A.2d at 101; Commonwealth v. Stewart, 456 Pa. 447, 450, 317 A.2d 616, 618, cert. denied, 417 U.S. 949, 94 S.Ct. 3078, 41 L.Ed.2d 670 (1974); Commonwealth v. Curry, 287 Pa. 553, 557, 135 A. 316, 317 (1926); Alexander v. Commonwealth, 105 Pa. 1, 9 (1884). Yet although the fallacy of the argument was patent and the history of the case graphically evidences a deliberate defense strategy of delay we compound the injury by providing another avenue of escape from the law’s just judgment. The proper approach would have been an immediate grant of the motion to quash this interlocutory and meritless appeal.
O’BRIEN, J., joins this dissenting opinion.