Court Opinion

ID: 9747980
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-27 15:46:54.862189+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:25:29.995818
License: Public Domain

DISSENTING OPINION BY
Senior Judge FRIEDMAN.
I respectfully dissent. The majority holds that un-appealed expungement or*197ders issued by the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny County (trial court) in April of 2004, directing keepers of records to “expunge and destroy ... documents pertaining to the arrest or prosecution” of John Doe (Appellant) for homicide and related charges,1 required only that the Commonwealth expunge criminal history record information pursuant to the Criminal History Record Information Act (CHRIA), 18 Pa.C.S. §§ 9101-9183. I cannot agree.
The CHRIA provides that “[c]riminal history record information shall be expunged” when a court order requires it. 18 Pa.C.S. § 9122(a)(2). The word “expunge” means to “remove information so that there is no trace or indication that such information existed.” 18 Pa.C.S. § 9102. The term “criminal history record information” is defined as:
Information collected by criminal justice agencies concerning individuals, and arising from the initiation of a criminal proceeding, consisting of identifiable descriptions, dates and notations of arrests, indictments, informations or other formal criminal charges and any dispositions arising therefrom. The term does not include intelligence information, investigative information or treatment information, including medical and psychological information, or information and records specified in section 9104 (relating to scope).
18 Pa.C.S. § 9102. Under section 9104 of the CHRIA, nothing in the act shall be construed to apply to public records, including court dockets, police blotters and press releases. 18 Pa.C.S. § 9104.
Far less limited in their reach, the trial court’s April 2004 expungement orders require, in pertinent part, as follows: “[K]eepers of records shall expunge and destroy the official and unofficial arrest, expungement and other documents pertaining to the arrest or prosecution or both of the above named defendant in the above captioned criminal proceedings.... ” (O.R., 4/1/04 Orders) (emphasis added).
Whereas the CHRIA requires the ex-pungement of information, the orders require the expungement of documents, whatever information they might contain. Moreover, the orders require not only the expungement of documents, but also the destruction of documents. Whereas the CHRIA excludes intelligence information, investigative information and public records from its scope, the orders exclude nothing, covering any and all official or unofficial documents pertaining to Appellant’s arrest and/or prosecution. Indeed, the unrestricted catch-all phrase “other documents” necessarily includes documents containing intelligence, investigative or treatment information, or anything else that does not fall within the CHRIA’s definition of criminal history record information, just as long as the documents pertain to Appellant’s arrest and/or prosecution for homicide. For these reasons, I would not.construe the un-appealed trial court orders as restricted by the CHRIA.
In my view, the majority’s contrary construction amounts to a reversal of the trial court orders years after expiration of the appeal period. Indeed, although the CHRIA was enacted well before the trial court issued its order, the trial court does not mention the CHRIA or use its well-defined terms in the orders. Particularly absent is the term “criminal history record information.”
The majority’s only justification for its construction is that a “broader interpretation leads to the absurd result that all *198expungement orders in Allegheny County disregard the statutory restrictions.” (Majority op. at 196.) However, I submit it is equally absurd to interpret the clear and unambiguous language of the trial court orders as being consistent with the CHRIA. Further, here, we are concerned with only two trial court orders, and, if the trial court intended its expungement orders to be consistent with the CHRIA, the trial court could have indicated as much. It did not do so.
This court has pointed out that an order is an order, not a suggestion. Cleary v. Department of Transportation, 919 A.2d 368 (Pa.Cmwlth.2007); Moore v. Workmen’s Compensation Appeal Board (Reading Paperboard Corporation), 676 A.2d 690 (Pa.Cmwlth.), appeal denied, 546 Pa. 658, 684 A.2d 559 (1996). Because the language of the trial court orders is clear and unambiguous and because that language is broader in scope than that set forth in the CHRIA, I would reverse.

. One order pertained to the charge of criminal homicide, and the other order pertained to the charges of burglary, robbery, conspiracy and firearms violations.