Court Opinion

ID: 9525178
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:00:31.427677+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:13:14.176380
License: Public Domain

*575R. M. Maher, P.J.
(concurring). I concur in the majority’s reversal of the orders suppressing the evidence and quashing the information, but would remand for an evidentiary hearing on defendant’s motion to suppress.
This case raises an issue left open by the Supreme Court in People v Talley, 410 Mich 378, 392, fn 4; 301 NW2d 809 (1981): whether opposing counsel may stipulate to the exclusive use of the preliminary examination transcript in a hearing on a motion to suppress. I conclude that opposing counsel cannot so stipulate.
The transcript of the preliminary examination paints the following scenario. On January 29, 1981, an employee at a Burger King restaurant, while taking defendant’s order, noticed a large bulge under defendant’s clothing near his shoulder. When she saw the end of a gun, the employee thought there was to be a robbery and sounded an alarm. A restaurant patron, Elizabeth Wasik, then saw the defendant leave the restaurant, head toward a car and sit in it. Ms. Wasik then saw the defendant "bend over”. The police arrived shortly thereafter. After speaking to both the employee and Ms. Wasik, they searched the defendant. Finding no weapon, one of the officers searched the car pointed out by Ms. Wasik. There, the officer found a gun in a shoulder holster on the floorboard behind the passenger seat. On the basis of this evidence, the defendant was eventually charged with carrying a concealed weapon on or about his person and/or carrying a concealed weapon in a motor vehicle, MCL 750.227; MSA 28.424.
Bound over for trial, the defendant brought a motion to quash the information which was properly treated as a motion to suppress. Both parties stipulated that the trial court could rule on the *576motion on the basis of the preliminary examination transcript alone. After hearing argument of counsel, the trial court ruled to suppress evidence of the gun and quash the information.
In People v Talley, supra, the Supreme Court specifically disapproved of the exclusive use of preliminary examination transcripts in determining a motion to suppress. Instead, the trial court is to review the evidence de novo by conducting an evidentiary hearing. Two concerns motivated the Court’s decision to adopt this position. First, a "trial court cannot properly assess credibility from the cold record prepared at the preliminary examination”. Talley, supra, p 391. Second, a de novo review allows the trial court to explore "constitutionally significant factual matters” not developed at the preliminary examination. Id.
A stipulation does not alleviate these concerns. In Talley, for example, it was critical for the court to decide whether the arresting officer testified truthfully that he observed the defendant stash a paper bag containing the evidence under his car seat. The officer’s credibility could not be assessed from the "cold record” made at the preliminary examination. I fail to see how a stipulation would sufficiently enliven the record to allow the trial court to adequately assess the officer’s testimony. As Justice Levin, concurring in Talley, remarked:
"[W]here there is an issue of credibility it is necessary to conduct a hearing and hear the witnesses. Unless the judge himself hears the witnesses, the advantage of the judge’s superior opportunity to assess credibility is lost.
"I would not allow the parties to stipulate to use of a preliminary examination record as a basis for deciding a credibility issue.” Talley, supra, p 395.
*577Talley also recognized that a preliminary examination transcript may omit "constitutionally significant” facts. The instant case provides an example of this defect. It was necessary for the trial court to elicit futher testimony from Ms. Wasik. She led the police to defendant’s car. More importantly, her description to the police of defendant’s behavior in the car — his "bending over” — is crucial to the issue of probable cause. Like the officer’s description of Talley’s behavior in his car, it provides the "furtive gesture” that may form the basis of probable cause. The court conducting the preliminary examination found Ms. Wasik’s oral description of defendant’s behavior inadequate and asked her to demonstrate. The transcript, however, provides no description of her physical demonstration. Thus, a trial court, reviewing the preliminary examination record, could not know, in sufficient detail, what Ms. Wasik saw defendant do in the car. The parties’ stipulation to the use of this record could not bring Ms. Wasik’s demonstration to life for the trial court. This could be accomplished only by a new evidentiary hearing.
Thus, the problems attending a trial court’s reliance on the preliminary examination transcript, identified in Talley, survive a stipulation. It may be argued, however, that these problems affect only the interests of the parties and that they should be allowed their decision to run the risk of damaging their own cause by stipulating to an inaccurate and incomplete record. But Talley was not concerned primarily with the interests of the parties. Rather it sought to assist trial and appellate courts in properly deciding the defendant’s constitutional claims. Thus, the Court explained that it prohibited the exclusive use of preliminary examination transcripts to rule on a suppression motion
*578"in order to promote a more thorough exposition of the events surrounding a contested search or seizure. This, we hope, will aid the trial courts as well as the appellate courts in drawing the difficult line between the constitutionally permissible search or seizure and the constitutionally impermissible one.” Talley, supra, p 390, fn 3.
The reason that this prohibition assists the court in properly resolving the defendant’s constitutional issues is clear: only on the basis of an adequate record can the court properly determine the legality of the challenged search and seizure, and the preliminary examination transcript does not provide such a record.
As shown above, a preliminary examination transcript provides an inadequate record for purposes of ruling on a suppression motion whether or not the parties have stipulated to it. Thus, a trial court cannot properly rule on a suppression motion on the basis of a stipulated preliminary examination transcript. By doing so, the trial court fails to vindicate the precise value which Talley sought to protect: the proper resolution of defendant’s constitutional issues. I conclude that a trial court may not rule on a suppression motion on the basis of a preliminary examination transcript alone even if stipulated to by the parties.
I find that the trial court erred by ruling on defendant’s motion to suppress on the basis of the stipulated preliminary examination transcript alone. I would reverse the orders suppressing the evidence and quashing the information and remand for an evidentiary hearing on defendant’s motion to suppress.
Because of my disposition of this case, I express no opinion as to the merits of defendant’s constitutional claim.