Court Opinion

ID: 9765029
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 03:48:09.27077+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:30:03.604142
License: Public Domain

FLAHERTY, Justice,
dissenting.
The majority correctly recognizes that the privacy interest asserted in this case “. . . finds explicit protection in the Pennsylvania Constitution . . . ” and, further, that “Disclosure of confidence made by a patient to a physician, or even of medical data concerning the individual patient could, under certain circumstances, pose such a serious threat to a patient’s right not to have personal matters revealed that it would be impermissible under either the United States Constitution or the Pennsylvania Constitution.” (Emphasis Supplied). It is, thus, conceded that, except for the unique circumstances here involved, the disclosure of the information encompassed by the subpoena in issue is impermissible as a constitutionally protected privacy interest. The circumstances, relied upon by the majority, however, are illusory in my view.
The fact that a grand jury is sworn to secrecy offers little, and at best insecure, protection to individuals, as experience has well demonstrated. The remaining “circumstance” belies the fallacy of the reasoning employed by the majority, as is stated: “In the event the tissue reports must be used as evidence at any trial which may subsequently occur, an appropriate means of protecting the confidentiality of the patients’ medical records can be devised.” If such can be accomplished at trial, as it most certainly can, why cannot the same “appropriate means” be “devised” by the District Attorney in his presentation to the grand jury? This question remains unanswered.
As the two “circumstances” which, according to the majority, take the subject information out of its constitutionally protected status have no support in reason or experience, I would reverse the Court below.