Court Opinion

ID: 9651413
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 16:18:50.763038+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:33.680989
License: Public Domain

*239Concurring Opinion by
Van der Voort, J.:
While I concur in the majority’s affirmance of judgment of sentence, I note my disagreement with its reliance upon the fact that at no point previous to appeal did appellant avail himself of the argument that the indictment failed as to specificity. I believe that the real issue presented to our Court is not the implication of appellant’s failure at trial to contend that time should have been more narrowly delineated, but rather whether or not the indictment was in accord with our law.
The Grand Jury returns, as to each of the aforementioned charges, read that appellant “between 1 January 1972 and 1 July, in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred 73, at the Borough of Williamsburg, in the County aforesaid [Blair] ....” did commit the alleged oifenses “against the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.” Appellant requested a bill of particulars asking for the names of witnesses and the time and place of the offense “as exact as may be.” The Commonwealth supplied the names of witnesses and as to the time and place of the offense stated as follows: “By virtue of the frequent visits of the defendant to the residence of the victim’s abode and the commission of the crime on those various occasions, the Commonwealth is able to establish when the defendant first came to the victim’s home, being on or about January 1, 1972, and subsequent visits up to July 1, 1973.”
For a concise statement of the principle which guides my deliberation herein, and which is in conformity with our Commonwealth’s law, we turn to United States v. Winer, 323 F. Supp. 604, 605 (E.D. Pa. 1971), wherein Judge Huyett said: “An indictment is sufficient if it (1) alleges all of the elements of the offense, (2) fairly informs the defendant of that which he must be prepared to meet in the preparation of his defense, (3) protects him against double jeopardy, and (4) enables the Court to determine whether the facts alleged are sufficient in *240law to withstand a motion to dismiss or to support a conviction.” “Of course, the indictment must be drawn with reasonable clearness and certainty to show the substance, time and place of the alleged oifense, so that a defendant may be informed in an intelligent manner of what he is called upon to answer....” Commonwealth v. Campbell, 116 Pa. Superior Ct. 180, 186, 176 A. 246, 249 (1935). See also Commonwealth v. Morgan, 174 Pa. Superior Ct. 586, 102 A.2d 194 (1954).
I believe that the facts of the instant case place it squarely within the precedent of Commonwealth v. Rouse, 207 Pa. Superior Ct. 418, 422-23, 218 A.2d 100, 102 (1966): “In the prosecution of sodomy or other crimes in which a particular date or day of the week is not the essence of the oifense, the Commonwealth’s burden is to prove the commission of the crime upon some date fixed with reasonable certainty and within the prescribed statutory period.” The date of commission is not an element of the oifense of either the crime of statutory rape, or sodomy, or corrupting the morals of children. Moreover, the crimes charged herein do not lend themselves to specificity as to date, and indeed it is more reasonable to expect in the instant circumstances that specific dates would be unknown. Our Pennsylvania Rule of Criminal Procedure Number 213 (a) (3) provides that “[a]n indictment ... shall be valid and sufficient in law if it contains: ... (3) the date when the oifense is alleged to have been committed if the precise date is known . . . provided that if the precise date is not known or if the oifense is a continuing one, an allegation that it was committed on or about any date within the period fixed by the statute of limitations shall be sufficient....” This portion of our case and procedural law stems from the legally-sanctioned ability of the Commonwealth to prove the occurrence of an event of criminality prior to the date listed in the indictment. “It has been held repeatedly that where time *241is not of the essence of the offense, the Commonwealth can show any time prior to the finding of the indictment and within the period of limitation.” Commonwealth v. Bridges, 82 Pa. Superior Ct. 92, 94 (1923). So long as time is not an element of the crime charged, and a defendant can adequately prepare answer, and the allegations charged occurred prior to or within the date or dates adopted by the Commonwealth and within the applicable statutory period, I conclude that a stated period of time is a sufficient statement of criminal activity for purposes of the indictments in question.
At trial of the instant case the Commonwealth proved that the offenses occurred in the victim’s home shortly (as conceded by appellant in his brief), after a hearing before a certain Magistrate, the date of which was stipulated to be June 26, 1972 and again two or three weeks after that. Appellant does not contest the particularity of the proof of the times of the offenses at trial, hence Commonwealth v. Devlin, 460 Pa. 508, 333 A.2d 888, filed March 18, 1975, is not apposite.
I therefore believe that the instant indictments were not defective and that trial proceeded properly thereon. For the foregoing reasons, I concur in affirming judgment of sentence.
Watkins, P.J., joins in this concurring opinion.