Court Opinion

ID: 9705134
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 00:57:39.423881+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:22:08.191964
License: Public Domain

JOHNSON, Judge,
concurring and dissenting.
I agree with my distinguished colleagues that Joseph H. Metts, at all stages of adjudication up to and including direct appeal, has properly preserved his challenge to the illegality of the electronic surveillance based upon the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution, and Article I, Section 8 of the Pennsylvania Constitution. Majority Opinion at 282-283. I also agree with the thorough analysis of the Majority, which concludes that Metts had a constitutionally protected expectation of privacy in the premises searched, while he temporarily *299resided at his sister’s apartment. Id. at 282-287. Because Metts had a protected expectation of privacy, and because his claim of error was properly preserved at all stages of adjudication, I must respectfully dissent from my colleagues’ refusal to apply the rule announced in Commonwealth v. Brion, 539 Pa. 256, 652 A.2d 287 (1994). See also Commonwealth v. Schaeffer, 539 Pa. 272, 652 A.2d 294 (1994) (Schaeffer II); and Commonwealth v. Schaeffer, 539 Pa. 271, 652 A.2d 294 (1994) (Schaeffer III).
In Brion, at 257, 652 A.2d at 287, our supreme court held that Article I, Section 8 of the Pennsylvania Constitution precludes the police from sending a confidential informer into the home of an individual to electronically record the conversations of that individual and transmit them back to the police. The facts in the present case are indistinguishable, in all material respects, from the facts presented in Brion. Therefore, the applicability of Brion to the present appeal is the only question remaining as to whether the contents of the intercepted conversations should have been suppressed.
I must disagree with the Majority as to our right, as an intermediate appellate court, to decide what effect should be given to a decision of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania announcing a new rule. There is no authority for the proposition implicit in my colleagues’ analysis in the Majority Opinion that an inferior court may, sua sponte, determine whether a decision pronounced by a higher court must be limited to a prospective application where the higher court is silent on the effect to be given to its decision. In McHugh v. Litvin, Blumberg, Matusow & Young, 525 Pa. 1, 10, 574 A.2d 1040, 1044 (1990), our supreme court, in a unanimous decision, declared that
the general law of our Commonwealth continues to be, as it was at common law, that our decisions announcing changes in the law are applied retroactively, until and unless a court decides to limit the effect of the change, and that litigants have a right to rely on the change, especially if they have a suit pending in our courts at the time the change is announced.
*300This rule applies with equal force in criminal proceedings. Commonwealth v. Brown, 494 Pa. 380, 384, 431 A.2d 905, 907 (1981); accord Commonwealth v. Cabeza, 503 Pa. 228, 232, 469 A.2d 146, 148 (1983).
The rule that controls this case is set forth in Cabeza, supra. There, the Majority held that “where an appellate decision overrules prior law and announces a new principle, unless the decision specifically declares the ruling to be prospective only, the new rule is to be applied retroactively to cases where the issue in question is properly preserved at all stages of adjudication up to and including any direct appeal.” Id. at 233, 469 A.2d at 148. (Emphasis added). This rule has been expressly recognized as the “third approach” of four possible approaches to apply in deciding what effect should be given to a decision announcing a new rule. Blackwell v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania State Ethics Commission, 527 Pa. 172, 181-82, 589 A.2d 1094,1099 (1991).
As the Majority points out, our supreme court, in announcing its decision in Brion, did not address whether that decision should be retroactively applied. Nevertheless, the Majority infers, without any explicit justification, that because the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania did not expressly deal with retroactivity in the Brion decision, this Court is free to apply the criteria set forth in Blackwell and reach its own, independent determination as to whether that decision of our higher court should be retroactively applied. Based upon the rule enunciated in Cabeza, supra, I believe this is error.
I recognize that a panel of this Court recently considered how a ruling of our supreme court should be applied where the higher court’s ruling was silent on the issue of retroactivity. Commonwealth v. Parker, 435 Pa.Super. 81, 644 A.2d 1245 (1994), appeal denied, 540 Pa. 630, 658 A.2d 793 (1995). In Parker, the question was whether the decision of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania pronounced in Commonwealth v. Lively, 530 Pa. 464, 610 A.2d 7 (1992), which was silent on the issue of retroactivity, should be applied retroactively. While the author of Parker ostensibly engages in a retroactivity analysis and quotes extensively from Pennsylvania Supreme Court *301cases, the result in Parker goes no further than applying the rules set forth in Blackwell, supra, and the cases coming before it. Thus, Parker does not support the Majority’s determination that this Court may engage in a retroactivity analysis and limit a Supreme Court decision to prospective application.
I have found no other case where a Pennsylvania intermediate appellate court has attempted to perform a retroactivity analysis of a decision declared, by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. In all of the other cases relied on by the Majority, our supreme court considers the retroactive application of its own decisions or rulings, either at the time when the ruling or precedent is pronounced or shortly thereafter. See Blackwell, supra; Cabeza, supra; August v. Stasak, 492 Pa. 550, 424 A.2d 1328 (1981); Brown, supra. See also McHugh, supra. In none of these cases did the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania limit a precedent to prospective application where the later case had properly preserved the issue at all stages of adjudication up to and including direct appeal.
The formal purpose of the Superior Court is to maintain and effectuate the decisional law of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania as faithfully as possible. Commonwealth v. Dugger, 506 Pa. 537, 545, 486 A.2d 382, 386 (1985). Through its decisions in Blackivell, Cabeza, Brown, and McHugh, our supreme court has clearly declared the effect to be given the Brion decision. Our supreme court did not declare the rule in Brion to be prospective only. Therefore, the rule must be applied to all cases where the issue in question has been properly preserved. There is no dispute among the members of this Court involving the preservation of the issue. The issue has been preserved. As a result, the rule in Brion must be applied to this appeal. To do otherwise would constitute a usurpation of the power of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania to decide, for itself, the effect to be given to its decisions.
Accordingly, I would reverse the judgment of sentence and grant Metts a new trial at which the intercepted conversations *302would be excluded. Brion, supra, at 262, 652 A.2d at 290. Hence, this dissent.
FORD ELLIOTT, J., joins in this concurring and dissenting opinion by JOHNSON, J.