Commonwealth v. Clark

662 A.2d 1084, 443 Pa. Super. 524, 1995 Pa. Super. LEXIS 1774
CourtSuperior Court of Pennsylvania
DecidedJune 22, 1995
StatusPublished

This text of 662 A.2d 1084 (Commonwealth v. Clark) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Superior Court of Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Commonwealth v. Clark, 662 A.2d 1084, 443 Pa. Super. 524, 1995 Pa. Super. LEXIS 1774 (Pa. Ct. App. 1995).

Opinion

TAMILIA, Judge:

The Commonwealth appeals from the February 16, 1994 Order granting defendants’ motions to suppress evidence seized at appel-lees’ places of employment during a warrant-less inspection of the premises and the subsequent execution of allegedly invalid warrants.1 The investigation and appellees’ ar[1086]*1086rest were the result of “whistleblowers’ ” allegations of wrong-doing provided to Pennsylvania Department of Health officials and the Office of the Pennsylvania Attorney General. A detailed recitation of the circumstances preceding appellees’ arrest, pivotal to the resolution of the issues before us, follows.

At the time of the alleged improper activity, appellee, William L. Clark, was President and Chief Executive Officer of and held an ownership interest in Central Pennsylvania Drug and Alcohol Services Corporation (CPDASC), t/d/b/a Talleyrand Retreat and Central Pennsylvania Individual and Family Counseling (CPIFC). Talleyrand was an inpatient drug and alcohol service provider, established pursuant to the terms of the Pennsylvania Drug and Alcohol Abuse Act, 71 P.S. §§ 1690.101 et seq., and was regulated by the Office of the Drug and Alcohol Programs (ODAP), Pennsylvania Department of Health. CPIFC provided out-patient drug and alcohol counseling. Appellee, Michael Barrett, was an employee of the Centre County Drug and Alcohol Program (Centre County), which utilized services provided by Talleyrand.

In July, 1991, an investigation was begun by ODAP into an alleged conspiracy by ap-pellees to defraud the county of more than $27,000 for services charged to Centre County by Talleyrand but not provided. The investigation was initiated after former CPDASC employees Sandy Taylor, Pam Johnson and Mary Natoli, and a member of Centre County’s Drug and Alcohol Planning Council, Mary Watson, notified Ronald Young, a field representative of ODAP, of, inter alia, suspected improper billing activity at Talleyrand. The disgruntled employees also complained to the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office and were interviewed on July 23, 1991 by Special Agent Dan Boden. On August 3, 1991, the employees informed Young, for the first time, of the substance of the billing irregularities and also advised him they had notified the State Attorney General’s Office. Boden testified although the employees’ allegations of wrong-doing were varied, only possible criminal activities such as billing irregularities, supported by documentation provided by Johnson and Taylor, were of interest to the Attorney General.

After being advised the employees had contacted the Attorney General’s office, Young contacted Boden, as a professional courtesy, and told him he was planning to conduct an unannounced inspection of Talleyrand the following week. Boden asked Young to delay his visit for a few days but made no request of Young to conduct his investigation in any manner other than the norm. On August 7, 1991, Young and another ODAP field representative made an unannounced visit to Talleyrand for the purpose of investigating complaints of non-compliance with confidentiality regulations, failure to follow personnel policies and fraudulent record keeping and billing practices. This inspection was conducted as authorized by 28 Pa. Code § 709.15, Right to enter and inspect. The Talleyrand client files inspected in furtherance of the investigation included one specifically identified by one of the employees, as well as 7 to 10 others selected at random. Young’s notes of this visit were not turned over to the Attorney General. Also on August 7, 1991, Young met with employee Johnson and secured copies of accounting documents she had removed from Talleyrand. Once again, none of this information was provided to the Attorney General. On August 20, 1991, a regularly scheduled visit of Talleyrand was conducted by ODAP field representative, William Foltz, who at Young’s request reviewed specific files to further his investigation into improper billing practices. On September 3, 1991, Young provided a copy of his finished report, with all clients’ names removed, to the Attorney General. Two days later, on September 5, 1991, ODAP informed Talleyrand of two areas of non-compliance, disciplinary actions and confidentiality, but took no further action with regard to any alleged improprieties, ex. improper billing. This concluded ODAP’s administrative investigation of Talleyrand as prompted by the employees’ complaints.

In October, 1991, Boden and the Criminal Investigation and Prosecution section of the Office of the Attorney General received a copy of Young’s September 3rd report. [1087]*1087Based in part upon the statements contained in Young’s report, as well as the information provided by the employee confidential informants, Boden obtained and executed, on December 18, 1991, a search warrant at the Centre County Drug and Alcohol Program.

On September 1, 1992, CPDASC sold Talleyrand to HUB Centre Inc. Clark, however, retained ownership of the real estate with HUB as a tenant. As part of this transaction, CPDASC turned over all Talleyrand client files with the understanding they would be retained for six years following any patient’s treatment, as required by law. In December, 1992, search warrants were obtained by the Attorney General’s office and executed upon records of CPDASC and Talleyrand, now operating under the auspices of HUB. The affidavits of probable cause in support of the warrants were based on the employees’ information and, in part, on Young’s September 3, 1991 report.

As a consequence of the information secured via the initial administrative inspections at Talleyrand and the execution of the search warrants subsequently obtained, ap-pellees were arrested and charged with tampering with public records or information and criminal conspiracy. Additionally, appellee Clark was charged with theft by deception. In granting apjoellees’ motion to suppress, the court reasoned unless Young’s search was clearly administrative, appellees were entitled to a reasonable expectation of privacy, necessitating the implementation of a warrant. In further support of its decision, the court characterized Young and his coworkers as agents of the state, whose investigation centered on criminal conduct from its inception.

The Commonwealth argues both the administrative, warrantless search and those subsequent searches conducted with the benefit of warrants were constitutional. Appellant contends the Department of Health employees acted properly in their capacity as administrative supervisors and as authorized by 28 Pa.Code § 709.15, Right to enter and inspect, investigating alleged wrong-doing by a Pennsylvania licensed drug and alcohol treatment services provider. The affidavits of probable cause to secure the wai'rants contained a detailed explanation of the information provided by the whistleblowers, and used that information obtained during the Department of Health’s investigation of Talleyrand only as supplemental support. Moreover, the Commonwealth argues, even if the purportedly tainted information provided by Young is excised from the affidavits of probable cause, sufficient probable cause still remained upon which to secure valid warrants.

In reviewing an Order granting a motion to suppress, we must first determine whether the suppression court’s factual findings and legal conclusions are supported by the record. Commonwealth v. Slaton, 530 Pa. 207, 608 A.2d 5 (1992); Commonwealth v. Lopez, 415 Pa.Super.

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Related

Commonwealth v. Ariondo
580 A.2d 341 (Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, 1990)
Commonwealth v. Slaton
608 A.2d 5 (Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, 1992)
Commonwealth v. Murphy
629 A.2d 1020 (Superior Court of Pennsylvania, 1993)
Commonwealth v. Pickron
634 A.2d 1093 (Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, 1993)
Commonwealth v. Lopez
609 A.2d 177 (Superior Court of Pennsylvania, 1992)

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Bluebook (online)
662 A.2d 1084, 443 Pa. Super. 524, 1995 Pa. Super. LEXIS 1774, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/commonwealth-v-clark-pasuperct-1995.