Commonwealth v. Rosen

42 A.3d 988, 615 Pa. 305, 2012 WL 1415771, 2012 Pa. LEXIS 965
CourtSupreme Court of Pennsylvania
DecidedApril 25, 2012
Docket50 MAP 2010
StatusPublished
Cited by23 cases

This text of 42 A.3d 988 (Commonwealth v. Rosen) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme 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. Rosen, 42 A.3d 988, 615 Pa. 305, 2012 WL 1415771, 2012 Pa. LEXIS 965 (Pa. 2012).

Opinions

OPINION

ORIE MELVIN, Justice.

We granted allowance of appeal to consider whether the Commonwealth can use evidence obtained pursuant to a limit[308]*308ed Fifth Amendment waiver, occasioned by a mental health defense in a defendant’s first trial as rebuttal in a subsequent trial where no mental health defense is presented. The issue arose after the Superior Court upheld the judgment of sentence of life imprisonment imposed for Appellant’s first-degree murder conviction following retrial. Upon review, we affirm the order of the Superior Court.

In the early morning hours of June 30, 2001, Appellant, Adam Rosen, stabbed his wife, Hollie Rosen, to death in their home. When police arrived at the scene, Appellant initially claimed that two intruders in ski masks and parkas committed the crime. He later provided multiple, differing explanations for the murder and ultimately admitted killing his wife. Appellant claimed he and Hollie were arguing, and each had a knife; when Hollie swung her knife at Appellant, he stabbed her in the chest, and she then plunged the knife into her own neck. N.T., 4/30/02, at 59-66.

Appellant proceeded to a jury trial on April 29, 2002. In support of his defense of diminished capacity,1 Appellant offered expert testimony from Dr. Paul Fink, a psychiatrist who examined Appellant and reviewed the notes of Appellant’s prior treating physicians. Dr. Fink testified that Appellant was suffering from manic-depressive illness accompanied by psychotic features and paranoia; he opined that Appellant was “psychotic” and incapable of forming an intent to kill at the time of the stabbing. N.T., 5/1/02, at 91. The Commonwealth presented opposing expert testimony by Dr. Timothy Michals, who examined Appellant and reviewed Dr. Fink’s report. Dr. Michals testified to a reasonable degree of psychiatric certainty that Appellant “had no mental disorder that would impair his capacity to form the intent to” kill his wife. Id. at 137. The Commonwealth’s evidence included the couple’s history of marital discord, Appellant’s fear that his wife planned to divorce him, evidence of Appellant’s delay in calling police for [309]*309at least one hour after his wife’s death, and his initial fabrication regarding how the murder occurred. Appellant was convicted by a jury of first-degree murder on May 2,2002, and the trial court sentenced him to life imprisonment on July 22, 2002.

The Superior Court affirmed the judgment of sentence on direct appeal, Commonwealth v. Rosen, 830 A.2d 1052 (Pa.Super.2003) (unpublished memorandum), and this Court denied review. Commonwealth v. Rosen, 574 Pa. 765, 832 A.2d 436 (2003). Appellant subsequently filed a PCRA petition raising multiple claims of ineffective assistance of counsel. Following an evidentiary hearing, the PCRA court denied the petition on March 1, 2005. On appeal, the Superior Court reversed and remanded for a new trial. It determined that trial counsel was ineffective for failing to call character witnesses on Appellant’s behalf, as their testimony allegedly tended to establish both that Appellant’s mental instability prompted his actions and that he neither planned nor intended to kill his wife. Commonwealth v. Rosen, 890 A.2d 1105 (Pa.Super.2005) (unpublished memorandum). This Court denied further review, Commonwealth v. Rosen, 588 Pa. 780, 906 A.2d 542 (2006), clearing the way for Appellant’s retrial.

Upon retrial, Appellant filed motions in limine on October 17, 2007, and November 2, 2007. The later motion alleged that despite his waiver of the psychotherapist-patient privilege, admission of the expert psychiatric testimony from Appellant’s first trial should be precluded at his retrial. N.T., 12/27/07, at 9. The Commonwealth filed a motion in limine on December 10, 2007, that is docketed but omitted from the record certified to us on appeal, and a supplemental motion in limine on December 26, 2007.2 The trial court held a hearing on December 27, 2007, granted the parties’ motions in part, [310]*310and ruled that since Appellant was not presenting a mental infirmity defense on retrial, the Commonwealth could not present the expert psychiatric testimony as substantive evidence in its case-in-chief. The trial court concluded, however, that if Appellant testified on his own behalf, then the Commonwealth could utilize Appellant’s admissions of guilt contained within the expert psychiatric testimony as impeachment evidence.3 Trial Court Opinion, 5/15/09, at 3. Thereafter, Appellant waived his right to a jury trial and proceeded with a bench trial. “Faced with the trial court’s in limine ruling, [AJppellant did not testify.” Appellant’s brief at 8. The trial court adjudged Appellant guilty of first degree murder and sentenced him to life imprisonment.

In concluding that the statements Appellant made to the psychiatric experts were not excludable under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution at his retrial, the trial court relied on this Court’s decision in Commonwealth v. Santiago, 541 Pa. 188, 662 A.2d 610 (1995). In that case, the defendant argued that the trial court erred in admitting psychiatric expert testimony from his first trial, in which he presented an insanity defense, because no such defense was proffered on retrial. The expert, a forensic psychiatrist who had been appointed to assist in the preparation of Santiago’s insanity defense in his first trial, had testified on Santiago’s behalf.

Santiago focused on the applicability of the psychiatrist-patient privilege and whether the Commonwealth’s discovery of psychiatric examination results pursuant to Pa.R.Crim.P. 305(C)(2) (a)(i)4 entitled it to use those results at retrial when [311]*311the defendant presented an insanity defense at his original trial but did not do so at retrial. We made clear:

against compulsory self-incrimination, to allow the attorney for the Commonwealth to inspect and copy or photograph any of the following requested items:
(i) results or reports of physical or mental examinations....
Appellant [Santiago] did pursue an insanity defense and had [his psychiatric expert] testify on his behalf at his first trial. Moreover, although the Commonwealth obtained the evidence of Appellant’s admission to [his psychiatric expert] pursuant to [Pa.R.Crim.P.] 305C(2)(a) at the first trial, at the second trial the Commonwealth possessed the evidence as a result of its voluntary disclosure by Appellant at his first trial.

Santiago, 662 A.2d at 614 (emphasis in original). We stated that the Commonwealth could not have presented such evidence under Rule 305 if the defendant had foregone an insanity defense at his original trial. The defendant’s waiver of the psychiatrist-patient privilege at the first trial, however, waived the privilege at the retrial. Thus, the Commonwealth could present the examination results even though insanity was not raised at the retrial. Id. at 614-15.

We were guided in Santiago by our decision in Commonwealth v. Boyle, 498 Pa. 486, 447 A.2d 250

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
42 A.3d 988, 615 Pa. 305, 2012 WL 1415771, 2012 Pa. LEXIS 965, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/commonwealth-v-rosen-pa-2012.