Com. v. Rivera, N., Jr.

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NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37
COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA IN THE SUPERIOR COURT
OF PENNSYLVANIA
Appellee
v.
NELSON RIVERA, JR.
Appellant No. 792 MDA 2017
Appeal from the Order May 8, 2017
In the Court of Common Pleas of Clinton County
Criminal Division at No: CP-18-CR-0000513-2016
_____________________________________________________________
COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA IN THE SUPERIOR COURT
OF PENNSYLVANIA
Appellee
v.
NAPHEACE JAMAL COOPER-REID
Appellant No. 793 MDA 2017
Appeal from the Order May 8, 2017
In the Court of Common Pleas of Clinton County
Criminal Division at No: CP-18-CR-0000245-2016
BEFORE: STABILE, J., NICHOLS, J., and RANSOM, J.
MEMORANDUM BY STABILE, J.: FILED: OCTOBER 13, 2020
In these consolidated appeals, Appellants Nelson Rivera, Jr. and
Napheace Jamal Cooper-Reid, co-defendants in a drug trafficking case, appeal
from an order denying their motions to bar retrial on double jeopardy grounds
following the declaration of a mistrial. Appellants contend that the
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Commonwealth committed prosecutorial misconduct with the intent to force a
mistrial or prejudice Appellants’ right to a fair trial. On June 13, 2018, we
affirmed the order denying Appellants’ motions for the reason that the
Commonwealth’s conduct was merely negligent, not intentional misconduct
designed to deprive Appellants of a fair trial. On June 25, 2020, our Supreme
Court remanded these appeals to us for reconsideration in light of the Court’s
decision in Commonwealth v. Johnson, —A.3d—, 2020 WL 2532671 (Pa.,
May 19, 2020), which held that prosecutorial overreaching sufficient to invoke
double jeopardy protections under the Pennsylvania Constitutional “includes
misconduct which not only deprives the defendant of his right to a fair trial,
but is undertaken recklessly, that is, with a conscious disregard for a
substantial risk that such will be the result.” Id. at *15. Having studied
Johnson and the record in this case, we hold that the Commonwealth’s
conduct was merely negligent, not reckless. Thus, the trial court properly
denied Appellants’ motions to bar retrial, and we affirm.
Appellants were charged with twenty counts of possession with intent to
deliver a controlled substance, a general conspiracy to sell a controlled
substance, two counts of corrupt organizations, one count of criminal use of a
communication facility and one count of dealing in proceeds of unlawful
activity. The case was complex because there were nineteen alleged sales of
various controlled substances between July 25, 2014 and April 19, 2015. The
trial court set aside five days for a jury trial, and the Commonwealth provided
a voluminous amount of pretrial discovery to Appellants.
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The Commonwealth committed the following missteps in this case:1 (a)
it did not inform Appellants that lead investigator Agent Sproat was going to
be called at trial, in part, as an expert witness; (b) it failed to provide a
PowerPoint presentation to Appellants before trial, and when it gave the
PowerPoint to Appellants during trial, it altered one of the PowerPoint slides
without first advising Appellants; (c) it introduced photographs during trial
consisting of aerial view maps of Lock Haven that it failed to disclose to
Appellants before trial; (d) it destroyed a cell phone containing text messages
that Agent Sproat testified about during trial; and (e) prior to trial, it failed to
disclose an inculpatory statement made by Appellant Rivera to Agent Sproat.
The final error (the failure to disclose Rivera’s statement in advance of Agent
Sproat’s testimony at trial) came to light on the third day of trial. At that
point, the trial court granted Appellants’ motion for a mistrial.
The trial court scheduled a retrial, but Appellants moved to bar retrial
on the basis of double jeopardy. In response, on May 5, 2017, the trial court
convened a hearing in which Agent Sproat testified about the Commonwealth’s
errors during trial. The theme of his testimony was that he did nothing
intentional to prejudice Appellants during trial. After the hearing, the trial
court denied Appellants’ motion to bar retrial but declared its order
immediately appealable. Appellants filed timely appeals, and on June 13,
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1 We will discuss each of these errors in greater detail below.
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2018, this Court affirmed in a memorandum on the ground that Appellants
failed to demonstrate that the Commonwealth committed intentional
misconduct to deprive them of a fair trial. Appellants filed timely applications
for reargument, which this Court denied, and petitions for allowance of appeal
in our Supreme Court. The Supreme Court granted allocator, and on June 25,
2020, it vacated this Court’s order and remanded for further consideration in
light of its decision in Johnson.
On remand, Appellant Rivera has filed a supplemental brief in which he
raises a single issue: “Whether the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s decision in
[Johnson] dictates that the above-captioned matter should be dismissed due
to prosecutorial misconduct?” Appellant Rivera’s Supplemental Brief at 1.
Appellant Cooper-Reid has filed a supplemental brief raising one question:
“Whether the Supreme Court decision [in Johnson] bars retrial of the
Appellant based on double jeopardy?” Appellant Cooper-Reid’s Supplemental
Brief at 1.
An appeal grounded in double jeopardy
raises a question of constitutional law. This court’s scope of
review in making a determination on a question of law is, as
always, plenary. As with all questions of law, the appellate
standard of review is de novo . . . To the extent that the factual
findings of the trial court impact its double jeopardy ruling, we
apply a more deferential standard of review to those findings:
Where issues of credibility and weight of the evidence are
concerned, it is not the function of the appellate court to substitute
its judgment based on a cold record for that of the trial court. The
weight to be accorded conflicting evidence is exclusively for the
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fact finder, whose findings will not be disturbed on appeal if they
are supported by the record.
Commonwealth v. Graham, 109 A.3d 733, 736 (Pa. Super. 2015).
The Double Jeopardy Clauses of the Fifth Amendment to the United
States Constitution and Article 1, § 10 of the Pennsylvania Constitution
prohibit retrial where prosecutorial misconduct during trial provokes a criminal
defendant into moving for a mistrial. See Oregon v. Kennedy, 456 U.S.
667, 679 (1982); Commonwealth v. Simons, 522 A.2d 537, 540 (Pa. 1987).
However, Article 1, § 10 of the Pennsylvania Constitution offers broader
protection than its federal counterpart in that
the double jeopardy clause of the Pennsylvania Constitution
prohibits retrial of a defendant not only when prosecutorial
misconduct is intended to provoke the defendant into moving for
a mistrial, but also when the conduct of the prosecutor is
intentionally undertaken to prejudice the defendant to the point
of the denial of a fair trial.
Commonwealth v. Smith, 615 A.2d 321, 325 (Pa. 1992).
Earlier this year, our Supreme Court held in Johnson that in addition to
the misconduct described in Smith, prosecutorial overreaching sufficient to
invoke double jeopardy protections under the Pennsylvania Constitution
includes reckless misconduct that deprives the defendant of a fair trial.
Johnson, 2020 WL 2532671, at *15. In Johnson, the victim was shot twelve
times outside of a bar in Philadelphia and died as a result of the shooting.
Police believed that multiple people acted in concert to kill the victim. Police
recovered a red baseball cap about nine feet from the victim’s body. A friend
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of the victim who was with him at the time of the shooting gave a police
detective a black baseball cap with a bullet hole in it that the victim had been
wearing when he was shot. The victim’s blood was found under the brim of
the black baseball cap. The defendant’s DNA was found on the sweatband of
the red baseball cap.
The Commonwealth proceeded on the premise that there was only one
baseball cap involved—the red one—and that it contained both the victim’s
blood and the defendant’s DNA. In fact, the red cap had the defendant’s DNA,
whereas the black cap contained the victim’s blood, and neither cap had DNA
from both individuals. The defendant was ultimately arrested and charged
with first-degree murder and other offenses.
At trial, the prosecutor told the jury in his opening statement that the
red baseball cap had the defendant’s sweat on it and the victim’s blood on it.
The lead crime scene investigator testified that he recovered the red baseball
cap from the scene and he saw fresh drops of blood underneath the red cap’s
brim. The Commonwealth presented evidence and a closing argument
consistent with the theory that the victim’s blood and the defendant’s sweat
were found on the red cap. There was no mention of the black cap. The
defendant was convicted on all counts and sentenced to death. The Supreme
Court affirmed the judgment of sentence.
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In PCRA2 proceedings, a criminalistics lab employee wrote a forensics
report that stated that two caps, a red cap and a black cap, each with a distinct
property receipt number, were analyzed and that the victim’s blood was only
found on the black cap. On this basis, the Commonwealth conceded that a
new trial should be granted.
The defendant filed a motion to bar retrial under double jeopardy
principles. Following an evidentiary hearing, the trial court stated that the
trial was a “farce,” and that the Commonwealth committed “almost
unimaginable mistakes.” Id. at *6. The court, however, credited the
prosecutor’s testimony and concluded that the Commonwealth did not engage
in intentional misconduct and bad faith. As a result, the court concluded that
the proper remedy was a new trial. On interlocutory appeal, this Court
affirmed.
Our Supreme Court reversed and remanded for entry of an order
granting the defendant’s motion to preclude retrial. The Court held that
prosecutorial overreaching sufficient to invoke double jeopardy
protections includes misconduct which not only deprives the
defendant of his right to a fair trial, but is undertaken recklessly,
that is, with a conscious disregard for a substantial risk that such
will be the result. This, of course, is in addition to the behavior
described in Smith, relating to tactics specifically designed to
provoke a mistrial or deny the defendant a fair trial.
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2 Post Conviction Relief Act, 42 Pa.C.S.A. §§ 9541-9546.
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Id. at *15. The Court cautioned, however, “retrial is only precluded where
there is prosecutorial overreaching—which, in turn, implies some sort of
conscious act or omission.” Id.
The Court continued:
[T]he common pleas court saliently found that the experienced
prosecuting attorney made “almost unimaginable” mistakes,
which “dovetailed” with other serious errors by law-enforcement
officers and other police personnel such as the DNA lab technician.
In terms of the errors made by the attorney himself, first, there
was a notable discrepancy between the property receipt numbers
for the two caps. The prosecutor was aware this meant that the
associated results reflecting the presence of the victim’s blood and
[the defendant]’s DNA might have related to different pieces of
physical evidence. Yet, in the face of this information, he never
sought to verify his working hypothesis that the receipt numbers
pertained the same baseball cap. He did not even notice this error
at the preliminary hearing when he had in his possession property
receipt number 2425291, which clearly stated that it was
associated with a black baseball cap. Second, in preparation for
a capital case, the prosecutor did not obtain a criminalistics report
which would have summarized the evidence connected with the
matter and revealed that there were two different caps involved.
As to the court’s suggestion that these items “dovetailed” with the
errors of other law enforcement personnel who held lead roles in
the investigation and prosecution, there are two particularly
noteworthy examples. First, on the night of the shooting, the
assigned detective interviewed the victim’s companion, Ms.
Williams, who personally handed him a black baseball cap with a
bullet hole in it, and explained that it was the hat the victim was
wearing when he was shot. This crucial piece of information was
apparently forgotten as the investigation ensued. Second, the
lead crime scene investigator testified that, when he went to the
location of the murder, he saw fresh drops of blood under the brim
of the red cap, when that would have been impossible—as
persuasively explained by the common pleas court. Additionally,
the fact that no photographs of the underside of the brim were
part of the crime scene record appears not to have been viewed
as problematic by anyone associated with the prosecution. We,
like the common pleas court, cannot escape the conclusion that
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the officer testified to something that he did not actually observe,
especially in light of his subsequent explanation that the testimony
was wrong and was based on a mere assumption.
Although the record, as discussed, supports the common pleas
court’s ultimate finding that these acts and omissions were not
made intentionally or with a specific purpose to deprive [the
defendant] of his rights, the record is likewise consistent with that
tribunal’s characterization that such mistakes were
“unimaginable.” Although “unimaginable” is not a traditional
mens rea descriptor, it is, together with all of the circumstances
on which it was based, strongly suggestive of a reckless disregard
for consequences and for the very real possibility of harm
stemming from the lack of thoroughness in preparing for a first-
degree murder trial.
Id. at 16.
Our Supreme Court’s decisions in Smith and Johnson establish that
Pennsylvania’s double jeopardy clause bars a retrial when the Commonwealth
engages either in intentional misconduct designed to deny the defendant a
fair trial or reckless misconduct. Importantly, these decisions are silent as to
whether mere negligence by the Commonwealth precludes retrial under
double jeopardy principles. Accordingly, our own decision on the subject of
negligence, Commonwealth v. Kearns, 70 A.3d 881 (Pa. Super. 2013),
continues to remain good law. Kearns holds that the Commonwealth’s
negligence—even gross negligence—is not a sufficient basis upon which to bar
retrial on double jeopardy grounds. Id. at 886 (in attempted murder case,
prosecutor’s gross negligence in failing to obtain and produce clearly
discoverable material, namely, defendant's post-arrest written statement to
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police and statement of only eyewitness, was insufficient basis upon which to
bar retrial on double jeopardy ground).
With this review of the law as backdrop, we turn to the errors committed
by the Commonwealth in this case. First, at the beginning of trial, the
Commonwealth moved to qualify Agent Sproat, a lead investigator who posed
as a heroin user during the underlying investigation, as an expert in voice
recognition. N.T., 2/27/17, at 45-57, 61-66. The trial court denied the
Commonwealth’s motion because it failed to disclose before trial its intent to
qualify Agent Sproat as an expert witness. Id. at 77-78.
Second, the Commonwealth attempted to introduce a PowerPoint
presentation to the jury that summarized evidence it had produced to
Appellants during pretrial discovery. Appellants objected on the ground that
the Commonwealth had not disclosed the PowerPoint presentation itself before
trial. N.T., 2/28/17, at 74. The trial court ordered the Commonwealth to
provide a copy of the PowerPoint to Appellants before introducing it into
evidence. The Commonwealth did so but altered one of the PowerPoint slides
without first advising Appellants. N.T., 3/1/17, at 179-80. The slide originally
reflected that one Draymond Jones made a drug delivery on April 19, 2015,
but the Commonwealth corrected the slide to reflect that Appellant Cooper-
Reid made the delivery—a claim that was consistent with a report that the
Commonwealth provided Appellants during pretrial discovery. Id. at 179-80.
The trial court permitted the jury to view the corrected slide.
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Following the grant of a mistrial, and during the hearing on Appellants’
motion to bar retrial on the basis of double jeopardy, Agent Sproat explained
that (1) he, the trial prosecutor, and a police chief corrected the PowerPoint
slide to state that Appellant Cooper-Reid made the drug delivery instead of
Jones, (2) the PowerPoint consisted of information included in reports that
Appellants received during discovery, and (3) the PowerPoint presentation was
a work in progress at the time of trial. The prosecution showed the corrected
PowerPoint slide to the jury instead of the incorrect slide. Agent Sproat
testified that he did not intentionally change information on the PowerPoint
but simply corrected the mistaken reference to Jones. N.T., 5/5/17, at 3-42.
Third, after Agent Sproat testified about a controlled purchase of heroin,
Appellants objected that the Commonwealth had not provided them with aerial
photographs of Lock Haven that were part of the PowerPoint presentation.
The photographs were essentially maps of the relevant area where the crimes
allegedly took place. The prosecutor informed the trial court that it had not
provided the photographs before trial because the information was otherwise
available. Agent Sproat testified that certain maps were contained in his
reports, although the map in question may not have been contained in a
report. Agent Sproat’s reports detailed the route he travelled in various parts
of the investigation. Accordingly, Agent Sproat explained that the
photographs/maps were in the PowerPoint to clarify to the jury where he was
going. The trial court concluded that the Commonwealth had to disclose the
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photographs/maps under Pa.R.Crim.P 573(B)(1)(f). The trial court confirmed
with counsel for Appellant Cooper-Reid that he received copies of the
photographs/maps through the PowerPoint that the Commonwealth gave him
on the first day of trial. Counsel stated, “We do have copies of the PowerPoint.
And I don’t see any prejudice there.” N.T., 02/28/17, at 80-83.
Fourth, the Commonwealth destroyed a cell phone that contained text
messages between Agent Sproat and Appellant Rivera. N.T., 3/1/17, at 12.
Agent Sproat testified that in November 2014, he had phone conversations
and text message communications with Rivera concerning heroin purchases.
Id. at 239-45. Rivera objected, claiming the Commonwealth had to provide
the original text messages to him. The prosecutor explained that the text
messages might have been memorialized in investigative reports but that the
original text messages may not be available. Id. at 246. Agent Sproat
explained that he turned in his prior work phone, which contained the text
messages in question, in order to receive another work phone, but did not
take photographs of text messages with Rivera on the first work phone. Id.
at 248. The Commonwealth then removed the text messages from the first
work phone. Id. at 6-7. When the trial court asked if a phone company could
retrieve the deleted text messages, Agent Sproat conceded the
Commonwealth’s actions rendered the first phone permanently unavailable.
Id. at 7-9. He explained that the Commonwealth removed the text messages
because the phone contained confidential information, including information
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from other cases, but that he copied the text messages verbatim in his
investigative reports. Id. at 10-12. The trial court concluded that the
Commonwealth did not act in bad faith by removing the text messages from
the phone, and that Agent Sproat’s testimony concerning text messages was
permissible under Pa.R.E. 1004.3 Id. at 20.
During the post-trial evidentiary hearing, Agent Sproat explained that
he did not photograph the text messages on this phone because of security
issues. Agent Sproat added that his work phone did not change often, so he
believed he would continue to have access to his text messages. He did not
turn in his first work phone intending for the text messages to be deleted.
N.T., 5/5/17, at 3-42.
Fifth, the Commonwealth failed to disclose Appellant Rivera’s
inculpatory statement before Agent Sproat’s testimony at trial. Agent Sproat
testified that on April 16, 2015, he had a phone conversation with Rivera in
which Rivera agreed to sell heroin on April 19, 2015. N.T., 3/1/17, at 171-
72. On April 19, 2015, Agent Sproat learned that Appellant Cooper-Reid would
make the sale, not Rivera. Id. at 172-79. Agent Sproat wrote a report that
the controlled purchase on April 19, 2015 was arranged on April 16, 2015, but
the report did not mention that the April 16, 2015 conversation was with
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3 Pa.R.E. 1004 provides in relevant part: “An original is not required and other
evidence of the content of a writing, recording, or photograph is admissible if
. . . all the originals are lost or destroyed, and not by the proponent acting in
bad faith.” Pa.R.E. 1004(a).
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Rivera. Id. at 188-200. The trial court concluded the Commonwealth
committed a discovery violation by not informing Appellants prior to trial that
Agent Sproat’s conversation on April 16, 2015 was with Rivera. Id. at 188-
204.
During the post-trial evidentiary hearing, Agent Sproat testified that he
could recall the April 16, 2015 conversation without notes because it was a
significant event in the case, and therefore he did not need to memorialize it
in a report. He testified that he did not intentionally fail to mention in his April
19, 2015 report that the conversation was with Rivera.
The trial court denied Appellants’ motion to bar retrial, reasoning that
“nothing in the evidence presented to us, particularly the testimony of [Agent]
Sproat, would suggest that the Commonwealth intended to keep [any]
information from defense counsel.” Order Denying Motion of Defendants to
Bar Retrial, 5/8/17, at 2. The court continued:
We find that neither the failure to clarify the contact between
[Agent] Sproat and Rivera on the 16th nor the belated
modification of a PowerPoint nor any of the other discovery
violations amounted to a deliberate and intentional tactic to deny
[Appellants] a fair trial. Clearly, [the prosecutor] and his
witnesses should have made a more diligent effort to
guarantee defense counsel had the information they believe was
necessary. On the other hand, the sheer complexity of this case
and the fact that the task force allowed [Appellants] to allegedly
engage in nineteen (19) separate sales before making an arrest
resulted in the accumulation of massive amounts of evidence
which defense counsel understandably had difficulty assimilating.
Nonetheless, we are not convinced that any alleged omissions or
misstatements amounted to deliberate misconduct or a pattern of
pervasive misconduct [that] would justify the dismissal of the
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charges against [Appellants]. The appropriate remedy for the
negligence of the prosecution is simply a new trial.
Id. at 2-3 (emphasis added).
The trial court presides as factfinder when the defendant moves to bar
retrial on the basis of prosecutorial misconduct, and we cannot disturb findings
that are supported by the record. Graham, 109 A.3d at 736. The bolded
language in the trial court’s order above demonstrates that it found the
Commonwealth’s errors were negligent, not reckless or intentional. The
record supports this finding. Agent Sproat’s testimony during trial and the
post-trial evidentiary hearing confirms that the alteration of the PowerPoint
slide, deletion of text messages from his first work phone, and his failure to
state in his report that his conversation on April 16, 2015 was with Appellant
Rivera were inadvertent mistakes. Similarly, the Commonwealth’s failure to
disclose its intent to call Agent Sproat as an expert (a failure that did not
prejudice Appellants since the trial court denied Agent Sproat permission to
present expert testimony) or to turn over aerial photographs of Lock Haven
prior to trial were slipshod errors, nothing more. Under Kearns, the
Commonwealth’s negligence does not provide a sufficient foundation for
barring retrial on the basis of double jeopardy.
Our Supreme Court has directed us to review this case in light of
Johnson. We see no resemblance between these cases. In Johnson, the
Commonwealth committed “almost unimaginable” overreaching in a murder
prosecution by (1) asserting the patently defective theory that a red baseball
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cap contained both the defendant’s blood and the victim’s sweat and (2)
ignoring evidence that demolished its claim about the red baseball cap (a black
baseball cap worn by the victim that had a bullet hole and only contained the
victim’s blood). In the present case, the Commonwealth was guilty of a
pattern of minor omissions, but not reckless and systematic overreaching. An
order denying retrial under these circumstances is far too harsh a remedy.
In short, the Commonwealth’s errors in this case were negligent rather
than reckless or intentional. Thus, Kearns governs this case instead of Smith
or Johnson—and under Kearns, the proper remedy for the Commonwealth’s
negligence was not to bar retrial but to order a new trial. The trial court
properly denied Appellants’ claim of double jeopardy.
Order affirmed. Case remanded for further proceedings. Jurisdiction
relinquished.
Judge Nichols concurs in the result.
Judge Ransom did not participate in the consideration or decision of this
case.
Judgment Entered.
Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq.
Prothonotary
Date: 10/13/2020
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