Pennsylvania v. Brown

On December 9, 2012, appellant/cross-appellee Darnell Brown attended a party after hiding a revolver in the wheel well of a nearby parked automobile. At the party, Brown began arguing with Cory Morton (the victim). Marcus Stokes (co-defendant) retrieved the revolver and handed it to Brown, who fired four shots into the victim, killing him. Dr. Marlon Osbourne of the Philadelphia Medical Examiner’s Office performed an autopsy of the victim and prepared a report of his findings. The report concluded the cause of death was multiple gunshot wounds and the manner of death was homicide. At the time of trial, Dr. Osbourne was no longer employed by the Medical Examiner’s Office and he was not called as a witness, but his report of the victim’s autopsy was admitted into evidence. The Commonwealth called Dr. Albert Chu of the Philadelphia Medical Examiner’s Office, who had not been present at the autopsy, to provide expert testimony based on portions of the autopsy report as well as autopsy photographs. The issue on appeal before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court centered on the autopsy report, specifically, whether an autopsy report was testimonial in nature, such that the report’s author must appear as a witness subject to cross-examination at a criminal trial for murder when the report is introduced as evidence substantiating the cause of the victim’s death. The Supreme Court held admission of the autopsy report without testimony from its author was error in this case, but the error was harmless, and therefore affirmed. View "Pennsylvania v. Brown" on Justia Law