Commonwealth v. Britton
| Decision Date | 22 April 2020 |
| Docket Number | No. 55 MAP 2018,55 MAP 2018 |
| Citation | 229 A.3d 590 |
| Parties | COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Appellee v. Stacy BRITTON, Appellant |
| Court | Pennsylvania Supreme Court |
California law enforcement officers interviewed Appellant Stacy Britton ("Appellant") in her California residence and, unbeknownst to her, recorded those interviews. Over Appellant's objection, the Commonwealth utilized those recordings as evidence to help convict Appellant of murder in Pennsylvania. We granted allowance of appeal to examine whether the California law enforcement officers were acting as agents of the Pennsylvania State Police when they recorded the interviews with Appellant in her California home, and if so, whether Pennsylvania constitutional and statutory protections are available to Appellant under those circumstances. For the reasons discussed below, we conclude that the Superior Court correctly determined that the California law enforcement officers were not acting as agents of the Pennsylvania State Police when they interviewed Appellant. Thus, examination of whether any Pennsylvania specific constitutional or statutory protections extended to Appellant's situation is unwarranted. Because the Superior Court reached the proper result in this matter, we affirm that court's judgment.
In July of 2002, human remains were discovered on a property in Monroe County, Pennsylvania. The remains were from a body which had been dismembered and burned in two, 55 gallon barrels. A forensic examination revealed that the cause of the victim's death was multiple stab wounds and blunt force trauma to the head and torso. The examination further revealed that the victim's head, hands, and legs were amputated postmortem.
At the time of the victim's death, Appellant lived with her then-husband, James Britton ("James"), in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. On August 24, 2002, the Brittons' home burned down as a result of arson, and the couple moved to California.
In 2003, the victim was identified as Robert Roudebush ("Victim"), a resident of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Around the same time that authorities learned of Victim's identity, James, who was incarcerated on charges unrelated to the instant matter, notified his probation officer and, later, the Pennsylvania State Police that he had information about a July 2002 murder of a person named Bob. James told the police that Larry Tooley, the Brittons' next door neighbor in Wilkes-Barre, committed the murder. Nonetheless, the case remained cold.
In 2008, Victim's murder was the subject of an investigating grand jury. During those proceedings, the Brittons testified and again suggested that Larry Tooley had committed Victim's murder. It, however, does not appear that anyone was charged as a result of the grand jury investigation. Consequently, the murder continued to remain unsolved.
On August 14, 2015, Appellant, who was living in San Bernardino County, California, called authorities in Pennsylvania to discuss information that she had regarding a 2002 homicide. More specifically, Appellant informed Monroe County Detective Joseph Coddington that on July 4, 2002, James killed Victim. During the course of their conversation, Appellant stated to the detective that she would prefer to speak to someone in person.
Detective Coddington passed this information along to his colleague, Monroe County Detective Wendy Serfass, who then contacted Corporal Shawn Williams of the Pennsylvania State Police.2 Corporal Williams called Appellant in California, and she repeated her story that James killed Victim. Appellant also stated that she dismembered the body at James' request and further described how the couple disposed of the body by placing the remains in plastic bags, driving them to a property, and burning them in barrels.
Corporal Williams' colleague, Pennsylvania State Police Corporal Thomas McAndrew, then called the County Sherriff's Department in San Bernardino, California, and eventually spoke to Detective Jon Cahow. Corporal McAndrew provided Detective Cahow with a background of this case and, pursuant to Appellant's request, asked the detective to interview Appellant in person. Corporal McAndrew and Detective Cahow did not discuss instructions on how the California law enforcement officers should conduct their interview with Appellant. The Pennsylvania State Police followed up later by emailing and mailing various reports and files to the San Bernardino County Sherriff's Department.
On August 17, 2015, Detective Cahow contacted Appellant by phone, and she agreed to meet with the detective and his partner, San Bernardino County Detective Charles Phillips, at the Morongo Sherriff's Station in California, where the detectives interviewed Appellant for several hours. Video and audio recordings were made of the interview, which presumably is legal and done as a matter of protocol in California. Further, there is a sign in the Sheriff's Station where Appellant was interviewed, advising interviewees that video and audio recordings are occurring.
As the interview proceeded, Appellant became tired and concerned that her son needed to go to bed to be ready for school the next day, but she agreed to continue the interview with the detectives at her home. There, the detectives recorded their conversation with Appellant by way of a belt recorder, i.e. , an audio recording device that the detectives placed on their belts. During the course of these interviews on August 17th, Appellant initially said that she came home on July 4, 2002, and discovered Victim dead in the basement of her home. However, later in the interviews, she recanted this statement, accepted responsibility for participating in the murder, explained in gruesome detail how she dismembered the body, and laid out how the couple disposed of the remains. Appellant also accused James of starting the fire that burned down their house in August of 2002.3
The California detectives returned to Appellant's home the next day and continued interviewing her. They again captured an audio recording of the conversation on a belt recorder. In addition, Detective Phillips utilized a Sherriff-issued iPad to record a video of Appellant demonstrating on a stuffed animal the manner in which James killed Victim. Appellant further admitted that she was present for and actively participated in Victim's murder.
Over the course of the two days of interviews, Detective Cahow periodically updated Pennsylvania State Police Corporal McAndrew concerning Appellant's statements. At some point during those conversations, Detective Cahow informed Corporal McAndrew that the California detectives were recording their interviews with Appellant. However, the California detectives never affirmatively informed Appellant that they were recording the interviews, although, as noted above, there was a sign in the Morongo Sheriff's Station advising that audio and video recording was taking place; moreover, Appellant was aware that the California detectives recorded her depiction of the murder on an iPad.
Pennsylvania authorities subsequently arranged for Appellant to return to the Commonwealth, where she was arrested and charged with multiple crimes connected to Victim's murder. The San Bernardino County Sherriff's Department later provided the recordings of Appellant's interviews to the Pennsylvania State Police.
Appellant filed an omnibus pretrial motion in the Pennsylvania trial court, seeking, inter alia , an order suppressing all of the recorded statements that she made to the California authorities in August of 2015. Pertinent to the instant appeal, Appellant averred that the San Bernardino County Sherriff's Department was working at the direction of the Pennsylvania State Police when the San Bernardino County detectives "surreptitiously" recorded her statements. Omnibus Pretrial Motion, 4/29/2016, at ¶¶ 13 & 14. Building on this premise, Appellant asserted that, as agents of the Pennsylvania State Police, the San Bernardino County detectives failed to follow "the dictates of the Pennsylvania [Wiretapping and Electronic Surveillance Control Act ("Pennsylvania Wiretap Act")4 ] and obtain proper authorization under the Act and in violation of [Appellant's rights under the] Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment[s] of the United States Constitution and under Article I, Section [8] of the Pennsylvania Constitution."5 Id. at ¶ 15.
The trial court held a hearing to address the pretrial motions. Relevant to Appellant's motion to suppress, the following witnesses testified: Monroe County Detective Joseph Coddington, San Bernardino County Detective Cahow, and Pennsylvania State Police Corporals Williams and McAndrew. These witnesses testified to, inter alia , the facts as outlined above.
After the suppression hearing, the parties submitted briefs in support of their legal positions. Related to her agency theory, Appellant revised her request for relief, seeking suppression only of the statements recorded in her California home. In short, Appellant contended that: (1) because the California law enforcement officers were acting as agents of the Pennsylvania State Police when they interviewed her in her California home, Pennsylvania law controls the legality of their actions in this regard; and (2) both the Pennsylvania Constitution and the Pennsylvania Wiretap Act precluded the California law enforcement officers from secretly recording Appellant in her home. In response, the Commonwealth argued that Appellant's statements were legally obtained in California pursuant to California law.
The trial court denied Appellant's motion to suppress. In its opinion in support of that decision, before turning to Appellant's agency argument, the court initially utilized a thorough conflict-of-law analysis to determine whether Pennsylvania or California law should govern the admissibility of the recorded statements that Appellant made in...
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