State v. Fernald

• Decision Date: 04 January 1978
• Citation: 381 A.2d 282
• Court: Maine Supreme Court
• Parties: STATE of Maine v. George A. FERNALD, Jr.

Page 282

381 A.2d 282

STATE of Maine v. George A. FERNALD, Jr.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Jan. 4, 1978.

Henry N. Berry III, Dist. Atty., Peter G. Ballou (orally), Deputy Dist. Atty., Portland, Stephen Moriarty (orally), Law Student Intern, for plaintiff.

Daniel G. Lilley (orally), Portland, for defendant.

Before McKUSICK, C. J., and POMEROY, WERNICK, ARCHIBALD, GODFREY and NICHOLS, JJ.

McKUSICK, Chief Justice.

The defendant, George A. Fernald, Jr., stands indicted for aggravated assault with a firearm and robbery with a firearm, in violation of 17-A M.R.S.A. §§ 208 and 651, respectively. This opinion consolidates our disposition of interlocutory appeals by the State from (1) denial by a District Court judge, ¹ after an adversary hearing, of the State's application for a search warrant for surgical removal of two metal fragments, allegedly of a bullet, lodged in the defendant's back and (2) denial by the Superior Court of the State's motion for a continuance pending the State's decision whether to appeal the District Court judge's ruling. The defendant moved to dismiss the State's appeal from the District Court judge, alleging that it was taken "in bad faith," and that "the allowance of this appeal would deny him his speedy trial rights." ² On an expedited schedule, this court ordered the defendant's motion to be briefed and argued at the same time as the merits of the State's appeals.

In view of our conclusion that neither the District Court judge's action in denying the application for a search warrant nor the Superior Court's denial of the State's motion for continuance was a "decision, order or judgment . . . or ruling against the State in any pretrial order" within the meaning of the statute authorizing interlocutory appeals by the State, 15 M.R.S.A. § 2115-A(1) (enacted 1968; amended 1971) (1975 Supp.), we dismiss both appeals for want of jurisdiction. ³

The defendant's indictment stems from an attempted robbery and shootout at the Maine Mall in South Portland. On July 2, 1977, at about 11:30 a.m., two Brinks security men, Carl Green, a messenger, and Donald Orick, a guard, were making a routine cash pickup from the Jordan Marsh department store. As Green, who was carrying the money, stepped off the escalator on the first floor of the store, he was accosted by a man armed with a gun, who demanded the money. When Green refused to comply, the gunman opened fire. Green and Orick exchanged some fifteen shots with the gunman before he fled from the store. Green was wounded. Blood found on the floor and on the door through which the gunman escaped indicated that the gunman had also been shot.

Several hours later, the defendant, Fernald, was admitted to the Maine Medical Center suffering from multiple gunshot wounds in his legs, left arm and shoulder, and abdomen. X-rays taken immediately upon his arrival disclosed the presence of several metallic fragments in the defendant's chest and back. An operation was performed on Fernald that evening, but no fragments were removed. The following morning, Detective Robert Schwartz presented Green (also in the hospital undergoing treatment for his wounds) with six photographs, including one of Fernald. Green positively identified Fernald as the gunman. ⁴ On the following day, July 3, 1977, the defendant was arrested, and the State subsequently sought and obtained the pending indictment.

On September 8, 1977, Detective Schwartz filed an "Affidavit in Support of a Search Warrant" with Honorable Bernard M. Devine, Judge of the District Court in the Ninth District, a district encompassing the Cumberland County jail where the defendant was being held pending trial. The Detective's affidavit requested authorization to have certain metallic objects, believed to be pieces of a bullet, removed from the defendant's back, "being (by Schwartz's sworn statement) evidence of the said George A. Fernald, Jr.'s presence at the scene of a robbery and aggravated assault in South Portland on July 2, 1977." Detective Schwartz first alleged the facts recited above to establish probable cause for the requested search warrant. He further alleged that Corporal William Manduca of the State Police, an expert in firearms identification, "has tested rounds fired by Carl Green and Donald Orrick (sic) at the time of the incident at Jordan Marsh and states that the weapons they used are such that a bullet fired from one of them (including a fragmented bullet) could be absolutely identified as having come from those particular guns." Prior to ruling on the application, Judge Devine, on the State's motion, held an adversary hearing, at which the State produced the testimony of Dr. Robert Kramer, one of the defendant's post-operative physicians. Dr. Kramer testified, from medical reports and x-rays taken of the defendant during his hospital treatment, that one large fragment is located less than one inch below the defendant's skin, can be physically palpated, and can be removed on an out-patient basis by use of a local anesthetic. With respect to a second large fragment, Dr. Kramer testified that it was approximately two centimeters deeper than the first but that more x-rays would be necessary to determine its precise location and the exact procedures necessary for its removal.

The District Court judge denied the State's search warrant application, without making specific findings of fact or conclusions of law. In order to decide whether to appeal that ruling, the State moved for specific findings and rulings on October 3, 1977. On the same day, the State also moved the Superior Court for a ten-day continuance of the trial, then set for October 5, pending the District judge's findings. The Superior Court refused to grant the continuance, and the State appealed that ruling on the morning scheduled for start of the trial. That appeal had the effect of staying further action in the Superior Court. See Rule 37(d), M.R.Crim.P. On October 12, 1977, the District Court judge responded to the State's request for findings, concluding that the surgical procedure for removal of either fragment would be an "unreasonable search and seizure" and that the State had failed to show that the fragments could be identified so as to be of evidentiary value at trial. The State promptly took an appeal to the Law Court from the District Court judge's denial of the requested search warrant. In view of our lack of jurisdiction over this appeal, we cannot, however, reach the interesting and, for Maine, novel questions of law presented by the State's request for surgical removal of the metallic fragments from the defendant's back.

The State predicates its right to appeal both the action of the District Court judge and that of the Superior Court upon the statutory authorization contained in 15 M.R.S.A. § 2115-A(1) (enacted 1968; amended 1971) (1975 Supp.), which provides: ⁵

"An appeal may be taken by the State in criminal cases on questions of law, with the written approval of the Attorney General, from the District Court and from the Superior Court to the law court from a decision, order or judgment of the court suppressing evidence prior to trial, allowing a motion to dismiss an indictment, complaint or information, quashing an arrest or search warrant or suppressing a confession or admission, or ruling against the State in any pretrial order. Such appeal shall be taken within 10 days after such order, decision or judgment has been entered, and in any case before the defendant has been placed in jeopardy under established rules of law. Any appeal which may be taken under this section shall be diligently prosecuted." (Emphasis added)

The critical question is whether either action constituted a "pretrial order" within the meaning of that term in the statute.

Prior to enactment of section 2115-A in 1968, the State enjoyed no right to appeal whatever. That condition of the law reflected an historical sensitivity to the defendant's constitutional guarantees of a speedy trial and freedom from being placed in double jeopardy. See Comment, The State Right to Appeal: Has Maine Been Too Cautious?, 21 Me.L.Rev. 221 (1969). In addition, appellate review of any interlocutory ruling, no matter by whom taken, is an exception to the "final judgment" rule and hence must be justified ordinarily by the presence of special policy considerations. Cf. State v. Placzek, Me., 380 A.2d 1010 (December 9, 1977). We recently recognized in State v. Kelly, Me., 376 A.2d 840, 843 (1977), that because granting the State a right of review in a criminal prosecution is "so serious and far-reaching an innovation in the criminal jurisprudence,"

"the question of whether to grant rights of 'review' to the State, in relation either to the final judgment or the interlocutory facets of a criminal prosecution, is to be decided by the Legislature. Further, rights of such substantive importance will not be taken to have been legislatively conferred by indirection or implication but only by legislation explicitly addressing the subject in express language of unmistakably plain meaning."

As Kelly suggests, in view of the unprecedented nature of section 2115-A, the scope of the appeal rights conferred upon the State by the legislature are to be strictly construed and not extended beyond the plain and necessary meaning of the grant.

As originally enacted in 1968, section 2115-A was specific in identifying only four "decisions, orders or judgments" that were appealable to the Law Court; namely, those (i) suppressing evidence prior to trial, (ii) dismissing an indictment, complaint or information, (iii) quashing an arrest or search warrant, and (iv) suppressing a confession or admission. A feature shared by those appealable orders is that a ruling adverse to the State on any of them might well result, either legally or practically, in the termination of an ongoing prosecution, thereby foreclosing any opportunity for this court's review of the correctness...