United States v. Dye, 11136.
| Decision Date | 16 December 1953 |
| Docket Number | No. 11136.,11136. |
| Citation | 208 F.2d 565 |
| Parties | UNITED STATES ex rel. THOMPSON v. DYE. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit |
Zeno Fritz, Louis C. Glasso, Pittsburgh, Pa., for appellant.
Albert A. Fiok, Asst. Dist. Atty. for Allegheny County, Pittsburgh, Pa. (James F. Malone, Jr., Dist. Atty., Pittsburgh, Pa., Frank F. Truscott, Atty. Gen., on the brief), for appellee.
Frank P. Lawley, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen. of Pennsylvania, for Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
Before KALODNER, STALEY and HASTIE, Circuit Judges.
The appellant is a prisoner under sentence of death imposed by a Pennsylvania court. He appeals to us from a judgment of the District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania, entered after full hearing, denying him a writ of habeas corpus, 113 F.Supp. 807. Two deficiencies of the present submission, one not correctible here, prevent us from making a decisive disposition of the litigation at this time.
First, the principal contention of the petitioner in the District Court was that the state officer who prosecuted him had been informed before trial by William Heagy, one of the two police officers who arrested appellant shortly after the homicide, that appellant when arrested appeared and acted drunk, incoherent and crazed — this statement being diametrically opposed to the state's contention that accused was in full possession of his faculties when arrested, and inferentially at the time of the killing. Yet the prosecution neither called Heagy nor advised the court or the defense that this testimony was available. In this habeas corpus proceeding Officer Heagy testified that he did inform the prosecutor as appellant now charges. The prosecutor denied this. The District Judge made no finding which of these accounts he believed. We think a finding on this issue is essential to a proper disposition of this case on its merits. Apparently, the District Judge thought this finding unnecessary because he was satisfied that the prosecutor acted in good faith believing that the truth of the matter was represented by evidence to the effect that the accused was in full possession of his faculties at the time in question. We, however, think the omitted finding goes to the very essence of the complaint of fundamental unfairness.
For the foregoing reason the cause must be remanded. But since it may come here again we also note a second point. Many factual matters about alleged testimony and...
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United States v. Price
...of Pennsylvania, 1953, 113 F. Supp. 807, and on appeal remanded by this court for additional reconsideration by the district court, 1953, 208 F.2d 565. The district court again denied the writ, 1954, 123 F.Supp. 759, but on appeal this court directed that a writ of habeas corpus should issu......
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United States v. McCorkle
...satisfactory conclusion was not founded on any original evidence at all for there was none before the court. In United States ex rel. Thompson v. Dye, 3 Cir., 208 F.2d 565, 566, after hearing the district judge declined to issue a writ. We reversed and remanded because he had made no findin......
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United States v. Dye
...U.S. 835, 72 S.Ct. 58, 96 L. Ed. 631. 2 1953, 203 F.2d 429, certiorari denied, 1953, 345 U.S. 960, 73 S.Ct. 946, 97 L. Ed. 1380. 3 1953, 208 F.2d 565. 4 At the district court habeas corpus hearing Dubis testified that he did detect an odor of alcohol on Thompson's breath and that "His shirt......
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United States v. Cavell, Civ. No. 15976.
...L.Ed. 469; DeVita v. McCorkle, 3 Cir., 1954, 216 F. 2d 743), and decide issues of fact relating to fundamental fairness. Thompson v. Dye, 3 Cir., 1953, 208 F.2d 565; Ackerman v. Johnston, D.C.W.D.Pa.1955, 139 F.Supp. 890, 892, affirmed 235 F.2d 958. This we have done and find that relator w......