COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Appellee, v. David Allen FIRMAN, Jr., Appellant.
Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.
Decided Dec. 31, 2002.
813 A.2d 643
Argued Sept. 10, 2002.
ORDER
PER CURIAM.
Based on its opinion, the Order of the Superior Court is affirmed. See Atkinson v. Evans, 787 A.2d 1033 (Pa.Super.2001).
Chief Justice ZAPPALA did not participate in the consideration or decision of this case.
David R. Crowley, Bellefonte, for The Pennsylvania Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.
Kevin Francis McCarthy, Pittsburgh, for Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
Nicholas J. Staffieri, Robert Michael Waller, Philadelphia, for Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority.
Before ZAPPALA, C.J., and CAPPY, CASTILLE, NIGRO, NEWMAN and SAYLOR, JJ.
OPINION
Justice SAYLOR.
We allowed appeal to consider the scope of the extraterritorial jurisdiction vested in officers of the Port Authority Police Department of Allegheny County.
Pursuant to the Railway and Street Railway Police Act,1 certain corporations and authorities, including the Port Authority of Allegheny County, are authorized to apply (via the State Police Commissioner) for the commissioning by the Governor of persons designated to act as transportation system policemen. See
On July 24, 1999, an on-duty Port Authority police officer was traveling on a public highway in a marked cruiser, en route from a downtown station to a patrol assignment on the West Bus-way (a dedicated, mass transit roadway). An automobile operated by Appellant, David Firman, Jr., abruptly swerved, causing the officer also to swerve and to brake to avoid a collision. The transportation system officer then observed Firman‘s vehicle changing lanes erratically and traveling at an excessive rate of speed, prompting him to initiate a traffic stop and administer field sobriety tests.3 Based on his
Firman filed a pre-trial motion to suppress all physical evidence resulting from his arrest, contending that the Port Authority officer‘s statutory authority did not extend to making arrests on public roads. In granting Firman‘s motion, the common pleas court observed that, in Commonwealth v. Mundorf, 699 A.2d 1299 (Pa.Super.1997), the Superior Court deemed the extraterritorial authority of Port Authority police limited to actions that are undertaken while officers are on routine patrol and which prevent an immediate threat to the welfare of Port Authority passengers or property. See id. at 1302. The suppression court also took note of the Superior Court‘s admonishment against general enforcement of criminal laws or the Vehicle Code by Port Authority police. See id. While expressing the view that Mundorf deserved to be reexamined by the appellate courts, and emphasizing that the transportation system officer‘s actions prevented potential harm to motorists, the common pleas court nevertheless concluded that suppression was warranted, since the officer was neither on Port Authority property nor acting to prevent an immediate threat to the authority‘s passengers or property. The Commonwealth filed an interlocutory appeal as of right, certifying that the suppression court‘s order substantially hindered or effectively terminated the prosecution.
The Superior Court reversed in a divided, en banc opinion. See Commonwealth v. Firman, 789 A.2d 297 (Pa.Super.2001). The majority opened its discussion with an overview of the enabling provisions of the Act, in particular, Section 3303, which establishes the powers and duties of transportation system police as follows:
(a) General powers.—Railroad and street railway policemen shall severally possess and exercise all the powers of a
police officer in the City of Philadelphia, in and upon, and in the immediate and adjacent vicinity of, the property of the corporate authority or elsewhere within this Commonwealth while engaged in the discharge of their duties in pursuit of railroad, street railway or transportation system business.
The dissent, on the other hand, reasoned that the unambiguous language of Section 3303(a) restricts the circumstances in which Port Authority police may exercise police powers and effectuate arrests. See Firman, 789 A.2d at 303 (Johnson, J., dissenting). The dissent explained that:
[t]he phrase “while engaged in the discharge of their duties,” critical to any consideration of this section, recognizes that an officer‘s discharge of specific duties consistent with the business of the Port Authority is a prerequisite to his exercise of any of the powers otherwise provided by this Act. This conditional nature of the officer‘s powers is
established by the legislature‘s use of the conjunction “while” in relation to the noun “discharge.” The plain meaning of these two words allows a Port Authority officer to exercise lawful powers during that time that he acts to remove the obligation or liability imposed by his duties. By virtue of the same language, the Act establishes that if the officer‘s conduct is not motivated by the need to remove his obligation to the Port Authority or is not carried out during the appropriate timeframe, it is not in accordance with the [Act].
Id. at 303-04 (citation omitted; emphasis in original). Thus, according to the dissent, “[t]he duties of the officer are, perforce, limited by the business of the Port Authority itself.” Id. at 304. The dissent then examined the nature of Port Authority business, as defined in the Second Class County Port Authority Act,
The act describes, with exhaustive care, the “rights or powers” of the Port Authority, including specifically the manner of “business” in which it may engage. See
55 P.S. § 553 . In none of section 553‘s twenty-seven subsections, has the legislature vested the Authority with the power to patrol public roadways not operated as high occupancy vehicle lanes.... Although section 553(15) provides the Port Authority with discretion “[t]o do all acts and things necessary for ... the general welfare of the authority to carry out the powers granted to it by this act or any other acts[,]”55 P.S. § 553(15) , neither this section nor the provisions of the Railway and Street Police Act suggest that the Port Authority‘s exercise of police powers on public roadways is “necessary.” Indeed, without some demonstrated relationship between the exercise of such expansive powers and the welfare of the Port Authority, I find it pointedly unnecessary.
Id. The dissent also endorsed Mundorf as setting forth the appropriate restrictions on extraterritorial arrest powers of Port Authority police. See Firman, 789 A.2d at 304-05 (Johnson, J., dissenting).
Recently, McKinley v. Commonwealth, 564 Pa. 565, 769 A.2d 1153 (2001), assessed the extraterritorial jurisdiction of members of the Harrisburg International Airport police force afforded by the General Assembly via legislative grant to the Department of Transportation. In the inquiry, we considered the model of municipal police jurisdiction, which incorporates both a concept of primary jurisdiction (authority derived from the employer-municipality and constrained by the geographical area corresponding with its territorial limits) and a separate direct grant of authorization to arrest outside the territorial limits of the employer-municipality, subject to legislatively defined limits directed to specific purposes. See id. at 576-77, 769 A.2d at 1160 (citing
Accordingly, the order of the Superior Court is affirmed.
than is the “official business” requirement contained within one subset of the circumstances enabling extraterritorial powers of municipal police. See
We do not dispute the concurring opinion‘s position that a Port Authority policeman can fairly be considered to be acting within the scope of transportation system business while he is affirmatively in the act of traveling between duty locations. The question presented on review of the Superior Court‘s opinion, however, is whether this status is maintained when the officer diverts from his assigned task of traveling to the new duty location because he has observed a violation or offense potentially unrelated to transportation system business and removed from Port Authority property. Under the express provisions of the statute, the officer‘s general police powers simply are not implicated in such circumstances, since the extraterritorial encounter must itself be within the scope of the officer‘s duties in pursuit of transportation system business. See
Justice CAPPY files a concurring opinion.
Justice EAKIN did not participate in the consideration or decision of this case.
CAPPY, Justice, concurring.
I agree with the majority that Section 3303(a) of the Railway and Street Railway Police Act (“Act“),
As this case raises a question of statutory construction, Pennsylvania‘s Statutory Construction Act applies.
In relevant part, the Act confers full police powers within the Commonwealth upon Port Authority officers who have undergone the requisite training “while engaged in the discharge of their duties in pursuit of ... transportation system business.”
Port Authority police to have greater authority than municipal police. Here, however, it appears that the transportation system officer reasonably committed to break off the encounter due to Firman‘s excessive rate of speed, but was nonetheless able to overtake Firman because of delaying traffic conditions. See N.T., Feb. 16, 2000, at 4, R.R. at 14a.
I take issue with the majority‘s construction of Section 3303(a) because it essentially adds to the statute‘s terms. That is to say, I disagree with the majority‘s decision to condition an officer‘s exercise of the authority that Section 3303(a) gives him upon the establishment of “a sufficient connection to [Port Authority‘s] transportation system business“, (Majority Opinion at 8), and to base Officer Porter‘s authority to take action on the fact that Appellant‘s conduct jeopardized Port Authority personnel and property. Moreover, insofar as Officer Porter was performing a function of his position, I view him as having been on “transportation system business“, and, therefore, I disagree with the majority‘s reference to Officer Porter‘s “mere ‘on-duty’ status” and the role that the majority envisions this phrase to play when the courts construe Section 3303(a)‘s extraterritorial jurisdiction standard hereafter. (Majority Opinion at 7-8).
In my view, the majority‘s analysis of Section 3303(a) does not arise out of the Act‘s language nor does it effectuate the legislature‘s intent, but rather, improperly reflects the majority‘s conception of the extraterritorial jurisdiction that Port Authority officers should possess.
I would, therefore, affirm the order of the Superior Court for the reasons that the Superior Court stated.
Chief Justice ZAPPALA dissenting.
I agree with the view expressed by Judge Johnson in his dissenting opinion below that the port authority officer here was not “engaged in the discharge of [his] duties” as required by