## Facts

- George and Walter Stenhach, brothers and part-time public defenders, represented Richard Buchanan on a first-degree murder charge in Pennsylvania.
- During a confidential attorney–client conference, Buchanan described the homicide and provided a map showing where he had discarded items connected to the killing, including a broken rifle stock.
- The attorneys used an investigator, Daniel Weidner (a former police officer), who located and recovered the broken rifle stock from the area identified by Buchanan.
- Weidner delivered the rifle stock to the attorneys, who placed it in a paper bag in a desk drawer and did not notify law enforcement.
- Weidner warned the attorneys that retaining the stock without disclosure was illegal; the attorneys maintained that privilege and ethics barred disclosure absent court order.
- During Buchanan’s trial, the judge ruled the attorney–client privilege did not protect the physical rifle stock and ordered its production; the stock was produced during the prosecution’s case.
- After Buchanan’s conviction of third-degree murder, the Commonwealth prosecuted the attorneys based on their retention of the rifle stock.

## Issues

1. Whether incriminating physical evidence obtained through client communications is protected by attorney–client privilege when in defense counsel’s possession.
2. Whether defense counsel has a legal duty to surrender incriminating physical evidence to the prosecution, and what timing is required.
3. Whether applying hindering-prosecution and evidence-tampering statutes to defense counsel’s handling of such evidence violates due process because the statutes are vague or overbroad as applied.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania reversed the judgments and vacated the attorneys’ sentences.
- The court held that incriminating physical evidence is not protected by attorney–client privilege merely because it comes into counsel’s possession through confidential communications.
- The court announced that defense counsel must deliver incriminating physical evidence to the prosecution immediately after a reasonable time for examination.
- The court concluded that, on the facts presented, the hindering-prosecution and evidence-tampering statutes failed to give fair notice of what conduct would constitute a crime when applied to defense counsel in this setting, so convictions could not stand.

## Legal Principles

- Attorney–client privilege protects confidential communications, not tangible incriminating objects; physical evidence itself is not privileged.
- Defense counsel may take possession of incriminating physical evidence for a reasonable period to examine or test it, but may not retain it to frustrate law enforcement.
- Once counsel has possessed incriminating physical evidence, counsel has an affirmative duty to surrender it to the prosecution after reasonable examination.
- Criminal liability cannot be imposed under broadly worded obstruction-related statutes where, as applied to defense counsel’s evidence-handling, the law does not provide fair warning and risks chilling constitutionally protected representation.

## Conclusion

The court vacated the defense attorneys’ obstruction-related convictions because the statutes, as applied, did not provide fair notice in an unsettled area, while establishing that incriminating physical evidence is not privileged and must be turned over to the prosecution after a reasonable opportunity for examination.


Commonwealth v. Stenhach, 517 Pa. 589, 534 A.2d 769 (Pa. 1987)