Commonwealth v. Thomas

Opinion by

Cercone, J.,

The appellant herein, after a jury trial, was found guilty of aggravated assault and battery and assault with intent to kill. In the instant appeal he urges this court to reverse the lower court’s denial of his motion for a mistrial after a Commonwealth witness, in an unresponsive answer to a question put by the court, referred to “mugshots” the police showed to him prior to the trial. The facts of the case are as follows.

On Easter Sunday evening in 1972, despite the holiday atmosphere, a heated argument culminating in a fistfight broke out between two teenagers on a…