Opinion
J-S61019-15 No. 1296 MDA 2014
12-08-2015
COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA, Appellee v. ROBERT WAYNE BROWN, Appellant
NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37
Appeal from the Judgement of Sentence Entered April 4, 2014, in the Court of Common Pleas of Cumberland County, Criminal Division at No(s): CP-21-CR-0000029-2011 and CP-21-CR-0003516-2010 BEFORE: PANELLA, WECHT, and STRASSBURGER, JJ. CONCURRING MEMORANDUM BY STRASSBURGER, J.:
Retired Senior Judge assigned to the Superior Court. --------
I join the Majority Memorandum, save for the manner in which it disposes the sufficiency-of-the-evidence claims. Majority Memorandum at 13-14. In my view, because Appellant's counsel has deemed this appeal frivolous and has sought to withdraw pursuant to Anders , we cannot simply find that Appellant waived sufficiency-of-the-evidence claims due to Anders counsel's failure to comply with Pa.R.A.P. 1925(b). See , e.g., Commonwealth v . Hernandez , 783 A.2d 784, 787 (Pa. Super. 2001) (concluding that Anders required the Court to examine the merits of Hernandez's issues despite his counsel's failure to file a court ordered 1925(b) statement). Moreover, such a finding of waiver in an Anders case seems to run contrary to this Court's decision in Commonwealth v. Flowers , 113 A.3d 1246 (Pa. Super. 2014), which held that, when counsel complies with Anders , this Court must make an independent review of the record to make certain that appointed counsel did not overlook the existence of potentially non-frivolous issues.
In any event, for the reasons cited by the trial court in its opinion, Trial Court Opinion, 1/7/2015, at 12-13, I believe any challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence would be frivolous in this case. Thus, I ultimately concur in the result reached by the Majority.