Summary
In Jones, a capital case, Jones filed a fourth PCRA petition arguing that he was entitled to relief pursuant to Williams.
Summary of this case from Commonwealth v. RaganOpinion
No. 763 CAP
09-21-2020
COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Appellee v. Aaron JONES, Appellant
ORDER
PER CURIAM.
AND NOW, this 21st day of September, 2020, the appeal is QUASHED. See Commonwealth v. Reid, ___ Pa. ___, 235 A.3d 1124 (2020) (quashing serial appeal after concluding Williams v. Pennsylvania, ___ U.S. ___, 136 S.Ct. 1899, 195 L.Ed.2d 132 (2016), does not provide exception to timeliness requirements of Post-Conviction Relief Act (PCRA), 42 Pa.C.S. §§ 9541-9546, and thus PCRA court lacked jurisdiction to reinstate appellate rights nunc pro tunc).
Justice Donohue files a concurring statement.
Justice Wecht files a concurring statement.
Judge Dubow files a concurring statement.
JUSTICE DONOHUE, concurring.
I concur. The per curiam order's reliance on Commonwealth v. Reid, ___ Pa. ___, 235 A.3d 1124 (2020), resolves this case, because even if the holding in Williams v. Pennsylvania, ___ U.S. ___, 136 S.Ct. 1899, 195 L.Ed.2d 132 (2016), inured to Jones' benefit its retroactive application is foreclosed by Reid.
I authored a dissenting opinion in Reid, which explains my position that Williams must apply retroactively. Notwithstanding, I agree that the PCRA court's order reinstating Jones' appellate rights must be reversed even under the views set forth therein. Williams held that former Chief Justice Castille violated the Due Process Clause by participating in a collateral appeal after having a "significant, personal involvement as a prosecutor in a critical decision regarding the defendant's case." Id. at 1905. As set forth in my Reid dissent, I believe that Williams must apply retroactively to an extremely small number of individuals. The opinion identified that class as "those capital case defendants where Castille, as District Attorney, authorized pursuit of the death penalty and later participated in an appeal from imposition of a death sentence." See Commonwealth v. Reid, ___ Pa. ___, 235 A.3d 1124 at n.4 (2020).
Jones is not among that group. Unlike Reid, where the Commonwealth did not argue that the PCRA petition was untimely, its brief in this appeal argues that the underlying PCRA petition at issue did not meet the time-bar exception because Williams is inapposite. The Commonwealth argues that "former Chief Justice Castille did not have significant, personal involvement in this case during his time as the District Attorney of Philadelphia. In fact, his tenure as the District Attorney ended six months before defendant was even arrested in this case." Commonwealth's Brief at 10. See PCRA Court Order, 12/14/2017, at 6 ("By the time [Jones] was charged, convicted and sentenced in the instant case, Mr. Castille was no longer serving as the District Attorney ..."). The PCRA court found that Williams nonetheless applied "due to the history between [Jones] and then District Attorney Castille," which included prosecutions against Jones due to his role in the Junior Black Mafia drug organization. Id. at 5.
The Commonwealth is correct. Because Castille lacked involvement in the actual prosecution against Jones that resulted in the death sentence, Williams is not implicated. Therefore, the point of dispute in Reid does not arise here and I agree that Jones' petition was untimely and the December 14, 2017 order granting relief must be vacated.1 Furthermore, I note that the remaining exceptions to the time-bar would not apply under Reid, as the Court there rejected arguments that language within Williams amounted to factual findings that could overcome the time-bar. Additionally, the alleged newly discovered facts and/or governmental interference regarding Castille's participation are irrelevant in light of the fact that such participation does not fall within the ambit of Williams. See 42 Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(1)(i-ii).
JUSTICE WECHT, concurring.
In Commonwealth v. Reid, ___ Pa. ___, 235 A.3d 1124 (2020), a majority of a special panel of this Court determined that the Supreme Court of the United States' decision in Williams v. Pennsylvania, ___ U.S. ___, 136 S.Ct. 1899, 195 L.Ed.2d 132 (2016), could not serve as a basis to establish timeliness for purposes of the Post Conviction Relief Act. I joined the dissent in Reid, and I continue to believe that it correctly explained why Reid had properly established jurisdiction in the PCRA court. This disagreement notwithstanding, Reid is now on the books. Accordingly, I am constrained to join the Court's order to quash the instant appeal.
JUDGE DUBOW, concurring:
I join the per curiam order quashing this appeal pursuant to Commonwealth v. Reid, 752 CAP. I write separately only to note that because former Justice Castille was not involved in the actual prosecution against Jones that resulted in the death sentence, Williams v. Pennsylvania, ___ U.S. ___, 136 S.Ct. 1899, 195 L.Ed.2d 132 (2016), does not apply to this case.