J-S29005-20

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37

COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA

v.

ANTHONY J. FRANKLIN 

Appellant

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 IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF

 PENNSYLVANIA

 No. 2985 EDA 2019

Appeal from the Order Entered September 19, 2019

In the Court of Common Pleas of Delaware County

Criminal Division at No(s): CP-23-CR-0007203-2006

BEFORE: PANELLA, P.J., NICHOLS, J., and PELLEGRINI, J.*

MEMORANDUM BY PANELLA, P.J.: Filed: August 20, 2020

Anthony Franklin appeals, pro se, from the order entered in the Court 

of Common Pleas of Montgomery County denying his “Petition for Credit for 

Imprisonment while in Custody prior to Sentence.” We affirm. 

Franklin entered a negotiated guilty plea to robbery and conspiracy to 

commit robbery.1In exchange for his plea, the trial court sentenced Franklin 

to eight and a half to twenty years’ incarceration. He did not file a postsentence motion or direct appeal. 

Franklin filed a timely pro se petition pursuant to the Post Conviction 

Relief Act (“PCRA”), 42 Pa.C.S.A. §§ 9541-9546. The PCRA court appointed 

counsel, who filed a Turner/Finley no merit letter and was permitted to 

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* Retired Senior Judge assigned to the Superior Court.

1 See 18 Pa. C.S.A. §§ 3701(a)(1)(v) and 903(a)(1). 

 
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withdraw. The court issued a notice of its intent to dismiss the petition without 

a hearing pursuant to Pa.R.Crim. 907, and later dismissed it. Franklin did not 

appeal that ruling. 

In the years that followed, Franklin filed successive petitions for 

collateral relief, none of which merited relief.2 He filed the instant petition, 

alleging he was not awarded credit for time served. The trial court denied 

Franklin’s petition on the basis that his claim was previously litigated.3

Franklin filed this timely pro se appeal. 

Franklin raises four issues on appeal, all of which claim he was denied 

credit for time served. See Appellant’s Brief, at 10-13. In each issue, the 

assignment of error oscillates between his plea counsel, the Commonwealth, 

and the trial court. See id. 

At the outset, we note Franklin identified the filing underlying this appeal 

as a “Petition for Credit for Imprisonment while in Custody prior to Sentence” 

and the trial court construed the petition as such. Our Supreme Court has 

held, however, that the PCRA subsumes all forms of collateral relief. See 

Commonwealth v. Judge, 916 A.2d 511, 520 (Pa. 2007). A challenge to the 

trial court’s failure to award credit for time served is a collateral attack upon 

the legality of the sentence and is cognizable under the PCRA. See 

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2 Following the dismissal of his first PCRA petition, Franklin filed subsequent 

PCRA petitions as well as a Writ of Habeas Corpus.

3 Franklin filed a petition on the same matter, which the trial court dismissed. 

See Trial Court Opinion, 11/27/19, at 2.
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Commonwealth v. Fowler, 930 A.2d 586, 595 (Pa. Super. 2007). Therefore, 

we must address Franklin’s petition under the framework of the PCRA. See 42 

Pa.C.S.A. § 9542. 

We begin by addressing the timeliness of Franklin’s petition. Generally, 

the PCRA grants jurisdiction to hear a collateral attack on a conviction only if 

a petition is filed in the year after the judgment of sentence becomes final. 

See Commonwealth v. Jones, 54 A.3d 14, 16 (Pa. 2012). The judgment of 

sentence is finalized when the petitioner’s direct appeal rights have been 

exhausted. See id., at 17. After the expiration of the one-year period, a 

petitioner must plead and prove one of three enumerated exceptions to the 

time bar in order to establish jurisdiction under the PCRA. See id.

In this case, the trial court sentenced Franklin for his crimes on 

December 5, 2007. Franklin had thirty days from the date of the judgment of 

sentence to file a notice of appeal to this Court. See Pa.R.A.P. 903(a) (“Except 

as otherwise prescribed by this rule, the notice of appeal required by Rule 902 

(manner of taking appeal) shall be filed within 30 days after the entry of the 

order from which the appeal is taken.”). Franklin did not pursue a postsentence motion or direct appeal. As such, his judgment of sentence became 

final on January 4, 2008. See 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 9542(b)(3). 

Franklin filed a timely pro se PCRA petition on October 10, 2008, which 

the PCRA court ultimately dismissed. He filed the instant PCRA petition 

(“Petition for Credit for Imprisonment while in Custody prior to Sentence”) 

almost eleven years later on September 5, 2019. Therefore, Franklin’s petition 
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is facially untimely, and we lack jurisdiction to decide this appeal unless 

Franklin pled and proved one of the three enumerated exceptions to the oneyear time bar in the PCRA.

Franklin did not attempt to plead or prove any of the timeliness 

exceptions in his petition. Accordingly, we are without jurisdiction to address 

the merits of Franklin’s petition. 

Order affirmed. 

Judgment Entered.

Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq.

Prothonotary

Date: 8/20/20