J-S65030-18

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37

COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA IN THE SUPERIOR COURT

OF PENNSYLVANIA

Appellee

v.

MUHAMMUD BINABDULRAHI HILL

Appellant No. 916 MDA 2018

Appeal from the PCRA Order Entered May 2, 2018

In the Court of Common Pleas of Schuylkill County

Criminal Division at No: CP-54-CR-0000057-2014

BEFORE: SHOGAN, STABILE, and McLAUGHLIN, JJ.

MEMORANDUM BY STABILE, J.: FILED JANUARY 25, 2019

Appellant, Muhammud Binabdulrahi Hill, appeals pro se from the May 2, 

2018 order denying his petition pursuant to the Post Conviction Relief Act 

(“PCRA”), 42 Pa.C.S.A. §§ 9541-46. We affirm. 

On October 22, 2014, a jury found Appellant guilty of aggravated 

assault, simple assault, and harassment.1 On December 2, 2014, the 

sentencing court imposed eight and one-half to seventeen years of 

incarceration. This Court affirmed the judgment of sentence on March 11, 

2015, and our Supreme Court denied allowance of appeal on September 27, 

2016. Appellant filed a timely first pro se PCRA petition on September 29, 

2017. On April 11, appointed counsel filed a no merit letter and petition to 

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1

 18 Pa.C.S.A. §§ 2701, 2702, and 2709. 
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withdraw pursuant to Commonwealth v. Turner, 544 A.2d 927 (Pa. 1988) 

and Commonwealth v. Finley, 550 A.2d 213 (Pa. Super. 1988) (en banc). 

The PCRA court entered an order on May 2, 2018 dismissing the petition 

without a hearing and without ever entering notice of its intent to do so in 

accord with Pa.R.Crim.P. 907. The only issue Appellant raises in this timely 

pro se appeal is whether the PCRA court erred by failing to file a Rule 907 

notice. 

Because Appellant challenges the PCRA court’s legal conclusion, our 

standard of review is de novo. Commonwealth v. Reyes-Rodriguez, 111 

A.3d 775 (Pa. Super. 2015) (en banc), appeal denied, 123 A.3d 331 (Pa. 

2015). Rule 907 provides in pertinent part as follows: 

Except as provided in Rule 909 for death penalty cases,

(1) the judge shall promptly review the petition, any answer by 

the attorney for the Commonwealth, and other matters of record 

relating to the defendant’s claim(s). If the judge is satisfied from 

this review that there are no genuine issues concerning any 

material fact and that the defendant is not entitled to postconviction collateral relief, and no purpose would be served by any 

further proceedings, the judge shall give notice to the parties of 

the intention to dismiss the petition and shall state in the notice 

the reasons for the dismissal. The defendant may respond to the 

proposed dismissal within 20 days of the date of the notice. The 

judge thereafter shall order the petition dismissed, grant leave to 

file an amended petition, or direct that the proceedings continue.

Pa.R.Crim.P. 907(1). 

The only case Appellant cites in support of his argument is 

Commonwealth v. Hopfer, 965 A.2d 270 (Pa. Super. 2009). There, as here, 

the petitioner’s counsel filed a no merit letter and the trial court dismissed the 
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petition without filing a Rule 907 notice. There, as here, the petitioner argued 

that the PCRA court committed an error of law in dismissing his petition 

without complying with Rule 907. We agreed. In its analysis, the Hopfer

Court considered our decision in Commonwealth v. Bond, 630 A.2d 1281 

(Pa. Super. 1993), in which this Court held that the PCRA court’s dismissal 

without filing notice was acceptable where the dismissal occurred more than 

20 days after the petitioner received counsel’s no merit letter. The Bond

Court declined to remand for entry of notice (under then extant Rule 1507, 

the predecessor to Rule 907) because counsel and the court “scrupulously” 

followed Turner/Finley procedure. Id. at 1283. The Bond Court wrote: 

In order to withdraw successfully, however, counsel must 

inform the court in a ‘no-merit letter’ the extent of her review, the 

exact claims raised by the petitioner, and explain why they are 

meritless. The post-conviction court must conduct its own review 

of the record and agree that the petition is meritless. Once this 

procedure is completed, the petitioner has received all the 

protection incorporated into the right to counsel in collateral 

proceedings’ to which he is entitled, and ‘[n]o further inquiry, 

notification to the petitioner or a finding that the claims of the 

petitioner [are] ‘wholly frivolous’ is necessary.

Id. at 1283 (quoting Turner and Finley). In addition to the no merit letter 

and petition to withdraw, the petitioner’s counsel sent multiple letters 

explaining the lack of validity of the petitioner’s claims. Id. The petitioner 

never responded to the Turner/Finley filing. The Bond Court therefore 

concluded that the Rule 1507 (now Rule 907) notice was unnecessary. Id. 

The Hopfer Court distinguished Bond, noting that the PCRA court in 

Bond waited more than twenty days after counsel’s Turner/Finley filing to 
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dismiss the petition. In Hopfer, however, the PCRA court dismissed the 

petition immediately upon receiving counsel’s Turner/Finley filing. Hopfer, 

965 A.2d at 275. The petitioner therefore received the no-merit letter no 

more than two days before the PCRA court’s dismissal order. Id. The Hopfer

Court held that “any notice of dismissal, whether in the form of a Rule 907 

notice by the court or a Turner/Finley no-merit letter, must occur at least 

twenty days prior to an official dismissal order.” Id. Taken together, Bond 

and Hopfer teach that counsel’s Turner/Finley filing can take the place of a 

Rule 907 notice so long as (1) counsel and the court scrupulously comply with 

Turner/Finley procedure, and (2) the PCRA court waits at least twenty days 

after the date of the Turner/Finley filing to enter a dismissal order.2 

Instantly, the record reflects that counsel filed the Turner/Finley

petition to withdraw and no merit letter on April 11, 2018. The PCRA court 

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2

 As a three-judge panel of this Court, we are not free to disregard the 

opinions in Bond and Hopfer. We observe however, that Rule 907 provides 

that a PCRA court “shall give notice to the parties of the intention to dismiss 

the petition and shall state in the notice the reasons for the dismissal.” 

Pa.R.Crim. P. 907(1). Our Supreme Court has noted that “the word ‘shall’ as 

used in a statute is generally regarded as mandatory[.]” Commonwealth v. 

Baker, 690 A.2d 164, 167 (Pa. 1997). The Bond and Hopfer Courts, in 

essence, apply a judicially-created exception to the mandatory language of 

Rule 907 which permits the PCRA court to rely on a Turner/Finley filing in

lieu of Rule 907 notice. This in turn, forces a pro se appellant to litigate 

whether compliance with Turner/Finley was sufficiently scrupulous, and/or 

whether Bond is viable under statutory construction analysis. This seems to 

us a significant burden to place on a pro petitioner who received no notice 

from the PCRA court that his petition was about to be dismissed without a 

hearing. Absent further direction from an en banc panel of this Court or our 

Supreme Court, however, we are constrained to adhere to existing precedent. 
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entered its dismissal order twenty-one days later, on May 2, 2018. The PCRA 

court therefore complied with Hopfer. Appellant never responded to counsel’s 

Turner/Finley filing, and he does not assert any deficiency in compliance with 

Turner/Finley on the part of counsel or the court. We therefore affirm the 

order dismissing Appellant’s petition. 

Order affirmed. 

Judgment Entered.

Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq.

Prothonotary

Date: 01/25/2019