J-S53032-20

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37

COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA

v.

MICHAEL JONES 

Appellant

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 IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF

 PENNSYLVANIA

 No. 803 EDA 2020

Appeal from the Judgment of Sentence Entered February 28, 2017

In the Court of Common Pleas of Philadelphia County Criminal Division at 

No(s): CP-51-CR-0003755-2016

BEFORE: SHOGAN, J., LAZARUS, J., and PELLEGRINI, J.*

MEMORANDUM BY PELLEGRINI, J.: FILED: APRIL 12, 2021

Michael Jones (Jones) appeals nunc pro tunc from the judgment of 

sentence imposed following his jury conviction in the Court of Common Pleas 

of Philadelphia County (trial court) of attempted murder, aggravated assault, 

robbery, conspiracy and carrying a firearm without a license.

1

 We affirm.

I.

A.

On February 6, 2016, at about 3:30 a.m., after getting off a SEPTA train 

on Broad Street in Philadelphia, Jones and co-defendants Syheed Wilson 

(Wilson) and Keirsten Carroll (Carroll) hailed a cab driven by the victim, Alex 

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* Retired Senior Judge assigned to the Superior Court.

1 18 Pa.C.S. §§ 901, 2502, 2702, 3701, 903 and 6106.
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Destin (Destin). Jones sat in the front passenger seat of the cab and his codefendants rode in the back. Jones directed Destin where to drive and then 

told him not to move as he put a gun to Destin’s head. (See N.T. Trial, 

10/26/16, at 62-63). When Destin continued to drive, Jones shot him. Destin 

jerked his head to the side and the bullet grazed his forehead. Jones shot 

Destin again and the bullet struck his right ear. Jones jumped out of the taxi

as it was still moving and fled. Wilson then pulled Destin’s right arm back and 

asked him to stop the cab. When Destin refused, Wilson shot him in the bicep. 

Destin lost control of the vehicle and hit a parked car. He ran from the vehicle 

and called for help.

Footage of Jones and his co-defendants just prior to the shooting was

captured on SEPTA video cameras and released to media outlets. Colin

Houston (Houston), the owner of the restaurant where Jones and Wilson 

worked at the time, contacted police and identified them. Jones and his codefendants were arrested on February 23, 2016. Following his arrest, Wilson 

gave a statement to police in which he identified Jones as the shooter.

B.

Prior to trial, defense counsel filed a motion seeking to redact all 

references to Jones contained in a statement that co-defendant Wilson had 

given to police. The Court ruled that specific references to Jones in the 

statement be replaced with the phrase “my friend.”
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At trial, Houston testified that he employed Jones and Wilson at Jack’s 

Firehouse Restaurant and that the two men were friends outside of work. He 

also testified that Wilson had referred Jones for the job. (See N.T. Trial, 

10/27/16, at 124-25).

The Commonwealth then called Detective Tim Quinn, who read Wilson’s 

statement to police into the record, over an objection by defense counsel

based on the Confrontation Clause violation.2 Wilson’s statement read in 

relevant part:

Myself and my friend had clocked out of work about 10:00 

to 11:00 p.m. on February 5th. We work at Jack’s Firehouse. ... 

We went to a party up in West Philly. I told my friends to call me 

when she was done. She work at the one on Fox Street. Myself 

and my friend had gotten on the subway about 2:00 a.m. to 2:30 

a.m. 

* * *

We [meet] my friend that was at Tasker-Morris station. She 

just happened to be on the same train, not the same car. My 

friend and I see her when we get off the subway. The three of us 

begin to walk together.

My friend flagged down a cab as soon as we got out the 

subway. We think my friend was going to pay for it. He gets in 

the front seat. I got in the backseat. I was behind the driver she 

was behind my friend.

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2 The Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution provides a criminal 

defendant with the right “to be confronted with the witnesses against him.” 

U.S. Const. Amend. VI. The Confrontation Clause protects a criminal 

defendant’s right to confront witnesses bearing testimony against him. See 

Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36, 51 (2004). The Pennsylvania 

Constitution provides the same protection as the United States Constitution 

under the Confrontation Clause. See Pa. Const. Article I, § 9.
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My friend- my friend in the front told the driver to go to 28th

and Tasker. I was talking to my friend in the back. We get to the 

corner of 27th and Morris Street. My friend out of nowhere [pulls 

a gun out].

My friend in the front seat takes his right hand and looking 

forward points the gun at the cabdriver and said “give that shit 

up.” The cabdriver, waving his hands as he was driving trying to 

get the gun. A shot went off towards the cabdriver’s arm. Only 

one shot went off.

Myself and my friend were in the backseat. My friend in the 

front seat just bails out of the cab. We tried to get out but we 

could not because of the locks. . . . 

(Id. at 186-88). Wilson did not testify.

Before the jury deliberated, the trial court issued the following limiting 

instruction:

There is a further rule that restricts use by you of the 

evidence offered to show that the defendants, Syheed Wilson and 

Keirsten Carroll, each made a statement concerning the crime 

charged. A statement made before trial may be considered as

evidence only against the defendant who made that statement. 

Thus, you may consider the statement as evidence against that 

defendant who made it if you believe that he or she made the 

statement voluntarily. You must not, however, consider the

statement as evidence against a defendant who did not 

make it.

(See N.T. Trial, 10/31/16, at 30) (emphasis added).

On October 31, 2016, the jury found Jones guilty of the above-listed 

offenses. On February 28, 2017, the trial court sentenced Jones to an 

aggregate term of not less than twenty nor more than forty years’ 

incarceration. After his direct appeal was dismissed for counsel’s failure to file 

a brief, Jones was successful in his PCRA petition seeking reinstatement of his 
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appellate rights nunc pro tunc on February 12, 2020. This timely appeal 

followed. Because the presiding trial court judge retired before Jones filed this 

appeal, the case was forwarded to this Court without a Rule 1925(a) opinion. 

See Pa.R.A.P. 1925(a).

II.

A.

On appeal, Jones challenges the trial court’s admission of Wilson’s 

redacted statement to police into evidence at trial. Jones argues that 

replacing his name with “my friend” violated his right to confront witnesses

under Bruton v. United States, 391 U.S. 123 (1968). Jones contends that 

because his former employer Houston testified that Wilson and Jones worked 

at his restaurant and were friends, it was plain to the jury that the “friend” in 

Wilson’s statement was Jones.3

In Bruton, the United States Supreme Court held the admission of a

non-testifying co-defendant’s statement at a joint trial that incriminated the

defendant violated the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment, even if 

the trial court issued a cautionary instruction to the jury. See Bruton, supra

at 126. The Court refined Bruton in Richardson v. Marsh, 481 U.S. 200 

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3 “Whether a defendant has been denied his right to confront a witness under 

the Confrontation Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the United States 

Constitution, made applicable to the States via the Fourteenth Amendment, is 

a question of law, for which our standard of review is de novo and our scope 

of review is plenary.” Commonwealth v. Rivera, 238 A.3d 482, 492 (Pa. 

Super. 2020) (citation omitted).
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(1987), holding that the admission of a co-defendant’s statement that 

redacted the defendant’s name did not violate the Confrontation Clause when 

accompanied by a proper limiting instruction. See Richardson, supra at 

211. The Court noted that the calculus changes when a co-defendant’s 

statement does not name the defendant, and emphasized there is an 

important distinction between statements that expressly incriminate the 

defendant and those that become incriminating only when linked to other 

evidence properly introduced at trial. See id. at 208, 211.

In Commonwealth v. Travers, 768 A.2d 845 (Pa. 2001), our Supreme 

Court applied these principles. There, the co-defendant’s statement to police

was redacted to replace any specific reference to the defendant by name with 

the neutral term, “the other man.” Id. at 846. The trial court also issued a 

cautionary instruction to the jury that it use the statement only against the

co-defendant. Id. The Supreme Court found no Confrontation Clause

violation, reasoning that the redacted statement could become incriminating 

only through independent evidence introduced at trial which established the 

defendant’s guilt, and only if the jury did not adhere to the court’s limiting 

instruction. It found that the redaction, combined with the trial court’s 

accurate cautionary charge, sufficed to protect the defendant’s Sixth 

Amendment right to confrontation. See id. at 851. It further determined that

since the statement was not so incriminating on its face, it was appropriate to
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apply the general rule presuming that jurors follow a court’s instructions. See

id.

B.

In this case, the trial court properly admitted Wilson’s redated statement 

because use of the phrase “my friend” did not violate Jones’ right to confront 

witnesses where the jury also received a cautionary instruction that it could 

not use the statement as evidence against him.4 Wilson’s redacted statement 

was facially neutral, and any connection drawn between the redacted name

and Jones was established through other independent evidence. Further, the 

trial court issued a limiting instruction to the jury expressly directing that it 

could consider the statement as evidence only against Wilson. Thus, the 

sound redaction, coupled with an appropriate instruction, sufficed to protect 

Jones’ right to confrontation.

Judgment of sentence affirmed.

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4 Jones’ reliance on Gray v. Maryland, 523 U.S. 185 (1998), is misplaced, as 

that case is distinguishable on its facts. At issue in Gray was admission of a 

statement by a non-testifying co-defendant which substituted blanks and the 

word “deleted” for Gray’s name. The United States Supreme Court held that 

this redaction, using an obvious blank space, a word such as “deleted”, or 

other prominent indication of alteration, is not sufficient to protect a 

defendant’s Confrontation Clause rights despite the trial court’s issuance of a 

limiting instruction. See Gray, supra at 194. The instant case involved no 

such deletion or obvious alteration and instead replaced Jones’ name with a 

neutral phrase, consistent with Travers.
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Judgment Entered.

Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq.

Prothonotary

Date: 4/12/21