J-S67001-14 

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION – SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P 65.37 

*Former Justice specially assigned to the Superior Court. 

COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA, : IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF 

: PENNSYLVANIA 

 Appellee :

:

 v. :

:

THOMAS P. PEEPLES, JR., :

:

 Appellant : No. 1274 WDA 2013 

Appeal from the Judgment of Sentence July 1, 2013, 

Court of Common Pleas, Venango County, 

Criminal Division at No. CP-61-CR-0000595-2012 

BEFORE: DONOHUE, MUNDY and FITZGERALD*, JJ. 

MEMORANDUM BY DONOHUE, J.: FILED NOVEMBER 20, 2014 

 Thomas P. Peeples, Jr. (“Peeples”) appeals from the judgment of 

sentence entered following his conviction of aggravated assault, simple 

assault, theft by unlawful taking, and receiving stolen property.1 Following 

our review, we affirm. 

 Peeples’s convictions arise out of events that occurred during the early 

morning hours of September 27, 2012. Peeples and Dean Bickel (“Bickel”) 

were involved in a physical fight outside of a bar in Oil City, Venango 

County. During the fight, Peeples slashed Bickel’s face with a knife, causing 

injury to his nose and one eye. When Bickel went to the nearby Country Fair 

convenience store in search of a phone, Peeples fled the scene on foot. 

Within minutes, he hitched a ride with a passing motorist, Tanya Wimer 

 

1

 18 Pa.C.S.A. §§ 2702(a)(4), 2701(a)(1), 3921(a), 3925(a). 
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(“Wimer”), and sat in the back seat of her car. During the trip, Peeples 

stated that he had been involved in a fight outside of a bar in Oil City. Also 

during the trip, Peeples stole Wimer’s wallet, which had been in the back 

seat of her car. Wimer dropped Peeples off at a grocery store in Franklin 

and returned to her home. Upon entering her home, Wimer received a call 

from the grocery store, informing her that a man had unsuccessfully tried to 

use her credit cards in the store and discarded them in the parking lot. 

 Peeples was arrested and charged with the offenses listed above. He 

filed a motion to sever the charges pursuant to Pa.R.Crim.P. 583 (”Rule 

583”), which the trial court denied. A three-day jury trial ensued, at the 

conclusion of which Peeples was convicted of all charges. He was sentenced 

to 39 to 78 months of incarceration. This timely appeal follows, in which 

Peeples challenges only the trial court’s denial of his motion to sever. 

Appellant’s Brief at 3. 

“A motion for severance is addressed to the sound discretion of the 

trial court, and ... its decision will not be disturbed absent a manifest abuse 

of discretion. The critical consideration is whether the appellant was 

prejudiced by the trial court's decision not to sever. The appellant bears the 

burden of establishing such prejudice.” Commonwealth v. Mollett, 5 A.3d 

291, 305 (Pa. Super. 2010). Prejudice in this context is defined as “that 

which would occur if the evidence tended to convict appellant only by 

showing his propensity to commit crimes, or because the jury was incapable 
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of separating the evidence or could not avoid cumulating the evidence.” 

Commonwealth v. Boyle, 733 A.2d 633, 637 (Pa. Super. 1999). 

Rule of Criminal Procedure 583 provides that “[t]he court may order 

separate trials of offenses or defendants, or provide other appropriate relief, 

if it appears that any party may be prejudiced by offenses or defendants 

being tried together.” Pa.R.Crim.P. 583. When considering a motion to 

sever, a trial court must engage in the following analysis: 

The court must determine whether the evidence of 

each of the offenses would be admissible in a 

separate trial for the other; whether such evidence is 

capable of separation by the jury so as to avoid 

danger of confusion; and, if the answers to these 

inquiries are in the affirmative, whether the 

defendant will be unduly prejudiced by the 

consolidation of offenses. 

Commonwealth v. Kunkle, 79 A.3d 1173, 1190 (Pa. Super. 2013) 

(quoting Commonwealth v. Lark, 543 A.2d 491, 497 (Pa. 1988)). 

In the present case, the trial court found the first prong of this test 

satisfied based upon its determination that the res gestae exception to the 

prohibition against admission of bad acts evidence applies. The trial court 

concluded that this exception applied because Peeples’s “actions from the 

time of the alleged assault occurred to the time he made the statements 

while riding with Wimer and stealing her wallet and credit cards amount to a 

continuous ongoing episode, notwithstanding the intermittent gaps in time.” 

Trial Court Opinion, 3/6/13, at 5. 
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Generally, evidence of bad acts is inadmissible to prove that a 

defendant acted in conformity with those acts or to demonstrate a 

propensity to commit crimes. Commonwealth v. Brown, 52 A.3d 320, 

325 (Pa. Super. 2012). “However, evidence of bad acts is admissible 

pursuant to our rules of evidence to prove motive, opportunity, intent, 

preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, and absence of mistake or accident.” 

Id. (citing Pa.R.E. 404(b)(2))2. In addition, “[o]ur Supreme Court has 

consistently recognized that admission of distinct crimes may be proper 

where it is part of the history or natural development of the case, i.e., the 

res gestae exception.” Id. at 326. 

 A common example of the use of the res gestae exception is where 

evidence of prior physical abuse is admitted to establish a pattern of events 

 

2

 This rule provides, in relevant part, as follows: 

(b) Crimes, Wrongs or Other Acts. 

(1) Prohibited Uses. Evidence of a crime, wrong, or 

other act is not admissible to prove a person's 

character in order to show that on a particular 

occasion the person acted in accordance with the 

character. 

(2) Permitted Uses. This evidence may be admissible 

for another purpose, such as proving motive, 

opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, 

identity, absence of mistake, or lack of accident. In a 

criminal case this evidence is admissible only if the 

probative value of the evidence outweighs its 

potential for unfair prejudice. 

Pa.R.E. 404(b)(1)-(2). 
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leading up to a victim’s murder. See Commonwealth v. Sherwood, 982 

A.2d 483, 497 (Pa. 2009) (holding that evidence that appellant had a history 

of beating victim relevant to help establish chain of events and pattern of 

abuse that eventually led to the fatal beating); Commonwealth v. 

Drumheller, 570 Pa. 117, 808 A.2d 893 (2002) (providing that evidence of 

multiple protection from abuse petitions filed by victim against appellant 

over three years leading to victim’s murder admissible to show history and 

natural development of case); Commonwealth v. Walker, 656 A.2d 90, 99 

(Pa. 1995) (“[E]vidence of appellant's repeated abuse of Lisa Johnson and 

threats were admitted for the purposes of proving not only appellant's 

malice, motive and intent to kill, but also to show the natural progression of 

the events leading up to the murder.”). 

This exception is also commonly used to permit the admission of 

evidence of bad acts that bear a causal relationship to the commission of the 

charged offense. For example, in Commonwealth v. Coles, 108 A. 826 

(Pa. 1919), the appellant and three compatriots entered a bar and began 

acting recklessly with the firearms they were carrying; of note, the appellant 

pointed a loaded firearm at the bartender and attempted to pull the trigger, 

but the firearm would not fire. One of the appellant’s friends then began to 

fire his gun, shooting at least one person. Appellant and his friends fled, 

and approximately 15 minutes later, killed a man who interfered with their 

escape. At trial, evidence of the incidents in the bar was admitted over the 
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appellant’s objection. Our Supreme Court found that the res gestae

exception applied to allow evidence of the reckless conduct in the bar, 

reasoning as follows: 

Evidence is necessarily admissible as to acts 

which are so clearly and inextricably mixed up with

the history of the guilty act itself as to form part of 

one chain of relevant circumstances, and so could 

not be excluded on the presentation of the case 

before the jury without the evidence being rendered

thereby unintelligible. 

*** 

The testimony in the present case touching the 

earlier occurrence in the saloon, although it disclose 

an offense there committed by the appellant and his

associates other than the offense with which they 

were charged in the indictment, was not offered to 

prove the commission of the earlier offense, but was 

offered as part of the res gestae of the crime of 

which he was charged and convicted, the felonious 

killing of George Williams within 15 minutes at most 

after the occurrence at the saloon and at a place 

they reached in their flight to escape arrest about a 

city square distant. The killing of Williams followed 

almost immediately upon the arrival of the defendant 

and his three associates at the place where they 

came together. The sudden arrival of four men at 

that point with no ostensible object or purpose, the 

arrest of the flight by the intervention of the officer 

of the law, who was immediately killed thereafter by 

one of them while he was attempting to disarm 

another—these facts and others equally pertinent 

having a direct bearing on the question of 

defendant's guilt would have been left wholly 

unexplained on the trial except as the testimony in

regard to the occurrence at the saloon had been 

admitted. The two offenses were shown to have 

been so related in point of time and distance 
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separating them as to make the earlier occurrence 

part of the res gestae attending the murder. 

Id. at 826-28. 

It is clear in these cases that evidence of the prior bad acts helped to 

establish the “chain or sequence of events which formed the history of the 

case” and that they were part of the natural development of the crime. 

Commonwealth v. Walker, 656 A.2d 90, 99 (Pa. 1995). However, in the 

present case, the crimes at issue do not provide a history or sequence of 

events that help to understand the natural development of each other. The 

theft of Wimer’s wallet does not, in any way, complete the story of Peeples’s 

assault on Bickel. Conversely, evidence regarding the assault is not relevant 

to the history or natural development of the case regarding the theft of 

Wimer’s wallet. That is to say, nothing that occurred prior to Peeples 

accepting a ride from Wimer bears any relevance as to the commission of 

the theft of Wimer’s wallet; Peeples could have been looking for a ride back 

to Franklin for any number of reasons, none of which would be at all relevant 

to the “natural development of the case” regarding the theft of the wallet. 

The res gestae exception does not apply in this case, as the trial court erred 

in concluding otherwise. 

 Nonetheless, we conclude that Peeples is not entitled to relief. As 

stated above, “the critical consideration” for our review “is whether [Peeples] 

was prejudiced by the trial court's decision not to sever.” Commonwealth 
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v. Mollett, 5 A.3d at 305. Peeples has not alleged, much less proved, that 

“the evidence tended to convict appellant only by showing his propensity to 

commit crimes, or because the jury was incapable of separating the 

evidence or could not avoid cumulating the evidence.” Boyle, 733 A.2d at 

637. Further, we can discern no such prejudice. The record reveals 

abundant evidence of Peeples’s guilt as to both crimes that would support 

his convictions if the charges had been severed. For instance, Bickel 

testified that after he and Peeples were left behind at the bar by their other 

friends, Peeples instigated the fight between them. N.T., 5/13/13, at 54. 

Bickel further testified that he grappled Peeples to the ground, tried to calm 

him down, and released Peeples after Peeples agreed not to continue to 

fight. Id. at 54-57. Bickel testified that immediately upon releasing 

Peeples, Peeples “sprang up immediately” and hit him in the face with the 

pocket knife that Peeples was known to carry. Id. at 57. Bickel testified 

that Peeples slashed him “from the corner of [one] eye all the way down to 

the tip of [his] nose.” Id. at 58. The knife nicked Bickel’s eyeball and 

damaged his nose to the point that it required a plastic surgeon to 

reassemble. Id. at 58, 62-63. Linda Beach (“Beach”) was another member 

of the group with Bickel and Peeples that went to the bar together on the 

night in question. Id. at 13. She testified that their friend Eric Smith

(“Smith”) drove everyone to the bar in his van. Id. at 14, 19. Beach 

further testified that Peeples left the bar before the rest of the group, and 
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when the remaining members exited the bar, Peeples had absconded with 

Smith’s van. Id. at 20. When Peeples returned, he and Smith argued over 

the fact that Peeples had taken the van. Smith ultimately drove away, 

leaving both Peeples and Bickel in the bar’s parking lot. Id. at 20-24. As 

Smith drove to Franklin, another member of the group received a phone call. 

Id. at 24. Beach recognized Bickel’s voice as the caller and heard him say, 

“Why’d you do that, [Peeples]?” before the phone went dead. Id. at 24-25. 

Bickel called Smith’s phone shortly thereafter, and he told Smith that 

Peeples had just stabbed him and asked Smith to pick him up. Id. at 25. 

With regard to the theft of Wimer’s wallet, Peeples admits stealing it, 

attempting to use her debit and credit cards at the grocery store, and then 

discarding them in the parking lot. N.T., 5/14/13, at 137.3 These events 

are so distinct that there is little chance that the jury cumulated the 

evidence or could not separate it. Further, the evidence of bad acts was 

limited only to the crimes for which Peeples was on trial; as such, there is 

little risk that Peeples was convicted solely based upon a perceived 

propensity to commit crimes. Because Peeples has failed to establish that 

he was prejudiced by the trial court’s failure to sever the charges, his claim 

does not succeed. Commonwealth v. Uderra, 706 A.2d 334, 339 (Pa. 

1998) (holding that the failure to demonstrate prejudice by the denial of 

 

3

 Indeed, in his brief on appeal, Peeples states that he always admitted his 

guilt as to the theft and never intended to defend against the theft related 

charges. Appellant’s Brief at 10. 
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motion to sever coupled with overwhelming evidence of guilt precludes 

finding of abuse of discretion by the trial court). 

 Judgment of sentence affirmed. 

 Mundy and Fitzgerald, JJ. concur in the result. 

Judgment Entered. 

Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq. 

Prothonotary 

Date: 11/20/2014