Opinion ID: 2089125
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Life Means Life Jury Instruction

Text: Next, appellant argues that trial counsel was ineffective for failing to request a jury instruction that a life sentence means that the appellant must spend his natural life in prison without the possibility of parole. [15] Appellant contends that when the jury asked the trial court for the actual definition of a life sentence, it was clearly indicating its concern regarding appellant's future dangerousness, and that therefore an instruction that life means life without parole should have been requested under Simmons v. South Carolina, 512 U.S. 154, 114 S.Ct. 2187, 129 L.Ed.2d 133 (1994). [16] At the outset, Simmons was not decided until after the completion of appellant's trial. Prior to Simmons, the law of this Commonwealth expressly prohibited juries from being informed that life means life without parole. Commonwealth v. Christy, 540 Pa. 192, 217, 656 A.2d 877, 889, cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 116 S.Ct. 194, 133 L.Ed.2d 130 (1995). Trial counsel will not be deemed ineffective for failing to anticipate a change in the law. Id. Furthermore, Simmons states that a jury must be informed that life means life without the possibility of parole only when the prosecutor injects concerns of the defendant's future dangerousness into the case. Simmons, supra at ___, 114 S.Ct. at 2190. Because the prosecutor did not make appellant's future dangerousness an issue in any sense, the instruction would not have been required under Simmons. Therefore, this claim has no merit.