Opinion ID: 2555770
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 18

Heading: Amenability to and Availability of Mental Health Treatment as a Mitigating Factor

Text: In Issue 16, Appellant asserts that penalty phase counsel was ineffective for failing to proffer, as a mitigating circumstance, evidence that Appellant's mental disorders, including PTSD, were amenable to treatment, and that appropriate treatment for his mental disorders was available to inmates serving a life sentence. Appellant relies on the Department of Corrections mental health documents discussed supra in Issue 15 to support these assertions. [44] Furthermore, he contends that his amenability to and the availability of appropriate mental health treatment should have been considered as additional evidence supporting his favorable prognosis for adjustment to prison life. Appellant's Brief at 60-61. Our review of the record reveals no indication that this matter was presented to the PCRA court in a timely enough fashion to preserve it for appeal, and Appellant fails to provide a citation to the record to establish the contrary. See Pa. R.App.P. 2117(c)(4) (requiring specific reference to the places in the record where the matter appears ... as will show that the question was timely and properly raised below so as to preserve the question on appeal); see also Pa.R.App.P. 2119(e). The matter was first raised in Appellant's motion for reconsideration, which was filed on July 21, 2008, nearly a month after the PCRA court had issued its opinion and order denying all of Appellant's claims for relief. There is also no indication from the record that the PCRA court addressed the matter. We conclude that the matter has been waived. See Pa.R.App.P. 302(a) (Issues not raised in the lower court are waived and cannot be raised for the first time on appeal.)