Court Opinion

ID: 9749369
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-27 16:40:42.354444+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:25:47.494602
License: Public Domain

*491POPOVICH, Judge,
dissenting:
I respectfully dissent from the opinion of the majority. I would vacate the judgment of sentence since appellant was sentenced on May 31, 1990, over two years after he was originally cited under 75 Pa.C.S.A. § 1501(a), in violation of 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 5553(e).
42 Pa.C.S.A. § 5553(e) specifically provides: “No proceedings shall be held or action taken pursuant to a summary offense under Title 75 subsequent to two years after the commission of the offense.” The majority ignores the mandatory language of § 5553(e), instead opting for an interpretation of § 5553(e) similar to that normally employed in a P.R.Crim.P. 1100 analysis. I cannot find any statutory authority for such a result. Moreover, the majority has failed to cite any legislative history which would support its conclusion that our representatives did not intend an absolute limit of two years for prosecution of summary traffic violations.
Penal statutes, outside of the Crimes Code,1 are to be strictly construed. 1 Pa.C.S.A. § 1928(b)(1); Lurie, 569 A.2d at 332; Commonwealth v. Wooten, 519 Pa. 45, 53, 545 A.2d 876, 879 (1988). The language of the statute in question is unquestionably unambiguous. All proceedings must be complete in a summary offense under Title 75 before the expiration of two years. Such was not the case presently.
In sum, I would vacate the judgment of sentence since it was entered more than two years after appellant was cited under Title 75. If the legislature finds this result “absurd”, it is within its exclusive province, not ours, to correct the perceived problem.

. See Commonwealth v. Lurie, 524 Pa. 56, 63, 569 A.2d 329, 332 (1990); 18 Pa.C.S.A. § 105 ("... provisions of this title shall be construed according to the fair import of their terms____”).