Court Opinion

ID: 9556786
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-18 17:08:47.548374+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:00:55.210854
License: Public Domain

J-S18014-23

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT O.P. 65.37

  COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA                 :   IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF
                                               :        PENNSYLVANIA
                                               :
                v.                             :
                                               :
                                               :
  JONATHAN GRANT                               :
                                               :
                       Appellant               :   No. 117 EDA 2023

            Appeal from the PCRA Order Entered December 9, 2022
                In the Court of Common Pleas of Bucks County
             Criminal Division at No(s): CP-09-CR-0003705-1991

BEFORE:      PANELLA, P.J., DUBOW, J., and STEVENS, P.J.E.*

MEMORANDUM BY PANELLA, P.J.:                          FILED AUGUST 18, 2023

       Jonathan Grant appeals from the order entered in the Bucks County

Court of Common Pleas on December 9, 2022, dismissing his petition filed

pursuant to the Post Conviction Relief Act (“PCRA”), 42 Pa.C.S.A. §§ 9541-

9546 as untimely. After careful review, we affirm.

       In 1992, a jury convicted Grant of first-degree murder, recklessly

endangering another person, possession of an instrument of crime, and flight

to avoid apprehension arising from charges that Grant fatally shot Nora

Adderly, a 41-year-old woman who shared an apartment with Grant. After the

jury deadlocked on the issue of the death penalty, the trial court sentenced

Grant to life imprisonment without parole. We affirmed the judgment of

____________________________________________

* Former Justice specially assigned to the Superior Court.
J-S18014-23

sentence on direct appeal. On September 12, 1994, the Pennsylvania

Supreme Court denied Grant’s petition for allowance of appeal. Grant did not

appeal to the United States Supreme Court.

       In the more than two decades that have passed, Grant has filed eleven

unsuccessful PCRA petitions.

       On March 4, 2022, Grant filed the instant PCRA petition, his twelfth.

PCRA counsel was appointed but did not file an amended petition. Instead,

counsel filed a Turner/Finley1 no-merit letter, along with a petition to

withdraw as counsel. After a hearing, the court notified Grant that it was

granting counsel’s motion to withdraw, and that it intended to dismiss the

petition pursuant to Pa.R.Crim.P. 907. After considering Grant’s response, the

PCRA court dismissed the PCRA petition. This timely appeal followed.

       Prior to reaching the merits of Grant’s claims on appeal, we must

consider the timeliness of his PCRA petition. See Commonwealth v. Miller,

102 A.3d 988, 992 (Pa. Super. 2014).

       A PCRA petition, including a second or subsequent one, must be
       filed within one year of the date the petitioner’s judgment of
       sentence becomes final, unless he pleads and proves one of the
       three exceptions outlined in 42 Pa.C.S.[A.] § 9545(b)(1). A
       judgment becomes final at the conclusion of direct review by this
       Court or the United States Supreme Court, or at the expiration of
       the time for seeking such review. The PCRA’s timeliness
       requirements are jurisdictional; therefore, a court may not
       address the merits of the issues raised if the petition was not
       timely filed. The timeliness requirements apply to all PCRA
____________________________________________

1 See Commonwealth v. Turner, 544 A.2d 927 (Pa. 1988), and
Commonwealth v. Finley, 550 A.2d 213 (Pa. Super. 1988) (en banc).

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      petitions, regardless of the nature of the individual claims raised
      therein. The PCRA squarely places upon the petitioner the burden
      of proving an untimely petition fits within one of the three
      exceptions.

Commonwealth v. Jones, 54 A.3d 14, 16-17 (Pa. 2012) (internal citations

and footnote omitted).

      Grant’s judgment of sentence became final in December 1994, ninety

days after his petition for allowance of appeal was denied by the Pennsylvania

Supreme Court, when time for filing a petition for writ of certiorari to the

United States Supreme Court expired. The instant petition – filed more than

two decades later – is patently untimely. Therefore, the PCRA court lacked

jurisdiction to review Grant’s petition unless he was able to successfully plead

and prove one of the statutory exceptions to the PCRA’s time-bar. See 42

Pa.C.S.A. § 9545(b)(1)(i)-(iii).

      The PCRA provides three exceptions to its time bar:

      (i) the failure to raise the claim previously was the result of
      interference by government officials with the presentation of the
      claim in violation of the Constitution or laws of this Commonwealth
      or the Constitution or laws of the United States;

      (ii) the facts upon which the claim is predicated were unknown to
      the petitioner and could not have been ascertained by the exercise
      of due diligence; or

      (iii) the right asserted is a constitutional right that was recognized
      by the Supreme Court of the United States or the Supreme Court
      of Pennsylvania after the time period provided in this section and
      has been held by that court to apply retroactively.

42 Pa.C.S.A. § 9545(b)(1)(i)-(iii). Exceptions to the time-bar must be pled in

the petition and may not be raised for the first time on appeal. See

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Commonwealth v. Burton, 936 A.2d 521, 525 (Pa. Super. 2007); see also

Pa.R.A.P. 302(a) (providing that issues not raised before the lower court are

waived and cannot be raised for the first time on appeal).

      Grant attempts to invoke Section 9545(b)(1)(ii), i.e., the newly

discovered fact exception. Section 9545(b)(1)(ii) “requires [a] petitioner to

allege and prove that there were ‘facts’ that were ‘unknown’ to him” and that

he could not have ascertained those facts earlier by the exercise of “due

diligence.” Commonwealth v. Bennett, 930 A.2d 1264, 1270-72 (Pa. 2007).

“The focus of the exception is on the newly discovered facts, not on a newly

discovered    or   newly    willing   source   for   previously   known   facts.”

Commonwealth v. Marshall, 947 A.2d 714, 720 (Pa. 2008) (citation and

brackets omitted). “Due diligence demands that the petitioner take reasonable

steps to protect his own interests. A petitioner must explain why he could not

have learned the new fact(s) earlier with the exercise of due diligence.”

Commonwealth v. Williams, 35 A.3d 44, 53 (Pa. Super. 2011) (citations

omitted).

      To invoke the newly discovered fact exception, Grant relies on a

Philadelphia Inquirer article from 1992. Grant highlights that the article

reports that John Neris, who is wheelchair bound, testified that Grant

previously shot him. Grant argues that the article proves Neris testified during

the guilt phase of the trial.

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      The actual “fact” for purposes of Section 9545(b)(1)(ii) would not be the

article itself, but rather the “fact” that the district attorney allowed Neris to

testify during the guilt phase of trial to an unrelated prior crime. However, this

is not a “newly discovered fact.” Grant was present during trial proceedings

and sat through all of the testimony offered by the Commonwealth. That Grant

found a newspaper article reiterating who testified, and when, does not satisfy

the newly discovered fact exception to the PCRA’s time-bar. It is not the

source of the facts - i.e., a newspaper article - but rather the information

contained in the source which may satisfy the newly discovered facts

exception.

      Further, Grant misreads the article. Grant purports the article indicates

Neris testified after Raymond Morris, and accordingly Neris must have testified

on January 9, 1992, since Morris testified on January 8, 1992. However, the

article actually states that Neris testified “after Raymond Morris … repeated

his earlier testimony that Grant acknowledged killing Adderly because she

knew of Neris’ shooting.” The article, which was published on Wednesday,

January 15, 1992, clearly states that Grant was convicted “on Monday”, which

would have been January 13, 1992. The article then states that Neris’s

testimony came “[b]efore the jury began its deliberations yesterday”, which

would have been Tuesday, January 14, 1992. As Grant was convicted on

Monday, January 13, 1992, the article indicates that Neris’s testimony came

during the penalty phase of trial proceedings.

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      Finally, Grant has failed to demonstrate he exercised due diligence in

finding the article. The article was published in 1992. The only explanation

Grant offers for the delay in locating the article is that he only recently decided

to ask his nephew to look into articles regarding his trial. Grant offers no

explanation for why he did look into these articles in the more than two

decades that passed since his trial.

      Accordingly, Grant has failed to plead and prove the newly-discovered

facts exception to the PCRA jurisdictional time-bar. Consequently, the PCRA

court lacked jurisdiction to review Grant’s PCRA petition, and we may not

review the substance of the petition on appeal.

      Order affirmed. Jurisdiction relinquished.

Judgment Entered.

Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq.
Prothonotary

Date: 8/18/2023

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