Court Opinion

ID: 9635348
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 13:47:58.912137+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:09:24.987243
License: Public Domain

ROBERTS, Chief Justice,
dissenting.
Because appellants are presently represented by the same counsel who represented them at trial and at the death penalty hearing, there has been no meaningful inquiry into whether appellants have been afforded their constitutional right to the effective assistance of counsel. In the absence *511of such an inquiry, the reasons for counsel’s strategy, which do not appear of record, cannot be known, and it cannot be determined whether there existed evidence which should have been presented by counsel but was not.
Accordingly, the record should be remanded for the appointment of new counsel, who would be obliged to submit a petition to the court of common pleas addressing the effectiveness of trial counsel. As previously stated, “[ujntil a hearing on counsel’s effectiveness has been held, this Court cannot fairly state that it has discharged its statutory duty to provide a thorough review of the judgment^] of sentence of death.” Commonwealth v. Zettlemoyer, 500 Pa. 16, 77, 454 A.2d 937, 971 (1982) (Roberts, J., joined by O’Brien, C.J., dissenting).