Court Opinion

ID: 9754054
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 19:41:06.580355+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:27:47.762476
License: Public Domain

*552Dissenting Opinion by
Mb. Chief Justice Bell:
On March 11, 1946, more than twenty-three years ago, this defendant, the appellant herein, while represented by two able attorneys, pleaded guilty to murder and was sentenced to life imprisonment. Since that time, appellant has flooded the Courts of this Commonwealth and those of the United States with petitions seeking to void his original conviction. The correctness of the original conviction can best be demonstrated by the number of times—eleven—appellant’s conviction has been sustained and his subsequent contentions have been held to be without merit.
In 1949, a petition for a writ of habeas corpus was brought directly to this Court and was denied. In 1949, appellant, with the assistance of counsel, filed a petition for habeas corpus in the District Court for the Western District of this State. After a hearing, the writ was denied and a petition for a certificate of probable cause to appeal was denied.
In 1953, a petition for a writ of habeas corpus which was filed in the Court of Common Pleas of Lawrence County was dismissed by that Court.
In 1955, a petition for a writ of habeas corpus was filed in the Court of Common Pleas of Lawrence County. Appellant was represented by competent counsel of his own choice at the Court hearing, after which his petition was dismissed (with an accompanying Opinion) and this dismissal was affirmed by this Court, Commonwealth ex rel. Herge v. Martin, 387 Pa. 117, 126 A. 2d 711.
In 1957, appellant filed another petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the Court of Common Pleas of Lawrence County, which was again denied.
In 1957, appellant filed another petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. After a hearing, the petition was denied. Appellant’s request for a certificate of *553probable cause to appeal was denied; Ms request for reconsideration was granted, and his request for a certificate of probable cause again refused. Appellant then attempted to appeal to the United States Supreme Court, but this appeal was denied.
In 1958, appellant once again petitioned the Court of Common Pleas of Lawrence County for a writ of habeas corpus and his request was again denied.
In 1963, appellant again petitioned the Court of Common Pleas of Lawrence County for a writ of habeas corpus. That petition was denied (with an accompanying Court Opinion) and the denial was affirmed by this Court, Commonwealth ex rel. Herge v. Rundle, 415 Pa. 36, 202 A. 2d 24.
In 1964, appellant twice petitioned the Court of Common Pleas of Lawrence County for a writ of habeas corpus and each of these requests was denied.
In 1968, appellant initiated a proceeding under the Post Conviction Hearing Act. Eleven of his thirteen claims were dismissed, and a hearing ordered by the lower Court on the two remaining claims. After the Court hearing, relief was denied on these two claims.
Defendant’s original trial attorneys are now deceased. Appellant, having pleaded guilty while represented by these lawyers, now asserts that his confessions were not voluntary, that he never knew of his right to appeal or to have Court-appointed counsel on appeal.
At defendant’s (appellant’s) original trial, the Commonwealth witnesses testified that defendant’s confessions were voluntary and the lower Court so found.
Nevertheless, a majority of this Court is remanding this case, nearly a quarter of a century after trial and conviction, for further consideration of the voluntariness of defendant’s guilty plea, and is directing • the Court below to appoint counsel for the purpose of filing and arguing post-trial motions, and, if necessary, *554prosecute an appeal. I pause long enough to ask: (1) Where will the Commonwealth find, after twenty-three years, its witnesses, and, if found, what will be their clear and dependable recollections; and (2) is there no such thing in the law as "finality” in decisions of the Courts in criminal cases; and (3) is Justice a one-way street, one-way for the criminal only; and (4) have the public no realistic rights to protection and safety against dangerous criminals; and (5) have other criminals and all civil litigants no rights to a more speedy trial of their long-delayed claims and cases? Is it any wonder that our Courts are swamped with a multitude of cases and a backlog which is stupendous!
The majority’s farfetched, pro-criminal Opinion is to me almost unbelievable.. The net result will be to open wide the doors of every prison and let many convicted murderers, and many armed robbers, and many perverted dangerous rapists and other dangerous criminals go free,—if they are willing to invent (as they undoubtedly will be) a legally helpful lie—no matter how many years ago they were convicted or how often they confessed their respective guilt, or how often the Courts have affirmed their convictions, or how disastrous and dangerous their release will be to the safety and the protection of the Public.
In these days when violent crime is rampant and terror stalks our Land, I once again urge the highest Courts of our State and Nation (1) to give greater protection to the law-abiding Public and (2) to close the legal loopholes they have recently and unrealistically invented which enable dangerous criminals to escape their swift and just punishment, and (3) to limit every convicted criminal to one appeal or to one post-conviction hearing.
For these reasons, I very vigorously dissent.