Court Opinion

ID: 9639003
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 16:01:21.209278+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:11.386182
License: Public Domain

TAMILIA, Judge,
concurring.
I vote to join Judge Hoffman in the above-captioned case. While I agree with Judge Johnson’s dissent that appellee has not appealed his sentence on the basis of denial of his motion to withdraw his guilty plea and we are considering the Commonwealth’s appeal of an improper sentence, it is in the interest of judicial economy and would be circuitous not to direct that appellee be permitted to withdraw his guilty plea. Otherwise, the matter must be remanded for resentencing, at which time a motion to withdraw the guilty plea, if presented, would most certainly be entertained, prior to resentencing. See Pa.R.Crim.P. 320.
This also appears to be one of the rare instances when granting a motion to withdraw guilty plea is justified. The trial court was emphatic in telling the district attorney and appellee that the sentence would be a mitigated sentence which was a condition under which the plea was accepted. See Plea hearing, 6/11/86, p. 13. It would be an injustice not to permit a withdrawal of that plea, when, in fact, an entirely different sentence would be imposed than that stated by the court, without objection from the district attorney at the time the plea was accepted. If this case was remanded for imposition of the mandatory sentence, the status of the case still would be at the stage where sentence had not yet been imposed, which would permit a motion to withdraw pursuant to Pa.R.Crim.P. 320. If sentence was imposed forthwith without permitting such a motion, then a motion challenging the guilty plea would be *399required pursuant to Pa.R.Crim.P. 321. Since these rules were promulgated to provide a record upon which appellate review could be founded, that requirement has been satisfied as the record is absolutely clear in establishing that the plea, upon remand, cannot now be considered to have been voluntary. Since, on appeal, appellee alleges the lack of voluntariness of the plea coupled with an allegation of ineffectiveness of prior counsel, raised at the first opportunity, in failing to present a motion to withdraw the plea in the post-trial proceedings, when it became known that the district attorney was pursuing the higher sentence, we may properly decide that issue.
There are no issues which need to be considered nor any further proceedings necessary by the trial court to bring about a just and proper result. The appellee desires his day in court which would be improperly denied him under any circumstances other than to permit him to withdraw his guilty plea.