Court Opinion

ID: 9753857
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 19:33:09.084743+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:27:43.617286
License: Public Domain

DISSENTING OPINION BY
STRASSBURGER, J.:
I respectfully disagree with the Majority’s conclusion that Commonwealth v. Bennett, 593 Pa. 382, 930 A.2d 1264 (2007) provides relief to Appellant. Accordingly, I would affirm the PCRA court’s order dismissing Appellant’s PCRA petition (PCRA III) as untimely.
I agree with the Majority that the PCRA petition is untimely unless Appellant can plead and prove one of the three specific, enumerated exceptions to the one year timeliness requirement in 42 Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(1). That subsection provides, inter alia, an exception to the one year limitations period where “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.” 42 Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(1)(h). Even if one of the exceptions is subsection 9545(b)(1) applies, the petition invoking the exception must be filed within 60 days of the date the claim could have been presented. 42 Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(2).
Appellant asks for relief pursuant to § 9545(b)(1)(h), asserting that our Supreme Court’s holding in Bennett, supra, entitles him to relief. Essentially, Appellant is arguing that Bennett, supra, is a newly-discovered fact and he has filed PCRA III within 60 days of learning of that fact.1 In Commonwealth v. Watts, 23 A.3d 980, 987 (Pa.2011), our Supreme Court held that “subsequent decisional law does not amount to a new ‘fact’ under section 9545(b)(ii) of the PCRA.” Accordingly, even though Appellant filed the instant PCRA petition within 60 days of the filing of Bennett, he is not entitled to relief.
*773I recognize that Appellant has never been able to litigate a PCRA petition on its merits. His first, timely PCRA petition (PCRA I) was never addressed by this Court on its merits because his court-appointed counsel failed to file an appellate brief. Although the PCRA II court attempted to rectify that situation by granting Appellant nunc pro tunc relief, this Court determined that the PCRA II petition filed by Appellant was itself untimely; 2 thus, Appellant was not able to litigate the merits of the petition. Appellant filed a petition for allowance of appeal from that decision, which was subsequently denied by our Supreme Court. Commonwealth v. Smith, 587 Pa. 722, 899 A.2d 1128 (2006). Right or wrong, PCRA II is the law of the case. As we have recently pointed out,
The law of the case doctrine sets forth various rules that embody the concept that a court involved in the later phases of a litigated matter should not reopen questions decided by another judge of that same court or by a higher court in the earlier phases of the matter.
Among the related but distinct rules which make up the law of the case doctrine are that: (1) upon remand for further proceedings, a trial court may not alter the resolution of a legal question previously decided by the appellate court in the matter; (2) upon a second appeal, an appellate court may not alter the resolution of a legal question previously decided by the same appellate court; and (3) upon transfer of a matter between trial judges of coordinate jurisdiction, the transferee trial court may not alter the resolution of a legal question previously decided by the transferor trial court.
Accordingly, under the pertinent authority, in a second appeal, this Court cannot change resolution of a legal question actually decided by a prior panel of this Court.
In re Estate of Elkins, 32 A.3d 768, 2011 PA Super 194 (Pa.Super.2011) (emphasis added).
Because Appellant is not entitled to relief, I would affirm the order of the PCRA court dismissing Appellant’s petition as untimely.

. Bennett, supra, was filed on August 23, 2007 and Appellant filed the instant PCRA petition asserting Bennett on September 30, 2007.

. It was filed within 60 days of the dismissal of the appeal in PCRA I; so it is not clear why it was deemed untimely. The memorandum states that "Appellant did not properly invoke any of the exceptions to the timing requirements." Commonwealth v. Smith, 1758 EDA 2002, Pa.Super. filed August 5, 2005, at 4.