Court Opinion

ID: 9645636
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 21:30:35.146248+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:05:28.647096
License: Public Domain

*116JOHNSON, Judge,
concurring and dissenting:
I join in the majority’s opinion to the extent that it affirms Appellant’s conviction for attempted rape, reverses the conviction for recklessly endangering another person and finds Appellant’s ineffective assistance argument to be without merit. However, I respectfully dissent on two issues, namely, (1) the majority’s affirmance of the unlawful restraint conviction, and (2) the issue of merger of simple assault and indecent assault into the attempted rape conviction.
I.
The majority opinion affirms Appellant’s unlawful restraint conviction and quotes language from Commonwealth v. Belgrave, 258 Pa.Super.Ct. 40, 45, 391 A.2d 662, 664 (1978) for support. However, the statute for unlawful restraint, 18 Pa.C.S.A. § 2902(1) requires the victim to have been exposed to “risk of serious bodily injury . . . ”.
The majority opinion determines that Appellant’s actions did not place the victim in “sufficient physical danger” to support a conviction for recklessly endangering another person. If Appellant’s conduct did not place the victim in danger of death or serious bodily injury, as required by the statute concerning recklessly endangering another person, then I fail to see how his restraint of the victim exposed her to the risk of serious bodily injury as required by the unlawful restraint statute. I also fail to find a semantical difference, under the instant factual situation, between the language in the statute concerning recklessly endangering another person, 18 Pa.C.S.A. § 2705 which states “. . . which places or may place another person in danger of . . . serious bodily injury.” and the language in the unlawful restraint statute, 18 Pa.C.S.A. § 2902 which states “. . . in circumstances exposing him to risk of serious bodily injury. . .”.
Therefore, if, as the majority determines, Appellant’s conduct did not place the victim “in sufficient physical danger to support a conviction for recklessly endangering another person”, then that same conduct must be insufficient to *117support the unlawful restraint conviction. Hence, the conviction for unlawful restraint should be reversed.
II.
The majority opinion does not address the question of the merger of the simple assault and indecent assault convictions into attempted rape. Although not raised by Appellant in his brief, the trial judge, in his lower court opinion, reviews Appellant’s post-trial motions which requested an arrest of judgment based upon the contention that the two assault charges merge into attempted rape. The trial judge, in his opinion, concludes that there is merger and that the assault sentences should be vacated.1 Because the question of legality of sentence is never waived, Commonwealth v. Walker, 468 Pa. 323, 362 A.2d 227 (1976); Commonwealth v. Lawton, 272 Pa.Super.Ct. 40, 414 A.2d 658 (1979), I believe the issue should be addressed.
Concerning the issue of merger:
“The true test of whether one criminal offense has merged into another. . . is whether one crime necessarily involves another, as for example, rape involves fornication, and robbery involves both assault and larceny. The ‘same transaction’ test is valid only when the ‘transaction’ means a single act. When the ‘transaction’ consists of two or more criminal acts, the fact that the two acts are ‘successive’ does not require the conclusion that they have merged. Two crimes may be successive steps in one crime and therefore merge, ... or they may be two distinct crimes which do not merge.’ Commonwealth ex rel. Moszczynski v. Ashe, 343 Pa. 102, 104-05, 21 A.2d 920, 921 (1941) (emphasis in original).”
Commonwealth v. Wojciechowski, 285 Pa.Super.Ct. 1, 8, 426 A.2d 674, 677 (1981).
*118It has been held that the crime of rape necessarily includes the crime of indecent assault. Commonwealth v. Richardson, 232 Pa.Super.Ct. 123, 334 A.2d 700 (1975).
Because the convictions for indecent assault and attempted rape were both based on the same sequence of events and facts, we should vacate the sentence on the lesser offense, indecent assault, as the two crimes merge.
The conviction for simple assault also merges into the conviction for attempted rape. See Commonwealth v. Irvin, 260 Pa.Super.Ct. 122, 393 A.2d 1042 (1978). The reasoning is that both the simple assault and attempted rape convictions were again based on the same sequence of events and facts. Therefore, we should vacate the sentence on the simple assault conviction.

. We take note of the fact that the trial judge had no jurisdiction to rule further in this case once the appeal had been filed. Pa.R.A.P. 1701(a), 42 Pa.C.S.A.; See Commonwealth v. Leatherbury, 269 Pa.Super.Ct. 194 n.4, 409 A.2d 431 n.4 (1979).