Court Opinion

ID: 9371180
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-02-15 17:09:10.796484+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:16:25.950422
License: Public Domain

J-S22028-22

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37

    COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA               :   IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF
                                               :        PENNSYLVANIA
                                               :
                v.                             :
                                               :
                                               :
    GABRIEL CRUZ                               :
                                               :
                       Appellant               :   No. 2084 EDA 2020

            Appeal from the PCRA Order Entered September 24, 2020
    In the Court of Common Pleas of Philadelphia County Criminal Division at
                        No(s): CP-51-CR-0011957-2010

BEFORE: BOWES, J., McCAFFERY, J., and SULLIVAN, J.

CONCURRING MEMORANDUM BY BOWES, J.:                 FILED FEBRUARY 15, 2023

       I agree with my esteemed colleagues that, pursuant to our decision in

Commonwealth v. Barnes, 167 A.3d 110 (Pa.Super. 2017) (en banc), the

fact that the jury was not specifically asked to determine whether the

attempted murder of Felix Santos resulted in serious bodily injury renders

Appellant’s sentence illegal as violative of the Sixth Amendment.         See

Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466 (2000).1 However, to the extent

that Barnes held that this Apprendi error necessarily results in an illegal

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1 I also agree with my colleagues that, under the prevailing law, we need not
remand for the PCRA court to consider the claim of ineffective assistance of
counsel Appellant presents in this appeal because the issue implicates the
legality of Appellant’s sentence and is therefore properly adjudicated by this
Court in the first instance. See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Warunek, 279
A.3d 52, 54 (Pa.Super. 2022) (“An illegal sentence must be vacated. A
challenge to the legality of the sentence can never be waived and may be
raised by this Court sua sponte.” (cleaned up)).
J-S22028-22

sentence, rather than being amenable to review pursuant to the harmless

error framework, it is at odds with federal court decisions that were

acknowledged favorably in our Supreme Court’s post-Barnes ruling in

Commonwealth v. King, 234 A.3d 549 (Pa. 2020). I am persuaded that the

harmless error review should apply in this case, and, if it did, would validate

Appellant’s sentence. Therefore, I write separately to advocate for Barnes’s

abrogation.

      I begin with a brief review of the underlying legal principles. Pursuant

to Apprendi, any fact that increases the maximum penalty for a crime is an

element of the crime which must be submitted to the jury to be proved beyond

a reasonable doubt. See Apprendi, supra at 490. The Apprendi holding

implicated, and sought to vindicate, two constitutional rights: “notice as

required by due process and the right to a jury trial.” King, supra at 560.

      It quickly was established that both (1) the failure to provide formal

notice of the intent to seek an enhanced penalty by including the enhancing

fact in the indictment, and (2) the failure to submit the enhancing element of

the crime to a jury, were not structural errors, but rather constitutional errors

that could be overlooked as harmless. See, e.g., United States v. Cotton,

535 U.S. 625 (2002) (due process right to notice); United States v. McCray,

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563 Fed.Appx. 705, 711 (11th Cir. 2014) (right to have elements determined

by a jury beyond a reasonable doubt).2

       The U.S. Supreme Court’s extension of Apprendi in Alleyne v. United

States, 570 U.S. 99 (2013), to facts that increased the minimum punishment

for a crime resulted in a flurry of rulings that mandatory minimum sentences

based upon facts not found by a jury beyond a reasonable doubt, but upon

the trial court’s finding the enhancing facts by a preponderance of the

evidence at sentencing, were illegal.            See, e.g., Commonwealth v.

Newman, 99 A.3d 86 (Pa.Super. 2014) (en banc) (vacating as illegal

sentence imposed pursuant to 42 Pa.C.S. § 9712.1, which provided a

mandatory minimum sentence for drug offenses committed with firearms,

expressly indicating that the fact of possession of a firearm was not an element

of the crime, required no notice, and was to be determined by the trial court

by a preponderance of the evidence at sentencing).

       In Commonwealth v. Wolfe, 140 A.3d 651 (Pa. 2016), our Supreme

Court rejected the possibility that the errors underlying these Alleyne-

violative sentences could be harmless because each statute that provided

authority for the imposition of judicially-determined mandatory minimum

sentences was itself “irremediably unconstitutional on its face, non-severable,

and void.” Id. at 663. As such, “a finding of harmless error would sanction

____________________________________________

2 See also Commonwealth v. Wolfe, 140 A.3d 651, 671 (Pa. 2016) (Todd,
J. dissenting) (collecting cases).

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a residual longevity in small segments of an unseverable statute requiring

unconstitutional actions on the part of judicial officers.” Id. at 662 n.6.

      Mindful of this legal landscape, I turn to the sentencing statute at issue

in this appeal. The statutory provision at issue in the case sub judice, which

was also the one at issue in Barnes, provides as follows in relevant part:

      [A] person who has been convicted of attempt, solicitation or
      conspiracy to commit murder . . . where serious bodily injury
      results may be sentenced to a term of imprisonment which shall
      be fixed by the court at not more than 40 years. Where serious
      bodily injury does not result, the person may be sentenced to a
      term of imprisonment which shall be fixed by the court at not more
      than 20 years.

18 Pa.C.S. § 1102(c).

      Plainly, § 1102(c) suffers from no facial Apprendi- or Alleyne-based

invalidity. Rather, Apprendi is implicated where, as is the case here and was

in Barnes, the enhancing fact—that serious bodily injury resulted from the

attempted murder—was not submitted to the jury as an element of the crime

to be proven by the Commonwealth beyond a reasonable doubt. Therefore,

the basis for the rejection of harmless error review by the Wolfe Court does

not pertain to § 1102(c).    Instead, pursuant to the federal case law cited

supra, sentences of more than twenty years imposed without notice of intent

to seek the enhanced penalty or a jury finding of resultant serious bodily injury

may be constitutionally valid if the error was harmless.

      In Barnes, we did not address the availability of harmless error per se.

However, we implicitly rejected the notion in disposing of the Commonwealth’s

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argument that the jury’s finding of serious bodily injury in connection with

aggravated assault gave rise to the inference that it found that such injury

resulted from the attempted murder. We observed that, under Pennsylvania

law, juries are permitted to reach inconsistent verdicts.3 See Barnes, supra

at 120. As such, despite any and all evidence to the contrary, “it was perfectly

acceptable for the jury here to find serious bodily injury with respect to

aggravated assault but not attempted murder.” Id. Thus, a fair reading of

Barnes is that, because the jury might have chosen to reject serious bodily

injury as to attempted murder even though it elected to convict the defendant

of aggravated assault-serious bodily injury, this Court is not permitted to

affirm a sentence that was imposed without the jury making its intent clear.

       In King, our Supreme Court granted allowance of appeal “to consider

the legality of Jimel King’s enhanced sentence for attempted murder resulting

in serious bodily injury under 18 Pa.C.S. § 1102(c) when the Commonwealth

failed to provide formal notice of its intent to seek the enhancement in the

charging documents.” King, supra at 552. In that case, King stipulated that

the victim suffered shattered bones requiring multiple surgeries followed by

intensive physical therapy and proceeded to trial upon the defense that

____________________________________________

3  Inconsistent verdicts are also permissible in federal prosecutions. See,
e.g., Hamling v. United States, 418 U.S. 87, 101 (1974) (“It has, of course,
long been the rule that consistency in verdicts or judgments of conviction is
not required.”). Nonetheless, as discussed above, federal courts apply
harmless error to Apprendi violations.

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someone else shot the victim. The jury convicted King of attempted murder,

specifically finding that the victim suffered serious bodily injury as a result of

the attempt, and the trial court subsequently imposed a sentence of twenty

to forty years of imprisonment for that count. On appeal to this Court, King

claimed his sentence was illegal because “the charging documents failed to

specifically allege attempted murder causing serious bodily injury or reference

[§] 1102(c)[.]” Id. at 554. This Court rejected King’s challenge, concluding

that King received sufficient notice, and our Supreme Court granted

discretionary review.

       The Barnes decision and related cases were discussed in both appellate

courts in examining the requirements of Apprendi in connection with

§ 1102(c).4 Our Supreme Court detailed the Barnes-based arguments of the

parties, as well as the Commonwealth’s contention that, if there was an

Apprendi error, it was harmless because the evidence of serious bodily injury

was “overwhelming and uncontested” and the defense strategy was not

impaired by the absence of formal notice. King, supra at 559.

       The Court agreed with King that he did not receive sufficient notice to

satisfy Apprendi. Id. at 562. In deciding the case on the grounds of the

____________________________________________

4Those cases include Commonwealth v. Reid, 867 A.2d 1280 (Pa.Super.
2005), Commonwealth v. Johnson, 910 A.2d 60, 62 (Pa.Super. 2006), and
Commonwealth v. Bickerstaff, 204 A.3d 988 (Pa.Super. 2019).

                                           -6-
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notice required to satisfy due process, the Court expressly declined to discuss

Barnes in detail.   Id. at 562-63.

      The Court went on to consider “whether the absence of [the factual

allegation of serious bodily injury] from the indictment or information requires

a finding that the resulting sentence for the aggravated crime was illegal.” Id.

at 563. To answer that question, the Court distinguished § 1102(c) from the

mandatory minimum statutes struck down in the wake of Alleyne, observing

that those statutes were facially unconstitutional and not severable, while

proper notice would have constitutionally permitted King’s § 1102(c)

enhanced sentence. Id. at 565-66.

      The Court also discussed and adopted the reasoning of the Cotton Court

in applying the harmless error framework to Apprendi-based due process

challenges, holding that harmless error review may be applied to “the notice

error herein.” King, supra at 564. In that vein, the Court explained:

             In Commonwealth v. Story, 383 A.2d 155 (Pa. 1978), this
      Court adopted a harmless error standard equally applicable to
      errors involving state law as those involving federal constitutional
      error. This standard provides that an error can be harmless only
      if the appellate court is convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that
      the error is harmless.       We also found that the burden of
      establishing harmlessness beyond a reasonable doubt is borne by
      the Commonwealth.          While cases involving harmless error
      typically involve the prejudicial impact of evidence erroneously
      admitted at trial, the doctrine is also implicated with other types
      of error. Furthermore, we have stated that the harmless error
      standard applies in the related context of variances between the
      criminal information and the proof presented at trial. Indeed,
      many courts have found that Apprendi errors may be harmless
      if the evidence is overwhelming and uncontroverted. See e.g.,
      Washington v. Recuenoco, 548 U.S. 212, 218-22 (2006)

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       (finding failure to submit sentencing factor to the jury, like the
       failure to submit an element to the jury, is not structural error,
       and is thus subject to harmless error analysis); Cotton, 535 U.S.
       at 632-34 (holding Apprendi error harmless where evidence
       overwhelming and uncontroverted); Wolfe, 140 A.3d at 662
       (acknowledging other courts have deemed Apprendi-based
       errors harmless, but declining to engage in harmless error
       analysis where “statute was itself found to be invalid and non-
       severable”).

King, supra at 564 (cleaned up).

       Ultimately, the King Court concluded that the notice error was harmless.

It observed that the evidence of serious bodily injury was “overwhelming and

uncontroverted,” that King had de facto notice that the Commonwealth was

seeking the enhanced sentence, and that King’s defense was not impacted by

the lack of formal notice. Accordingly, the Court held “the harmless nature of

the error precludes a finding that the sentence was illegally imposed.” Id. at

566.

       Since King specifically declined to address the validity of Barnes, and

limited its adoption of harmless error review to the notice aspect of Apprendi,

I must agree with the Commonwealth that it is still the law of Pennsylvania

that harmless error analysis does not apply to the jury trial aspect of

Apprendi. See Commonwealth’s brief at 8-9 n.4. However, in my view, the

facts of this case demonstrate why the harmless error framework should

apply.

       As we observed on Appellant’s direct appeal, the evidence adduced at

his trial established that Felix Santos was placed on life support at Temple

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University Hospital as a result of extensive bleeding and loss of oxygen to the

brain after he was stabbed in the chest and torso multiple times while

Appellant held him down.          See Commonwealth v. Cruz, 122 A.3d 446

(Pa.Super. 2015) (unpublished memorandum at 1). Appellant did not contest

the nature of the injuries, but proceeded on a defense that he was not the one

who harmed Mr. Santos.5 The trial court instructed the jury that, in order to

find Appellant guilty of attempted murder, it must conclude that the

Commonwealth proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Appellant or a co-

conspirator stabbed Mr. Santos, that the stabbing was done with the specific

intent to kill Mr. Santos, and that the stabbing was a substantial step toward

committing murder.        See N.T. Trial, 9/28/12, at 119-20.   In turn, for the

charge of “aggravated assault, causing serious bodily injury,” the trial court

instructed the jury that guilt had to be based upon the finding beyond a

reasonable doubt that Appellant “caused serious bodily injury to Felix Santos.”

Id. at 122. The court further defined the term “serious bodily injury.” Id.

The jury found Appellant guilty of both crimes, which ultimately merged for

sentencing purposes because they were based upon the same criminal act.

____________________________________________

5 See, e.g., N.T. Trial, at 51 (opening statement Appellant’s counsel) (“[Y]our
heart goes out to the complainant in this matter. It has to go out to somebody
that’s on life support in the way he is right now. But you know what, that’s
not what we’re here for. We’re not here for that. We’re here to see was it
this man, my client, Mr. Cruz, or anybody else was it them, are they the ones
that did it. That’s the question. That’s what has to be decided.”).

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      Plainly, the evidence that Mr. Santos suffered serious bodily injury as a

result of the attack in which Appellant participated was uncontroverted and

overwhelming and the jury concluded beyond a reasonable doubt that

Appellant caused it. It is abundantly clear to me that, had the jury been asked

whether the attempted murder resulted in serious bodily injury to Mr. Santos,

it would have said yes.         Appellant thus received the benefit of the

constitutional right to a trial by jury safeguarded by Apprendi. Nonetheless,

Barnes mandates that we rule Appellant’s sentence illegal and vacate it.

      I was in the Barnes majority. “Wisdom too often never comes, and so

one ought not to reject it merely because it comes late.” Henslee v. Union

Planters Nat. Bank & Tr. Co., 335 U.S. 595, 600 (1949) (Frankfurter, J.,

dissenting). Belatedly accepting the wisdom of the federal courts’ application

of the harmless error framework to cases such as the one sub judice, I ask

our Supreme Court to overturn both the Barnes decision and our ruling in the

instant case.   Specifically, I implore our Supreme Court to extend King’s

application of harmless error review for violations of the notice element of

Apprendi to Apprendi’s requirements concerning the right to a jury trial,

adopting the reasoning of now-Chief Justice Todd in her Wolfe dissent:

      [B]oth state and federal courts which have considered this Sixth
      Amendment issue have embraced a harmless error analysis, and
      I find this case easily satisfies harmless error criteria. First, there
      is a strong presumption that constitutional errors permit a
      harmless error analysis. . . . Indeed, certain [federal court]
      decisions have embraced a broad harmless error analysis, finding
      any error to be harmless where a rational jury would have found
      the triggering fact in light of overwhelming evidence. Of course,

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      assessment of the broadest harmless error approach is
      unnecessary here, where a jury actually found beyond a
      reasonable doubt the triggering fact.

            Regardless, these tribunals’ approach supports a
      determination that the imposition of a sentence in violation of
      Alleyne does not require resentencing in all circumstances.
      Indeed, the majority’s rejection of a harmless error analysis will
      result in an undeserved windfall to certain defendants. This is
      especially true in the matter sub judice, as here . . . [the
      defendant] has received all that Alleyne requires. Accordingly,
      any error in sentencing was harmless.

Wolfe, supra at 670–71 (Todd, J. dissenting) (citations omitted).

      Deciding this matter on a clean slate, I would hold that Appellant is not

entitled to resentencing based upon the harmless Apprendi error in this case.

However, bound to faithfully apply the precedent that now constrains me, I

concur in the Majority’s disposition of this appeal.

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