Court Opinion

ID: 9542953
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:40:37.815358+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:09:20.724470
License: Public Domain

WIEAND, Judge,
dissenting:
The majority holds that appellant’s convictions for aggravated assault and attempted murder do not merge for purposes of sentencing because the convictions were based upon different criminal acts. According to the majority, appellant’s conviction for aggravated assault was based upon his act of shooting his wife in the hip, while his conviction for attempted murder was based upon his subsequent act of striking his wife in the head with the butt of the shotgun. This, however, is contrary to the charges *278made against appellant in the information. While I agree that crimes which are based upon separate criminal acts should not merge, my review of the record in the instant case causes me to conclude that appellant’s convictions for aggravated assault and attempted murder were based upon the same factual predicate, namely, the combined acts of shooting and bludgeoning his wife with the gun. He was not charged and the jury was not instructed to find that the separate acts of shooting and bludgeoning constituted separate crimes.
The current test used to determine whether offenses should merge for purposes of sentencing was established by the Supreme Court in Commonwealth v. Williams, 521 Pa. 556, 559 A.2d 25 (1989) and Commonwealth v. Weakland, 521 Pa. 353, 555 A.2d 1228 (1989). This test has been summarized by the Superior Court as follows:
In order for offenses to merge, one offense must be a “lesser included offense” of the other, i.e. the elements of the lesser offense must be identical to and capable of being wholly subsumed within the elements of the greater offense, and the factual predicate for the lesser included offense must also be part of the factual predicate required to establish the greater offense.
Our Supreme Court has thus adopted what amounts to a conclusive presumption of legislative intent, or a rule of statutory construction, which provides that the legisla.ture will be conclusively presumed to have intended to vindicate any and all interests violated by a lesser included offense in the authorized penalty for the greater offense, and that when the legislature creates an offense whose elements cannot be wholly subsumed within those of another offense, the legislature will be conclusively presumed to have identified a separate interest to be separately vindicated. The only exception to these bright line rules or presumptions applies when facts other than those required to support the greater offense support a conviction for an otherwise lesser included offense.
*279Commonwealth v. Yates, 386 Pa.Super. 282, 287-288, 562 A.2d 908, 911 (1989) (citations omitted).
In my judgment, aggravated assault is a lesser included offense of attempted murder; and, therefore, when a defendant has been convicted of both of these offenses because of the same criminal conduct, his convictions merge for purposes of sentencing. See: Commonwealth v. Anderson, 416 Pa.Super. 203, 610 A.2d 1042 (1992) (en banc) (Wieand, J., dissenting). Therefore, the issue in the instant case is whether the same factual predicate was the basis for convicting appellant of both aggravated assault and attempted murder.
My review of the record discloses that appellant was charged by criminal information with attempted murder, with one count of aggravated assault under 18 Pa.C.S. § 2702(a)(1)1 and with a second count of aggravated assault under 18 Pa.C.S. § 2702(a)(4).2 However, it was alleged by the Commonwealth in each count of the information that the crime had been committed by appellant when he “shot Louise Wood with a twelve-gauge shotgun and then struck her in the head at least two times using the shotgun as a club.” In accordance therewith, the trial court instructed the jury that the charge of attempted murder and both counts of aggravated assault were based upon the same alleged conduct, i.e., the shooting of appellant’s wife and striking her with the shotgun. Thus, appellant’s convictions for attempted murder and both counts of aggravated assault were based upon precisely the same factual predicate.
*280Thereafter, the trial court concluded that appellant’s conviction for aggravated assault under § 2702(a)(4) merged with the conviction for aggravated assault under § 2702(a)(1),3 but the court refused to merge the aggravated assault into appellant’s conviction for attempted murder.
I would hold, under the circumstances of this case and for reasons stated in my dissenting opinion in Commonwealth v. Anderson, supra, that the crimes of aggravated assault and attempted murder in this case merged for purposes of sentencing. All crimes consisted of a single, factual predicate, i.e., the shooting and bludgeoning of appellant’s wife. Because the majority has reached a contrary conclusion, I respectfully dissent.
McEWEN, DEL SOLE and BECK, JJ., join in this dissenting opinion by WIEAND, J.

. Pursuant to 18 Pa.C.S. § 2702(a)(1), “[a] person is guilty of aggravated assault if he attempts to cause serious bodily injury to another, or causes such injury intentionally, knowingly or recklessly under circumstances manifesting extreme indifference to the value of human life.” This offense is graded as a felony of the first degree. 18 Pa.C.S. § 2702(b).

. Pursuant to 18 Pa.C.S. § 2702(a)(4) "[a] person is guilty of aggravated assault if he attempts to cause or intentionally or knowingly causes bodily injury to another with a deadly weapon.” This offense is graded as a felony of the second degree. 18 Pa.C.S. § 2702(b).

. Although I express no opinion regarding the correctness of this determination by the trial court, it is eminently clear therefrom that the trial court found that the same factual predicate had been the basis for both aggravated assault offenses.