Court Opinion

ID: 9762484
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 02:25:26.228862+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:34.972810
License: Public Domain

CERCONE, Judge,
concurring.
I agree with the thorough discussion presented by the majority with regard to the application of Pennsylvania Rule of Criminal Procedure 1410. I write separately only to express my concern over the facts underlying the instant appeal.
This case originated as a dispute between a landowner and a telephone company over a private right-of-way purportedly granted by the landowner’s predecessor in interest. However, it is undisputed in the record that the landowner informed the telephone company that it did not, in fact, possess a valid right-of-way to cross her property. According to the landowner, the utility secured the signature of only one of the co-tenants by the entireties on the right-of-way.
The telephone company did not seek a resolution of the property dispute through the issuance of a preliminary injunction, a restraining order or some other legal remedy. Instead, the company requested state police troopers to prevent the landowner from impeding their entry onto her property. The telephone company intended to dig a trench across the property for the purpose of laying a telephone cable. When the landowner arrived at her property, the troopers stopped her vehicle and ordered her not to interfere with the telephone company employees. When the landowner attempted to stop the telephone employees from digging on her property, the state troopers arrested landowner for disorderly conduct. During her arrest, the landowner kicked a state trooper resulting in the additional charges of aggravated assault and resisting arrest.
I am somewhat perplexed that neither trial nor appellate counsel questioned whether state police troopers were in the performance of their duties when the incident took place. The state troopers were without the authority of a court order or warrant to enter the property. Moreover, there is no evi*358dence of probable cause to believe that the landowner was committing a crime on her own property. In fact, State Police Trooper Michael Funk testified that the landowner insisted that telephone company employees were trespassing on her property.
By statute, a landowner has the right to use force against a trespasser. The Crimes Code provides that
[t]he use of force upon or toward the person of another is justifiable when the actor believes that such force is immediately necessary:
(a) to prevent or terminate an unlawful entry or other trespass upon land or a trespass against or the unlawful carrying away of tangible movable property, if such land or movable property is, or is believed by the actor to be, in his possession or in the possession of another person for whose protection [she] acts....
18 Pa.C.S.A. § 507(a). Here, state troopers arrested appellant as she attempted to use minimal force to eject telephone company employees from her property. I question whether such conduct is “disorderly conduct” or was merely an appropriate use of force by the landowner against a trespasser as permitted by statute.
Present counsel does not raise the issue of whether the incident took place while the state trooper was in the performance of his duties. Pursuant to the Crimes Code, a person is guilty of aggravated assault if she:
(3) attempts to cause or intentionally or knowingly causes bodily injury to a police officer ... in the performance of duty[.]
18 Pa.C.S.A. § 2702(a)(3). Additionally, a person commits the crime of resisting arrest if
with the intent of preventing a public servant from effecting a lawful arrest or discharging any other duty, the person creates a substantial risk of bodily injury to the public servant or anyone else, or employs means justifying or requiring substantial force to overcome the resistance.
Id. § 5104. The record discloses no evidence of a court order, warrant, or probable cause to believe that a crime was being *359committed by the landowner on her property. Thus, the question of whether the state troopers were in the performance of their duties would be a pivotal question in determining whether the Commonwealth presented sufficient evidence to establish the crimes of aggravated assault or resisting arrest.
Unfortunately, present counsel has not challenged the sufficiency of the evidence underlying the instant appeal, nor has counsel raised an ineffectiveness claim related to trial counsel’s failure to pursue this issue. Accordingly, this court is without authority to address the question on its merits.1

. I do note that this issue could be raised by new counsel through a layered claim of ineffective assistance of all prior counsel.