Court Opinion

ID: 9719725
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 08:01:37.744207+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:09.553002
License: Public Domain

Justice SAYLOR,
concurring.
I join the majority opinion, subject only to a reservation concerning the passage suggesting that the sentencing court could have revoked Appellee’s probation and imposed a maximum sentence based on the mere fact of Appellee’s having been arrested and charged with new crimes. See Majority Opinion, at 423-25, 888 A.2d at 793. In this regard, I tend toward the view that the fact of an arrest and new charges should not be deemed sufficient in and of itself to support revocation. Accord Commonwealth v. Sims, 770 A.2d 346, 352 (Pa.Super.2001); see generally Johnson v. State, 62 Md.App. 548, 490 A.2d 734, 736-37 (1985) (collecting cases).1 I join the *427majority disposition not so much because I view the sentencing court’s approach as an act of lenity,2 but rather, because I find nothing in the governing statutory scheme to prevent the approach as an orderly manner of addressing multiple acts that are in violation of the terms governing a probationer’s release.

. Indeed, a number of jurisdictions have couched revocation on such limited grounds as a due process violation. See, e.g., State v. Kidwell, *4271995 WL 68164 (Ohio App. Feb. 16, 1995); Wright v. State, 640 S.W.2d 265, 269 (Tex.Crim.App.1982).

. In this regard, I also have difficulty with the majority’s indication that the maximum sentence was imposable based on technical violations. While this may be true in the abstract, there are limits to the sentencing court’s discretion, and, as applied to the circumstances of individual technical probation violations, it may be an abuse of discretion to impose a maximum sentence.