Court Opinion

ID: 9752287
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 17:55:11.775192+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:27:13.008489
License: Public Domain

CAPPY, Justice,
concurring.
I agree with the result reached by the Majority because fairness dictates that the instant case be remanded to the trial court and Appellant permitted to file a motion for a new trial nunc pro tunc challenging the weight of the evidence. However, given the clear oversight in new Rule 1410 respecting weight of the evidence claims, I would go further and specifically direct that the Criminal Rules Committee amend Rule 1410 as soon as practical to explicitly provide for weight of the evidence challenges.
*141As Chief Justice Flaherty notes, new rule 1410 allows a defendant the option of filing post-trial motions or simply filing a direct appeal. Previously, only those issues raised in post-trial motions were deemed preserved for appeal and thus, a defendant was required to file post-trial motions. New Rule 1410 achieves its objective of permitting the by-passing of post-trial motions, by specifically stating that “[ijssues raised before or during trial will now be deemed preserved for appeal whether or not the defendant elects to file a post-sentence motion on those issues.” The problem, as Chief Justice Flaherty so aptly notes, is that challenges to the weight of the evidence can never be raised “before or during trial”; rather such challenges can only be raised after trial. Thus, there is a clear void in new rule 1410; a void which I believe was unintentional and one which the Criminal Rules Committee must address. The fact that the trial court in the instant case addressed the challenge to the weight of the evidence in its opinion filed pursuant to Pa.R.A.P.1925 simply does not cure the deficiency in new rule 1410 since there likely will be times where, under similar circumstances, the trial court will either review such a challenge in its rule 1925 opinion in a cursory fashion or even fail to address such a challenge at all. Certainly, given the language of rule 1410 as it now stands, a defendant caught in those circumstances should not be denied his or her right to challenge the weight of the evidence any more than the defendant in the instant matter should. At the very least, Rule 1410 should specifically state that challenges to the weight of the evidence must be raised first in the trial court or else those challenges will be deemed waived.
Accordingly, in addition to ordering a remand here, I would direct that the Criminal Rules Committee revise Rule 1410 posthaste.