Court Opinion

ID: 9718249
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:19:34.80423+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:58.170149
License: Public Domain

McEWEN, Judge,
concurring.
Since I have such respect for the insight of my colleagues who compose the majority, I hasten to declare that I join them in the order which reverses the ruling of the trial *586court. I am not convinced, however, that we need here proceed to so extended an illumination of the issues as provided by the majority. Thus it is that I simply observe that I agree that the appellant cannot be found to have effected a waiver of his right to raise the bar of collateral estoppel simply because he requested and was granted a severance. I also share the view that the Commonwealth is barred, by principles of collateral estoppel, from relitigating the common issue of ultimate fact essential to appellant's previous acquittal, namely, whether appellant was in possession of a firearm on April 22, 1990.
Ashe established that once an accused has been acquitted, a state cannot prosecute him a second time for a related offense having a common issue of ultimate fact essential to conviction which the previous acquittal had determined in his favor. See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Peluso, 481 Pa. 641, 393 A.2d 344 (1978); Commonwealth v. Klinger, 264 Pa.Super. 21, 398 A.2d 1036 (1979).
Commonwealth v. Harris, 400 Pa.Super. 12, 18, 582 A.2d 1319, 1322 (1990). Cf: Commonwealth v. Smith, 518 Pa. 15, 27-29, 540 A.2d 246, 252-253 (1988). Thus it is that I would preclude the Commonwealth from further prosecution of appellant.