Court Opinion

ID: 9711788
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 04:39:09.695774+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:07.498712
License: Public Domain

WIEAND, Judge,
concurring and dissenting.
After reviewing the briefs filed pro se by appellant and by his counsel, I concur in the decision of the majority to affirm the judgment of sentence. However, I respectfully dissent from the majority’s formulation of a policy which precludes consideration by the Superior Court of pro se briefs where separate briefs have been filed by counsel. It is not that I disagree necessarily with the substance of such a policy as much as I disagree with this Court’s right to determine the same. My review of the Supreme Court’s per curiam order in Commonwealth v. Gaerttner, 518 Pa. 452, 543 A.2d 1091 (1988), which remanded the case to the Superior Court with directions to consider the defendant’s pro se brief, suggests that the Supreme Court has already adopted a policy which is contrary to the policy which this Court attempts to set in the instant case. See also: Commonwealth v. Shaw, 379 Pa.Super. 491, 495 n. 2, 550 A.2d 555, 557 n. 2 (1988). Although it is correct that the Supreme Court in Gaerttner acted merely by per curiam order and did not provide us with the reasons for its decision, I can only assume that it acted in the interest of achieving full and complete appellate review as speedily as possible and with a minimum waste of judicial resources, both in the trial and appellate courts. Whatever the Supreme Court’s reasons, however, its per curiam order in Gaerttner, in my judgment, has precedentially established a procedural policy which the Superior Court is required to follow.