Court Opinion

ID: 9634642
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 13:19:01.063618+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:09:07.295716
License: Public Domain

ROBERTS, Justice,
concurring.
I agree with the majority that the order of the PCHA court should be affirmed. I must disagree, however, with the majority’s assertion that the question whether post-sentencing counsel should have taken an appeal “depends on the merits of the grounds for appeal.”
*599Contrary to the assertion of the majority, the inquiry must be whether appellant wished that an appeal be taken. Appellant’s right to an appeal is constitutionally protected. Pa. Const. art. V, § 9; see Douglas v. California, 372 U.S. 353, 83 S.Ct. 814, 9 L.Ed.2d 811 (1963). The decision to appeal, like the decision to plead guilty, to waive the right to counsel, to waive the right to trial by jury, or to testify on one’s own behalf, is personal to the accused. Fay v. Noia, 372 U.S. 391, 83 S.Ct. 822, 9 L.Ed.2d 237 (1963); see Commonwealth ex rel. Robinson v. Myers, 427 Pa. 104, 233 A.2d 220 (1967); ABA Project on Standards for Criminal Justice, Standards Relating to Criminal Appeals § 2.2(b)(Approved Draft, 1970). See generally Comment, Criminal Waiver: The Requirement of Personal Participation, Competence and Legitimate State Interest, 54 Calif.L.Rev. 1262 (1966). Moreover, for the waiver of appellate rights to be effective, it must affirmatively appear that there has been an “intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right.” Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U.S. 458, 464, 58 S.Ct. 1019, 1023, 82 L.Ed. 1461 (1938).
Viewed from this perspective, the record is clear that there has been no such waiver. At all relevant times appellant sought to exercise his appellate rights. Post-sentencing counsel did nothing to preserve appellant’s appeal. The PCHA court, therefore, should have granted appellant an appeal as if timely filed. See Commonwealth ex rel. Robinson v. Myers, supra.
Here, however, the PCHA court resolved the contentions appellant would have raised on a direct appeal against appellant. It did so by applying the proper legal standards. Thus, treating the present proceedings as a timely appeal from judgment of sentence, see Commonwealth v. Alston, 473 Pa. 40, 373 A.2d 741 (1977), there is no basis to disturb the judgment of sentence. As in Alston, here the “failure to allow appeal as though timely filed was not prejudicial.” 473 Pa. at 47, 373 A.2d at 744.