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NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37
COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA, IN THE SUPERIOR COURT OF
PENNSYLVANIA
Appellee
v.
SEAN DARRINGTON,
Appellant No. 1193 MDA 2016
Appeal from the PCRA Order May 27, 2016
In the Court of Common Pleas of Dauphin County
Criminal Division at No(s): CP-22-CR-0002322-1993
BEFORE: GANTMAN, P.J., SHOGAN and STRASSBURGER,* JJ.
MEMORANDUM BY SHOGAN, J.: FILED APRIL 12, 2017
Appellant, Sean Darrington, appeals from the order denying his serial
petition filed pursuant to the Post Conviction Relief Act (“PCRA”), 42 Pa.C.S.
§§ 9541-9546. We affirm.
We summarize the procedural history of this matter as follows. On
October 9, 1994, a jury convicted Appellant of first-degree murder and
robbery.1 On October 18, 1994, the trial court sentenced Appellant to serve
a term of life imprisonment for the conviction of first-degree murder and a
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*
Retired Senior Judge assigned to the Superior Court.
1
The crimes involved the murder of Dale Bloom, who was found dead in his
home, and the robbery of the victim’s car. An autopsy revealed that Mr.
Bloom suffered five gunshot wounds, five puncture wounds, and had been
cut with a hand saw about his neck.
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consecutive term of incarceration of ten to twenty years for the robbery
conviction. On direct appeal, a panel of this Court affirmed Appellant’s
judgment of sentence on July 10, 1995, and our Supreme Court
subsequently denied Appellant’s petition for allowance of appeal on
December 14, 1995. Commonwealth v. Darrington, 667 A.2d 417 (Pa.
Super. filed July 10, 1995) (unpublished memorandum), appeal denied, 668
A.2d 1122 (Pa. 1995).
Subsequently, Appellant filed multiple petitions seeking collateral
relief. Appellant’s most recent PCRA petition, which is the subject of this
appeal, was filed on March 25, 2016. On May 6, 2016, pursuant to
Pa.R.Crim.P. 907, the PCRA court issued notice of its intent to dismiss
Appellant’s petition. The PCRA court then dismissed the instant petition on
May 27, 2016. This timely appeal followed. Both Appellant and the PCRA
court have complied with Pa.R.A.P. 1925.
Appellant presents the following issues for our review:
I. The lower court abused its discretion in entering an order that
Montgomery v. Louisiana, 136 S.Ct. 718 (2016) is not
retroactive to Appellant’s lack of statutory authorization
sentencing claim that fulfills the statutory requirements of 42
Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(1)(iii) as an exception to 42 Pa.C.S. §
9545(b) where this claim was presented within 60 days per 42
Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(1) and further in light of Welch v. United
States, No. 15-6418, 2016 U.S. LEXIS 2541 (U.S. April 18,
2016) that supports and demonstrates Appellant’s right to
resentencing due to the lower courts lack of statutory
authorization for the sentence imposed?
II. Did the Court of Common Pleas “abuse its discretion” where
the court adjudicated this matter under a manifest conflict of
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interest due to the supported fact(s) the instant PCRA court was
the District Attorney during the relevant times of Appellant’s
criminal proceedings as demonstrated in the records?
Appellant’s Brief at 4.
When reviewing the propriety of an order denying PCRA relief, we
consider the record “in the light most favorable to the prevailing party at the
PCRA level.” Commonwealth v. Stultz, 114 A.3d 865, 872 (Pa. Super.
2015) (quoting Commonwealth v. Henkel, 90 A.3d 16, 20 (Pa. Super.
2014) (en banc)). This Court is limited to determining whether the evidence
of record supports the conclusions of the PCRA court and whether the ruling
is free of legal error. Commonwealth v. Rykard, 55 A.3d 1177, 1183 (Pa.
Super. 2012). We grant great deference to the PCRA court’s findings that
are supported in the record and will not disturb them unless they have no
support in the certified record. Commonwealth v. Rigg, 84 A.3d 1080,
1084 (Pa. Super. 2014).
We first address whether Appellant satisfied the timeliness
requirements of the PCRA. Effective January 16, 1996, the PCRA was
amended to require a petitioner to file any PCRA petition within one year of
the date the judgment of sentence becomes final. 42 Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(1).
A judgment of sentence “becomes final at the conclusion of direct review,
including discretionary review in the Supreme Court of the United States and
the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, or at the expiration of time for seeking
the review.” 42 Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(3). This time requirement is mandatory
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and jurisdictional in nature, and the court may not ignore it in order to reach
the merits of the petition. Commonwealth v. Cintora, 69 A.3d 759, 762
(Pa. Super. 2013).
However, an untimely petition may be received when the petition
alleges, and the petitioner proves, that any of the three limited exceptions to
the time for filing the petition, set forth at 42 Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(1)(i), (ii),
and (iii), is met.2 A petition invoking one of these exceptions must be filed
within sixty days of the date the claim could first have been presented. 42
Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(2). In order to be entitled to the exceptions to the
PCRA’s one-year filing deadline, “the petitioner must plead and prove
specific facts that demonstrate his claim was raised within the sixty-day time
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2
The exceptions to the timeliness requirement are:
(i) the failure to raise the claim previously was the result of
interference by government officials with the presentation of the
claim in violation of the Constitution or laws of this
Commonwealth or the Constitution or laws of the United States;
(ii) the facts upon which the claim is predicated were unknown
to the petitioner and could not have been ascertained by the
exercise of due diligence; or
(iii) the right asserted is a constitutional right that was
recognized by the Supreme Court of the United States or the
Supreme Court of Pennsylvania after the time period provided in
this section and has been held by that court to apply
retroactively.
42 Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(1)(i), (ii), and (iii).
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frame” under section 9545(b)(2). Commonwealth v. Carr, 768 A.2d 1164,
1167 (Pa. Super. 2001).
As previously noted, our review of the record reflects that Appellant’s
judgment of sentence was affirmed by this Court on July 10, 1995, and our
Supreme Court denied Appellant’s petition for allowance of appeal on
December 14, 1995. Darrington, 667 A.2d 417 (Pa. Super. filed July 10,
1995) (unpublished memorandum), appeal denied, 668 A.2d 1122 (Pa.
1995). However, Appellant did not file a petition for writ of certiorari with
the United States Supreme Court. Accordingly, Appellant’s judgment of
sentence became final on March 13, 1996, ninety days after the
Pennsylvania Supreme Court denied Appellant’s petition for allowance of
appeal and the time for filing a petition for review with the United States
Supreme Court expired. See 42 Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(3) (providing that “a
judgment becomes final at the conclusion of direct review, including
discretionary review in the Supreme Court of the United States and the
Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, or at the expiration of time for seeking the
review.”); U.S.Sup.Ct.R. 13. Thus, the instant PCRA petition, filed on March
25, 2016, is patently untimely.
As stated, if a petitioner does not file a timely PCRA petition, his
petition may nevertheless be received under any of the three limited
exceptions to the timeliness requirements of the PCRA. 42 Pa.C.S. §
9545(b)(1). If a petitioner asserts one of these exceptions, he must file his
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petition within sixty days of the date that the exception could be asserted.
42 Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(2).
Appellant attempts to invoke the third exception to the PCRA
timeliness requirements with reliance upon the United States Supreme
Court’s decision in Miller v. Alabama, 132 S.Ct. 2455 (2012). In Miller,
the Court held that sentencing a juvenile convicted of a homicide offense to
mandatory life imprisonment without parole violates the Eighth
Amendment’s prohibition to cruel and unusual punishment. Accordingly,
such sentences cannot be handed down unless a judge or jury first considers
mitigating circumstances. Id. at 2475.
Subsequently, the United States Supreme Court issued its decision in
Montgomery v. Louisiana, 136 S.Ct. 718 (2016), clarifying that Miller
applies retroactively. Montgomery, 136 S.Ct. at 735-736. In
Commonwealth v. Secreti, 134 A.3d 77, 82 (Pa. Super. 2016), this Court
held that the date of the Montgomery decision is to be used when
calculating whether a petition is timely filed under the sixty-day rule of 42
Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(2). Secreti, 134 A.3d at 82. Accordingly, under the
holding of Secreti, Appellant has satisfied the sixty-day rule of section
9545(b)(2), because the instant PCRA petition, filed on March 25, 2016, was
filed on the sixtieth day after Montgomery was decided on January 25,
2016.
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However, the holding in Miller was limited to those offenders who
were juveniles at the time they committed their crimes. Miller, 132 S.Ct. at
2460. In Commonwealth v. Cintora, 69 A.3d 759 (Pa. Super. 2013), this
Court held that Miller is not an exception under section 9545(b)(1)(iii) to
those over the age of eighteen at the time of the commission of their crimes.
Cintora, 69 A.3d at 764. In Cintora, the co-appellants, who were nineteen
and twenty-one years old at the time of their crimes, argued that Miller
applied to them because a human brain does not fully develop until the age
of twenty-five, and because “it would be a violation of equal protection for
the courts to treat them[,] or anyone else with immature brains, as adults.”
Cintora, 69 A.3d at 764. This Court rejected these claims, stressing that
the co-appellants’ “contention that a newly-recognized constitutional right
should be extended to others does not render their petition timely pursuant
to section 9545(b)(1)(iii).” Id. (emphasis in original).
Recently, in Commonwealth v. Furgess, 149 A.3d 90 (Pa. Super.
2016), we reaffirmed our holding in Cintora. In Furgess, the appellant,
who was nineteen years old when he committed his crimes, presented an
argument similar to Appellant’s herein, maintaining that he “may invoke
Miller because he was a ‘technical juvenile’” based on “neuroscientific
theories regarding immature brain development….” Furgess, 149 A.2d at
94. Relying on Cintora, we reiterated that “petitioners who were older than
18 at the time they committed murder are not within the ambit of the Miller
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decision and therefore may not rely on that decision to bring themselves
within the timebar exception in Section 9545(b)(1)(iii).” Id.
Our review of the certified record reflects that Appellant’s date of birth
is November 1, 1971. The crimes for which Appellant was convicted
occurred in June of 1993. Thus, Appellant was twenty-one years old when
he committed his crimes. Based on our holdings in Cintora and Furgess, it
is apparent that the rule announced in Miller cannot apply to Appellant, who
was over eighteen years old when he committed murder. Accordingly,
Appellant’s arguments that Miller should apply to his case cannot satisfy the
timeliness exception of section 9545(b)(1)(iii).
In conclusion, because Appellant’s PCRA petition was untimely and no
exceptions apply, the PCRA court correctly determined that it lacked
jurisdiction to address the claims presented and grant relief. See
Commonwealth v. Fairiror, 809 A.2d 396, 398 (Pa. Super. 2002) (holding
that PCRA court lacks jurisdiction to hear untimely petition). Likewise, we
lack the authority to address the merits of any substantive claims raised in
the PCRA petition. See Commonwealth v. Bennett, 930 A.2d 1264, 1267
(Pa. 2007) (“[J]urisdictional time limits go to a court’s right or competency
to adjudicate a controversy.”).
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Order affirmed.
Judgment Entered.
Joseph D. Seletyn, Esq.
Prothonotary
Date: 4/12/2017
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