[J-30-2022]
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF PENNSYLVANIA
WESTERN DISTRICT
BAER, C.J., TODD, DONOHUE, DOUGHERTY, WECHT, MUNDY, BROBSON, JJ.
MARIE SCOTT, NORMITA JACKSON, : No. 16 WAP 2021
MARSHA SCAGGS, REID EVANS, WYATT :
EVANS, TYREEM RIVERS : Appeal from the Order of the
: Commonwealth Court entered May
: 28, 2021 at No. 397 MD 2020.
v. :
: ARGUED: April 13, 2022
:
PENNSYLVANIA BOARD OF PROBATION :
AND PAROLE :
:
:
APPEAL OF: MARIE SCOTT, NORMITA :
JACKSON, MARSHA SCAGGS, TYREEM :
RIVERS :
OPINION
JUSTICE DONOHUE DECIDED: OCTOBER 19, 2022
The four named appellants were convicted of what is today codified as second-
degree murder1 and as a result are ineligible for parole per 61 Pa.C.S. § 6137(a)(1). (“The
board may parole … any offender to whom the power to parole is granted to the board by
this chapter, except an offender condemned to death or serving life imprisonment.”).
1 18 Pa.C.S. § 2502(b) (murder of the second degree); 18 Pa.C.S. § 1102(b) (setting
penalty for murder of the second degree as a term of life imprisonment). Appellant Marie
Scott was charged in 1973, before the crime exists as it does today. See Commonwealth
v. Moore, 373 A.2d 1101, 1103 n.4 (Pa. 1977) (stating that as of 1974 “murder of the
second degree has been reclassified as murder of the third degree
and felony murder has been reclassified as murder of the second degree”).
Appellants filed a petition for review in the nature of a complaint in the Commonwealth
Court, seeking a declaration that Section 6137(a)(1)2 is unconstitutional as applied on the
grounds that depriving Appellants of any opportunity for parole violates the constitutions
of this Commonwealth and the United States. We granted review to determine whether
this suit was within the Commonwealth Court’s original jurisdiction to hear suits against
government agencies like the Board of Probation and Parole (“Board”)3 or whether the
petition fell within the statutory exception for petitions in the nature of post-conviction
relief. We affirm the Commonwealth Court’s holding that it lacked jurisdiction. While
some claims challenging parole eligibility may be heard in the Commonwealth Court,
these claims, which require the declaration of a new constitutional holding that life
sentences without the possibility of parole (“LWOP”) sentences are unconstitutional, are
encompassed by the statutory exception for petitions in the nature of post-conviction
relief. We therefore affirm.
I.
Procedural Background
On May 19, 2020, each appellant submitted an application for parole to the Board.4
Petition for Review, 7/8/2020, at 9-10, ¶ 19. The Board denied each application on the
2 As the Commonwealth Court pointed out in its opinion, while Appellants generically
referenced Section 6137 their challenge is to Section 6137(a)(1). We thus refer to that
subsection. Scott v. Pa. Bd. of Prob. & Parole, 256 A.3d 483, 485 n.3. (Pa. Commw.
2021).
3 42 Pa.C.S. § 761.
4 The facts specific to each of the four underlying convictions for second degree murder
are irrelevant to our analysis and we omit these details. The Commonwealth Court
opinion, authored by then-President Judge and now-Justice Brobson, cogently sets forth
the facts and rehabilitative efforts of the respective appellants.
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basis that serving a sentence of life imprisonment rendered each ineligible for parole per
Section 6137. Id. at 10, ¶ 20. On July 8, 2020, counsel filed a petition for review in the
Commonwealth Court’s original jurisdiction, seeking a declaration that Section 6137(a)(1)
was unconstitutional as applied. The petition raised two claims for relief. First, that the
Board’s enforcement of the statute “violates Art. I, § 13 of the Pennsylvania state
constitution prohibiting ‘cruel punishments.’” Id. at 36, ¶ 133. With respect to this count,
Appellants argued that the analysis would be the same as under the Eighth Amendment
to the United States Constitution because the Pennsylvania Constitution must offer at
least as much protection. The second claim argued that if the first claim were rejected
the statute is unconstitutional under the heightened protections of the Pennsylvania
Constitution. Id. at 38, ¶ 141 (citing Commonwealth v. Edmunds, 586 A.2d 887 (Pa.
1991)).
The Board, represented by the Attorney General, filed preliminary objections,
which included a “lack of jurisdiction / improper venue.” While 42 Pa.C.S. § 761(a)(1)
authorizes suits “[a]gainst the Commonwealth government,” the Board pointed to the
statutory exception for “actions or proceedings in the nature of applications for a writ of
habeas corpus or post-conviction relief not ancillary to proceedings within the appellate
jurisdiction of the court.” 42 Pa.C.S. § 761(a)(1)(i). According to the Board, the claims
raised fit within this statutory exception. Preliminary Objections, 8/7/2020, at unnumbered
¶ 11.
Appellants replied to the objections, arguing, in pertinent part, that the
Commonwealth Court had original jurisdiction over the matter because they were not
challenging their sentence of life imprisonment. Their fundamental position was that the
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trial court imposed the sentence of life imprisonment but did not impose a sentence of life
without parole. The inability to receive parole is a result of multiple statutory provisions,
“but it is not part of the sentence per se.” Answer to Preliminary Objection, 9/8/2020, at
3, ¶ 2. Thus, the sought relief did not implicate their criminal sentences but merely “parole
eligibility, which may or may not result in release, and … does not challenge Petitioners’
underlying convictions or sentences[.]” Id. at 8, ¶ 16 (emphasis omitted).
The Commonwealth Court sustained the jurisdictional preliminary objection and
dismissed the petition. Scott v. Pa. Bd. of Prob. & Parole, 256 A.3d 483, 485 (Pa.
Commw. 2021). The panel drew guidance from Stackhouse v. Commonwealth, 832 A.2d
1004 (Pa. 2003) (plurality), which addressed whether the Commonwealth Court had
jurisdiction over a three-count complaint filed by Diane Stackhouse, a Pennsylvania State
Police employee. The allegations concerned Stackhouse’s application for a job
promotion, which entailed an internal investigation. Stackhouse alleged that certain PSP
employees were permitted to improperly probe her private affairs. Stackhouse named as
defendants the PSP, the PSP Commissioner, and Deputy Commissioner Paul Evanko.
The first count of the complaint sought a declaration that Stackhouse’s privacy and
reputational interests were harmed during the investigation. The second and third counts
sought monetary damages from Commissioner Evanko.
Stackhouse filed her suit in the court of common pleas. The defendants filed
preliminary objections asserting that the Commonwealth Court had original jurisdiction,
because the complaint was against the PSP as an agency and its officials. The trial court
granted the jurisdictional objection and transferred the action to the Commonwealth
Court, which in turn determined that the actions were essentially tort actions. Those
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actions are specifically excluded from its original jurisdiction. See 42 Pa.C.S. §
761(a)(1)(v) (generally excluding actions against government officials “in the nature of
trespass”). It therefore dismissed the petition for lack of original jurisdiction.
We affirmed, with no majority opinion. The primary difficulty was that all parties
agreed that the first count was within the Commonwealth Court’s original jurisdiction, but
the remaining two were excluded because they were essentially tort actions. The
Commonwealth argued that the Commonwealth Court had ancillary jurisdiction over
counts two and three per 42 Pa.C.S. § 761(c) (“To the extent prescribed by general rule
the Commonwealth Court shall have ancillary jurisdiction over any claim or other matter
which is related to a claim or other matter otherwise within its exclusive original
jurisdiction.”). Stackhouse, meanwhile, agreed that only count one was within the
Commonwealth Court’s original jurisdiction but “for the sake of judicial economy” asked
that the matter be remanded to the county court of common pleas. Stackhouse, 832 A.2d
at 1007.
A three-Justice plurality resolved the issue by recharacterizing count one,
concluding that it “rests upon the same allegations of defamation and invasion of privacy
as asserted in Counts II and III.” Id. at 1008. Including a count for declaratory or injunctive
relief cannot “transform the complaint” from a trespass action into an action belonging
within the Commonwealth Court’s original jurisdiction. Id. Because “the core of
[Stackhouse’s] complaint is an action in trespass, original jurisdiction lies in the court of
common pleas notwithstanding the injunctive/declaratory label attached to Count I.” Id.
at 1009. The plurality remarked that “permitting jurisdictional questions to turn solely upon
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the styling of claims within a complaint would arguably permit forum shopping through
pleading.” Id. at 1008 (citation omitted).
Following that rationale, the Commonwealth Court concluded that the two claims
presented “squarely challenge the constitutionality of Petitioners’ sentences.” Scott, 256
A.3d at 491. The panel observed that the Appellants heavily relied on precedents like
Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460 (2012) (holding that Eighth Amendment prohibits
sentencing individuals who commit crimes as juveniles to mandatory sentence of life
imprisonment without parole) to support their petition for review. While the Appellants
styled these claims in the context of seeking declaratory relief from a Commonwealth
agency, that characterization did not control per the Stackhouse analysis. The Appellants
“have fashioned the Petition in this manner in a thinly veiled attempt to forum shop through
pleading[.]” Id. at 492. The court concluded that the statutory exception applied and
dismissed the petition.
Senior Judge Bonnie Brigance Leadbetter dissented. Judge Leadbetter did not
“read the Complaint in this case as an attack on Petitioners’ convictions or sentences, but
rather as what it purports to be: a facial and as applied Eighth Amendment challenge to
the provisions of the Prisons and Parole Code[.]” Id. at 496 (Leadbetter, J., dissenting).
Judge Leadbetter observed that the claims “plainly cannot be raised in petitions filed
pursuant to the Post Conviction Relief Act because such petitions have been time-barred
for many years and when they were timely, the pled circumstances which now give rise
to potential Eighth Amendment claims did not exist.” Id. (footnote omitted).
Appellants filed a direct appeal to this Court as of right. 42 Pa.C.S. § 723(a).
[J-30-2022] - 6
II.
Arguments
The Appellants reiterate their fundamental argument that their petition does not
attack their sentences or convictions and merely challenges the Board’s decision not to
process their applications for parole. For over a century this Court has recognized the
principle that “the maximum sentence imposed by the trial court is the ‘true sentence’ and
the only sentence with ‘legal validity,’ and that parole is merely a condition on that
sentence.” Appellants’ Brief at 20.
Appellants discuss our recent decision in Hudson v. Pennsylvania Board of
Probation & Parole, 204 A.3d 392 (Pa. 2019), which in their view corroborates the
foregoing distinction between challenges to parole eligibility that belong in the
Commonwealth Court and claims concerning the sentence itself, and definitively
establishes that the Commonwealth Court erred by finding a lack of jurisdiction. In
Hudson, an inmate serving a sentence of life imprisonment for second degree murder
sought parole, which the Board denied on the basis that an inmate is eligible for parole
only upon completing the minimum sentence; a sentence of life imprisonment has no
minimum sentence and thus is ineligible for parole. Hudson thereafter filed a petition for
review in the Commonwealth Court, alleging that “because the common pleas court had
failed to specify a minimum sentence, he should be deemed to have an implied minimum
of one day of confinement.” Id. at 394.
[J-30-2022] - 7
As discussed in more detail later, the Hudson Court determined that the minimum
sentence “merely sets the time after which he is eligible to serve the remainder of his
sentence on parole.” Id. at 396. We rejected the notion that trial courts must set a
minimum sentence when imposing a life sentence, as that is logically impossible without
knowing when a person will die. We also rejected the argument that a minimum sentence
should be presumed. We ultimately concluded that “the Board lacks the power to release
on parole an inmate servicing [sic] a mandatory life sentence for second-degree murder.”
Id. at 399.
According to Appellants, Hudson supports a finding of jurisdiction because we
stated that “the actual sentence of a prisoner subject to total confinement is his maximum
sentence.” Id. A decision in their favor means only that they will be eligible for parole,
and even if paroled “their maximum sentence of life – the ‘real’ and ‘only’ sentence they
are serving – will remain intact.” Appellants’ Brief at 23.
Appellants argue that nothing in Hudson suggested that the Commonwealth Court
lacked jurisdiction to entertain the claim, as this Court is free to address subject-matter
jurisdiction sua sponte. It thus follows that we implicitly accepted the Commonwealth
Court’s original jurisdiction. Appellants submit that it is unlikely the Hudson Court
overlooked an obvious jurisdictional issue, and the case should therefore be read to hold
that the Commonwealth Court has original jurisdiction to entertain claims concerning
parole eligibility.
Appellants finally urge this Court to consider federal decisions examining claims
brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, which provides civil remedies for violations of
constitutional rights. Appellants cite Hill v. Snyder, 878 F.3d 193 (6th Cir. 2017), which
[J-30-2022] - 8
involved a suit commenced in 2010 by several Michigan individuals serving sentences of
life imprisonment without parole for crimes committed as juveniles. During the pendency
of that litigation, the United States Supreme Court decided Miller and Michigan officials
made legislative changes in response. Appellants quote the portion of Hill declaring that
the claims could proceed under Section 1983 because “success would not automatically
result in speedier release … [b]ecause the Michigan Parole Board retains discretion to
deny parole to those who are or become eligible[.]” Id. at 211. Thus, success on the
merits “would not automatically spell speedier release” and the suits could proceed under
Section 1983. Appellants maintain that we should adopt this same logic.
The Commonwealth challenges the Appellants’ fundamental premise that parole
consideration exists separately from the criminal sentence. “This is artifice intended to
circumvent the clear limitations on Commonwealth Court jurisdiction, and obtain a
second, illicit bite at the apple.” Commonwealth’s Brief at 5. Eligibility for parole
consideration is “entirely a function of the sentence.” Id. (emphasis omitted). The
Commonwealth points out that many individuals, including the lead plaintiff in this case,
have attempted to file PCRA petitions seeking a declaration that their sentences are
unconstitutional following Miller but have uniformly lost. “They cannot simply repackage
those failed sentencing claims as ‘administrative’ challenges without obliterating the
PCRA’s jurisdictional boundaries while turning Commonwealth Court into just another
post-conviction review forum.” Id. The Commonwealth submits that Hudson supports its
position because that case “held that § 1102(b)—by its own terms—does indeed bar
parole.” Id. at 7. Therefore, LWOP “is not independent of the sentencing statute … but
integral to it.” Id.
[J-30-2022] - 9
Responding to the argument that the Hudson Court implicitly determined that the
Commonwealth Court has jurisdiction over all types of parole eligibility claims, the
Commonwealth points out that “the parties … proceeded without objection” as to
jurisdiction, and “this Court was not obligated to object on their behalf, and its restraint
does not create legal precedent.” Id. at 11.
The Commonwealth also says that Appellants’ reliance on extending cases like
Miller illustrates that Appellants do not merely challenge parole as a “condition.”
“Petitioners are at a loss to explain why an effort to apply Miller belongs in a PCRA court,
but an effort to extend Miller belongs in Commonwealth Court.” Id. at 11-12. The
Commonwealth maintains that the Appellants will become eligible for parole only if a new
decision determines that LWOP is an unconstitutional sentence for persons convicted of
felony murder and is held to apply retroactively through the PCRA. Id. at 18.
III.
Analysis
“In ruling on whether the preliminary objections … were properly sustained, we
must determine whether it is clear and free from doubt from all the facts pleaded that
Appellants will be unable to prove facts legally sufficient to establish jurisdiction or a right
to relief.” Ciamaichelo v. Indep. Blue Cross, 909 A.2d 1211, 1216 n.7 (Pa. 2006) (citation
omitted). “The issue for review centers on the question of subject matter jurisdiction. As
this question is purely one of law, our standard of review is de novo, and our scope of
review is plenary.” Commonwealth v. Jones, 929 A.2d 205, 211 (Pa. 2007) (quoting
Commonwealth v. Bethea, 828 A.2d 1066, 1071 n.5 (Pa. 2003)). Additionally, the
jurisdictional question involves an interpretation of Section 761(a)(1) and (a)(1)(i), and we
[J-30-2022] - 10
thus must examine the statutory text. “Whether subject matter jurisdiction lies in
the Commonwealth Court is a question of statutory interpretation, as to which our
standard of review is de novo and our scope of review is plenary.” In re Petition for Enf't
of Subpoenas issued by Hearing Exam'r in a Proceeding before Bd. of Med., 214 A.3d
660, 666 (Pa. 2019) (citation omitted). As with all questions of statutory interpretation,
“our foremost object is to ‘ascertain and effectuate the intention of the General
Assembly.’” Id. (quoting 1 Pa.C.S. § 1921(a)). Thus, our task is to determine whether
this petition contains claims that the General Assembly would have intended the
Commonwealth Court to hear.
On its face, the petition for review sought relief against the Board and therefore
meets the plain language of Section 761(a)(1). The Commonwealth responds that the
claim Appellants have raised is in the nature of a writ of habeas corpus and therefore falls
within the plain language of (a)(1)(i). At this juncture, a discussion of jurisdictional
concepts and the General Assembly’s creation of a separate forum for processing
collateral claims concerning an inmate’s sentence provides useful background for our
analysis.
A.
Jurisdiction
Article V, Section 4 of the Pennsylvania Constitution, adopted April 23, 1968,
created the Commonwealth Court and stated that the court shall “have such jurisdiction
as shall be provided by law.” The General Assembly enacted Section 761 of the Judicial
Code, which conferred the Commonwealth Court with original and exclusive jurisdiction
over certain cases, including civil actions or proceedings against government agencies
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and officials. The conferral of original and exclusive jurisdiction creates subject-matter
jurisdiction in the Commonwealth Court for the specified classes of claims. See
Shenango Valley Osteopathic Hosp. v. Dep't of Health, 451 A.2d 434, 437 n.7 (Pa. 1982)
(“Certainly a complaint alleging a cause of action for relief against the Commonwealth
derivative from provisions of the federal and state constitutions states a claim within
the subject-matter jurisdiction of the Commonwealth Court.”). Simultaneously, the
statutory exclusion cited by the Commonwealth makes clear that any claim that is “in the
nature of applications for a writ of habeas corpus or post-conviction relief” is removed
from the Commonwealth Court’s original jurisdiction.
The General Assembly has separately created a statutory mechanism for
adjudicating “a writ of habeas corpus or post-conviction relief.” The Post-Conviction
Relief Act “shall be the sole means of obtaining collateral relief and encompasses all other
common law and statutory remedies for the same purpose that exist when this subchapter
takes effect, including habeas corpus and coram nobis.” 42 Pa.C.S. § 9542.5 That the
PCRA exists at all is a matter of statutory grace as “States have no constitutional
obligation to provide a means for collaterally attacking convictions; however, if they do,
then such procedures must comport with the fundamental fairness mandated by the Due
Process Clause.” Commonwealth v. Haag, 809 A.2d 271, 283 (Pa. 2002) (citation
omitted). See also Pennsylvania v. Finley, 481 U.S. 551, 556-57 (1987) (“Postconviction
relief is even further removed from the criminal trial than is discretionary direct review. It
5 “[W]e have never held that the remedy of habeas corpus does not exist for the rare
instance where the PCRA offers no remedy.” Commonwealth v. West, 938 A.2d 1034,
1043 (Pa. 2007). There is no question that the PCRA offers a remedy if the claim is
viewed as challenging the constitutionality of a sentence of LWOP.
[J-30-2022] - 12
is not part of the criminal proceeding itself, and it is in fact considered to be civil in
nature.”).
The General Assembly’s determination that a PCRA petition must be filed within
one year of when a petitioner’s judgment of sentence becomes final6 is statutorily
described as a jurisdictional limitation. 42 Pa.C.S. § 9545 (entitled “Jurisdiction and
proceedings”); see also Commonwealth v. Peterkin, 722 A.2d 638, 641 (Pa. 1998) (“[O]n
November 17, 1995, the General Assembly amended the PCRA to require that, as a
matter of jurisdiction, a PCRA petition must be filed within one year of final judgment.”).
We have further concluded that this jurisdictional requirement implicates subject-matter
jurisdiction. Commonwealth v. Fahy, 737 A.2d 214, 222 (Pa. 1999) (“Jurisdictional time
limits go to a court's right or competency to adjudicate a controversy.”); Commonwealth
v. Whitney, 817 A.2d 473, 478 (Pa. 2003), overruled on other grounds by Commonwealth
v. Small, 238 A.3d 1267 (Pa. 2020) (“We have also held that even where the PCRA court
does not address the applicability of the PCRA timing mandate, this Court will consider
the issue sua sponte, as it is a threshold question implicating our subject matter
jurisdiction and ability to grant the requested relief.”). The PCRA’s strict one-year limit on
filing a petition reflects the General Assembly’s intent to accord finality to the criminal
process. See Peterkin, 722 A.2d at 642 (“With the 1995 amendments to the PCRA, the
6 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). The finality line is critical because defendants whose cases are not yet final
are constitutionally entitled to the retroactive application of new rules subject to doctrines
like waiver. Griffith v. Kentucky, 479 U.S. 314 (1987); Commonwealth v. Hays, 218 A.3d
1260 (Pa. 2019) (declining to apply on direct review a new rule due to defendant’s failure
to preserve the issue).
[J-30-2022] - 13
General Assembly has established a scheme in which PCRA petitions are to be accorded
finality. … At some point litigation must come to an end.”).
Relatedly, the PCRA offers a limited ability to obtain relief based on subsequent
changes in the law issued after the one-year period to seek collateral relief has lapsed.
The PCRA contains three statutory exceptions to the time-bar, including, as relevant here,
for the assertion of “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)(iii). This exception balances the societal interest in affording criminal
convictions finality against the societal interest in permitting defendants to obtain relief
based on extraordinary changes in the law.
B.
Hudson and jurisdiction
The Section 9545(b)(1)(iii) exception has been frequently invoked as a basis to
apply Eighth Amendment cases like Miller or extend them to defendants similarly situated
to Appellants. See Commonwealth v Cintora, 69 A.3d 759, 764 (Pa. Super. 2013)
(holding that the exception does not recognize “a new Eighth Amendment right, that those
whose brains were not fully developed at the time of their crimes are free from mandatory
life without parole sentences”); Commonwealth v. Lee, 206 A.3d 1, 10 (Pa. Super. 2019)
(en banc) (“As compelling as the ‘rationale’ argument is, we find it untenable
to extend Miller to one who is over the age of 18 at the time of his or her offense for
purposes of satisfying the newly-recognized constitutional right exception in section
9545(b)(1)(iii).”). Setting aside for the moment that these cases involved claims explicitly
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seeking relief from unconstitutional punishment, the Commonwealth’s argument that
Appellants’ position undermines this body of case law is compelling. Yet, as Appellants
point out, Hudson implicitly accepted that claims challenging parole eligibility are properly
within the Commonwealth Court’s original and exclusive jurisdiction. We thus begin with
this purported discrepancy.
Initially, we reject the Commonwealth’s response that Hudson may be ignored
because the parties did not raise any jurisdictional issue. The General Assembly
conferred the Commonwealth Court with subject-matter jurisdiction over certain matters,
and “subject-matter delineations must be policed by the courts on their own initiative even
at the highest level.” Bisher v. Lehigh Valley Health Network, Inc., 265 A.3d 383, 400
(Pa. 2021) (quoting Ruhrgas AG v. Marathon Oil Co., 526 U.S. 574, 583 (1999)). To the
extent the debate in this case is simply about which court is tasked with adjudicating the
present dispute (as opposed to whether any court can hear the matter), the institutional
interest is somewhat lessened because the General Assembly has authorized this case
to proceed either in the Commonwealth Court or in the relevant courts of common pleas
through the PCRA.7 Nevertheless, this Court could not implicitly sanction the
7 We distinguish Stackhouse on the basis that the parties and this Court agreed that at
least one of the counts belonged in the Commonwealth Court. Moreover, the three-
Justice plurality opinion is not binding, and the three dissenting Justices disagreed with
recharacterizing the complaint. The dissenting Justices opined that the proper course
was to have the monetary damages counts proceed in the courts of common pleas, with
the Commonwealth Court having appellate jurisdiction over those claims once resolved
by the court of common pleas. The controlling vote was cast by Justice Newman, who
opined that the key question was whether the Commonwealth Court, by virtue of having
exclusive original jurisdiction over count one, had ancillary jurisdiction over the remaining
two claims as set forth by Section 761(c). Justice Newman concluded that because “the
General Assembly has expressly removed this variety of claim from the possible
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Commonwealth Court adjudicating a case that the General Assembly removed from its
jurisdiction.
In retrospect, a discussion of jurisdiction in Hudson would have been useful, and
we rectify that omission today. We conclude that when examining the plain language of
Section 761 the Commonwealth Court properly addressed the dispute in Hudson as a
matter within its original jurisdiction. The Hudson petitioner, like the Appellants here, was
serving a LWOP sentence and was denied parole. Hudson then filed a petition for review
in the Commonwealth Court’s original jurisdiction, asking the court to direct the Board to
review him for parole. The Commonwealth Court sustained a demurrer on the grounds
that the Board cannot grant parole to an inmate serving a life sentence. Because Hudson,
like Appellants here, requested that the Board process his parole application, the case
facially supports the Appellants.
A closer examination, however, reveals that the instant petition and the Hudson
claims are only superficially similar. As discussed later in full detail, the primary distinction
is that Hudson’s request for relief required only a determination of whether his sentence
included an implied minimum of one day, whereas Appellants here seek a determination
that their sentence is illegal. The former type of claim need not be brought under the
PCRA whereas the latter must due to the fact each appellant’s sentence became final
long ago.
cognizance of the Commonwealth Court in the exercise of its original jurisdiction, ancillary
jurisdiction over this matter cannot lie.” Stackhouse, 832 A.2d at 1010 (Newman, J.,
concurring). This case involves no comparable questions of ancillary jurisdiction as the
parties agree that the suit must proceed en toto in either the Commonwealth Court or
under the PCRA.
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As this is a matter of statutory interpretation, we return to the text. Section
761(a)(1)(i) states that the Commonwealth Court lacks subject-matter jurisdiction over
claims that constitute “actions or proceedings in the nature of applications for a writ of
habeas corpus or post-conviction relief not ancillary to proceedings within the appellate
jurisdiction of the court.” 42 Pa.C.S. § 761(a)(1)(i). The language “in the nature of” signals
that a court is not cabined by the most generic categorization of the requested relief.
Doing so would risk contradicting legislative intent, as creative plaintiffs can mask the
nature of a claim through artful pleading. We have recognized that the captioning of a
pleading does not control. In Commonwealth v. Porter, 35 A.3d 4, 12 (Pa. 2012), we
stated: “Misdesignation does not preclude a court from deducing the proper nature of a
pleading.” (citing Commonwealth v. Abdul-Salaam, 996 A.2d 482 (Pa. 2010)). In Abdul-
Salaam, we stated, “[n]otwithstanding the exclusivity of the PCRA for such collateral
attacks, appellant styled the petition as a ‘Third Protective Petition for Habeas Corpus
Relief.’” Id. at 483-84. We quashed the appeal as interlocutory and indicated that “the
court should decide the serial PCRA petition—styled by appellant as his ‘Third Protective
Petition.’” These cases indicate that a court should examine the arguments and the
requested relief to discern the true “nature” of the claim.
Thus, Hudson cannot be reduced to the proposition that a claim implicating “parole
eligibility” is automatically included (or excluded) from the Commonwealth Court’s original
jurisdiction. We believe that the starting point for determining the “nature” of a given claim
requires an examination of what effect the requested relief would have in light of the legal
theories offered in support. In short, if the necessary consequence of granting relief
based on the supplied arguments is that the conviction or sentence is undone or otherwise
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modified, then the claim is in the “nature of … a writ of habeas corpus or post-conviction
relief[.]”
Applying this framework to Hudson the claims in that case were not in the nature
of a writ of habeas corpus or post-conviction relief. Had Hudson’s legal theory prevailed,
both his conviction and sentence would remain wholly unchanged. Hudson asserted that
he was eligible for parole because he had reached his minimum sentence of one day.
Because life sentences do not include any minimum, Hudson argued that “he should be
presumed to have a minimum sentence of one day and, as such, that he should
immediately be reviewed for parole.” Id. Hudson pointed out that 42 Pa.C.S. § 9756,
which applies to sentences of total confinement, states that a court “may impose a
sentence to imprisonment without the right to parole” in specified situations, life
imprisonment not among them. 204 A.3d at 398 (quoting 42 Pa.C.S. § 9756(c)). We
agreed that the language was “admittedly somewhat confounding, as it does seem to
imply that, in every other instance besides the four categories mentioned … a sentencing
court may not impose a sentence which omits a parole-eligibility date.” Id. Yet “the sole
statutory directive for courts in imposing a minimum term of total confinement does not
apply to mandatory life sentences.” Id. As a result, trial courts were “unable to specify a
parole-availability date in accordance with law, and unable to omit one in accordance with
law.” Id. We concluded that Hudson “lack[ed] any legal right to parole eligibility” and that
no implied minimum sentence existed. Id. at 399.
But Hudson would have been eligible for parole if his sentence did include an
implied minimum. More significantly, had we agreed that a minimum sentence was
imposed by operation of law, Hudson’s sentence would not have been modified in any
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way. Thus, the predicate condition for merits relief did not involve any disruption of the
underlying sentence. It merely required a judicial determination of whether the sentence
included a presumed minimum. This puts Hudson on the same footing with other cases
that we have determined may proceed outside the PCRA. For example, in
Commonwealth v. Martinez, 147 A.3d 517 (Pa. 2016), we examined three appeals, where
each plaintiff sought lesser sexual registration obligations based on a theory of specific
performance of their plea agreements.8 Our Martinez decision concluded that “a court
must determine whether an alleged term is part of the parties' plea agreement. If the
answer to that inquiry is affirmative, then the convicted criminal is entitled to specific
performance of the term.” Id. at 533. Determining whether an alleged term is part of an
agreement is analogous to the Hudson Court’s determination of whether Hudson’s
sentence contained a presumed minimum.
Further supporting this understanding of Hudson is our order in Brown v.
Pennsylvania Department of Corrections, 81 A.3d 814 (Pa. 2013) (per curiam), wherein
we vacated a Commonwealth Court order and remanded with instructions to transfer to
the court of common pleas. Petitioner David Brown filed a petition for review “alleging
that his confinement … was illegal due to an alleged failure of SCI–Albion to produce a
written sentencing order[.]” Id. The Commonwealth Court dismissed for lack of
jurisdiction. While we declined to address the merits of the claim, our decision confirmed
the Commonwealth Court’s determination that per Section 761(a)(1)(i) the action did not
belong in the Commonwealth Court. Instead, the action belonged “in the jurisdiction and
8 While the Martinez decision did not discuss the PCRA, our subsequent decision in
Commonwealth v. Lacombe, 234 A.3d 602, 617 (Pa. 2020), parenthetically noted that the
petitions would have been untimely under the PCRA.
[J-30-2022] - 19
venue of the court of record from which the order of detention came.” Id. at 815. This
was because Brown “initially and principally is testing ‘the legality of [his] commitment and
detention,’ and therefore his petition for review sounded in habeas corpus.” Id. (quoting
Commonwealth ex rel. Bryant v. Hendrick, 280 A.2d 110, 112 (Pa. 1971)) (bracketing in
original). Brown did not specify whether the claim was to ultimately be treated as a PCRA
petition once transferred to the court of common pleas or whether it was the type of claim
for which the PCRA offered no remedy. See Commonwealth v. Judge, 916 A.2d 511,
520 (Pa. 2007) (permitting petition for writ of habeas corpus to proceed outside the PCRA)
(“Appellant's claim concerning his deportation from Canada to face a death sentence falls
outside the intended scope of the PCRA.”). But the core logic underpinning Brown, that
if a claim is testing the legality of commitment it is in the nature of habeas corpus and thus
is not within the Commonwealth Court’s original jurisdiction, is sound.
C.
These claims test the legality of continued confinement
Having determined that the Hudson claims were not “in the nature of … a writ of
habeas corpus” and thus properly before the Commonwealth Court, the question remains
whether the same is true of these claims. As with Hudson, we make this determination
by examining the legal theories offered in support and assessing the consequences of
granting relief.
Beginning with their legal theories, Appellants forward a creative argument by
attempting to divorce parole eligibility from the criminal sentence. But this purported
distinction breaks down when scrutinized. First, Hudson holds otherwise. We explained
that the “minimum sentence merely sets the time after which he is eligible to serve the
[J-30-2022] - 20
remainder of his sentence on parole.” Hudson, 204 A.3d at 396. Our opinion concluded
that the General Assembly did not intend for a trial judge to impose a minimum sentence
when imposing a sentence of life imprisonment. Furthermore, a minimum sentence could
not be presumed. Id. at 398-99. This represents a holding that the General Assembly
intended that for all offenders who are sentenced to life imprisonment, ineligibility for
parole is a part of their sentence. Nor is that outcome surprising as this Court had already
addressed, albeit in cursory fashion, a similar claim. See Commonwealth v. Cornish, 370
A.2d 291, 293 (Pa. 1977) (“[T]o the extent Cornish's argument can be understood as
challenging the legality of [Section] 1102(b) … because it disallows judicial discretion in
sentencing by providing for a mandatory sentence of life imprisonment in all cases of
murder of the second degree, the contention is devoid of merit.”).
The Dissent states that we “somehow conclude[ ] that Appellants’ judgments of
sentence prohibit parole, which is not what the Crimes Code says.” Dissenting Op. at 4
(Wecht, J.). The Dissent does not cite authority establishing that the judgment of
sentence is defined solely by the punitive measures specified within the Crimes Code,
and we fail to see why the challenged provision in the Parole Code is not fairly described
as part of the criminal sentence. Cf. Warden, Lewisburg Penitentiary v. Marrero, 417 U.S.
653, 658 (1974) (holding that a section of a repealed statute which had barred parole
eligibility for certain narcotics offenders survived the repeal; “Although, of course, the
precise time at which the offender becomes eligible for parole is not part of the sentence
… it is implicit in the terms of the sentence.”). Certainly, a flat categorical prohibition on
parole that applied the moment Appellants were sentenced to the specified term of life
imprisonment constitutes a punitive measure. Id. at 662 (“[O]nly an unusual prisoner
[J-30-2022] - 21
could be expected to think that he was not suffering a penalty when he was denied
eligibility for parole.”). And if the General Assembly attempted to categorically bar parole
eligibility after-the-fact for a set of crimes, that increased punishment would raise serious
constitutional questions. See Cimaszewski v. Bd. of Prob. & Parole, 868 A.2d 416, 426–
27 (Pa. 2005) (“[I]t is now clear that retroactive changes in the laws governing
parole may violate the ex post facto clause. … The controlling inquiry in determining if
an ex post facto violation has occurred is whether retroactive application of the change in
the law creates a significant risk of prolonging Appellant’s incarceration.”) (quotation
marks, citation, and bracketing omitted). As a result, the legislative intent to forever bar
parole eligibility for all individuals convicted of second-degree murder is best described
as part of the judgment of sentence.9 That explains, of course, why so many litigants
9 The Dissent claims that we hold that “provisions of the Parole Code that govern the
powers of the Parole Board are somehow ‘best described as part of the judgement of
sentence.’” Dissenting Op. at 5 (Wecht, J.). We merely observe that, when the General
Assembly bars parole eligibility for a crime, that punitive measure is part of the judgment
of the sentence.
To the extent the Dissent reads our analysis as universally addressing all crimes, that
incorrectly conflates a legislative judgment that certain offenders may never seek parole
with offenders who the General Assembly say may become eligible for parole. In the
former case, the General Assembly’s clear intent to categorically bar parole eligibility
serves to impose a mandatory minimum of life imprisonment without the possibility of
parole. In the latter cases, a prisoner becomes eligible for parole upon serving the
minimum sentence specified, even though the prisoner may or may not be granted parole
at that time. Thus, the observation that parole does not set aside or affect the sentence,
id. at 8 n.27, is inapt. The cited case speaks to “prisoners who seem capable of
rehabilitation outside of prison walls,” id., but that point has no bearing where the General
Assembly had already decided that Appellants should forever remain behind those walls.
See id. at 3 n.8 (conceding that the General Assembly “intended to ensure that those
convicted of second-degree murder are never to be released on parole.”). The Dissent’s
insistence that the judgment of sentence does not prohibit parole is incompatible with that
legislative intent. Absent evolving Eighth Amendment cases regarding the
[J-30-2022] - 22
seek relief via the PCRA when a new Eighth Amendment case is decided: the claim is
that their sentence is now (based on the change in law) illegal. See 42 Pa.C.S. § 9542
(“This subchapter provides for an action by which persons convicted of crimes they did
not commit and persons serving illegal sentences may obtain collateral relief.”).
Nor is it a new notion that the ineligibility for parole when paired with the specified
sentence of life imprisonment operates to impose a mandatory minimum sentence of life
imprisonment without the possibility of parole. Indeed, in Commonwealth v. Cunningham,
81 A.3d 1 (Pa. 2013), which addressed whether Miller would apply retroactively, we
acknowledged that “the Miller majority did not specifically address the question of whether
its holding applies to judgments of sentence for prisoners, such as Appellant, which
already were final as of the time of the Miller decision.” 81 A.3d at 4 (emphasis added).
As then-Chief Justice Castille recognized, the General Assembly had created a
mandatory sentence of life imprisonment without parole. “Prior to Miller, there was
nothing … to restrict the legislative power to establish a mandatory sentence of life
imprisonment without possibility of parole … as appropriate punishment for a juvenile who
commits murder of the first or second degree.” Id. at 11 (Castille, C.J, concurring).
Furthermore, accepting Appellants’ description of their parole eligibility as a mere
“condition” with respect to their convictions and yet part of the sentence for other
convictions, including other types of felony murder, would lead to absurd results. For
example, a defendant who commits second-degree murder by means of arson “shall be
sentenced to life imprisonment without right to parole.” 18 Pa.C.S. § 3301(b)(1). The
constitutionality of criminal sentences, these Appellants would have no basis whatsoever
to challenge their inability to seek parole.
[J-30-2022] - 23
inability to receive parole under this statute satisfies the Dissent’s Crimes Code-based
test and thus an individual convicted of that crime could not seek relief in the
Commonwealth Court under the Appellants’ theory. This is an absurd result,10 which
Hudson rightly eschews by treating all individuals serving a sentence of life imprisonment
as ineligible for parole regardless of the statutory language contained within the
underlying crime or other sentencing statutes.11,12 In all cases where a trial court is
required to impose a sentence of life imprisonment, the inability to set a minimum period
10And perhaps an unconstitutional one, as there would seem to be no valid basis to permit
one set of individuals to challenge their parole ineligibility while denying the same to
others even though the General Assembly intended for all to be ineligible for parole.
The Dissent forces its views of the legal issues upon our opinion, claiming that this
observation suggests that the General Assembly could not impose different punishments
for different crimes. Dissenting Op. at 5 n.14 (Wecht, J.). The General Assembly can of
course dictate different punishments for different crimes. The potential infirmity arises
from the fact that we conclude that the General Assembly intended for sentences of life
imprisonment to include, as part of the criminal sentence, a total inability to receive parole.
11 The statutes enacted following Miller are the exception to this. 18 Pa.C.S. § 1102.1.
12 The Dissent claims that this is a “startling admission indeed, and not one that we often
encounter in a judicial opinion.” Dissenting Op. at 5 (Wecht, J.). The “startling” nature of
our observation comes only from the Dissent grafting onto our opinion its view that a
judgment of sentence is solely defined by the punishment specified within the Crimes
Code—a position that we reject. To be clear, we do not blithely ignore statutory language.
Instead, we merely hold that regardless of whether the General Assembly chose to
explicitly insert the words “without parole” within the Crimes Code the various statutory
provisions, working together, operate as a matter of law to impose a sentence of life
imprisonment without the possibility of parole. The Dissent does not say what else a
categorical bar on parole eligibility would possibly be if not a punitive sanction flowing
from the criminal conviction (i.e., a sentence), nor does it explain how Eighth Amendment
cases have any bearing on the legal issue presented if Appellants are not in fact attacking
their criminal sentences.
[J-30-2022] - 24
of incarceration means that by operation of law the offender is serving a mandatory
sentence of life imprisonment without parole.
Second, the case law that Appellants rely upon to support the merits of their claim
all involve the constitutionality of criminal sentences. Appellants’ papers are replete with
references to United States Supreme Court case law describing the Eighth Amendment’s
proportionality component. The Eighth Amendment prohibits “cruel and unusual
punishments,” and, for the most part, decisions interpreting the Eighth Amendment
“consider punishments challenged not as inherently barbaric but as disproportionate to
the crime.” Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48, 59 (2010). The proportionality concept is
rooted in the concept that “punishment for crime should be graduated and proportioned
to offense.” Weems v. United States, 217 U.S. 349, 367 (1910).
Proportionality challenges “fall within two general classifications.” Graham, 560
U.S. at 59. The first type is challenges to a sentence’s length given all the circumstances
of a case. Id. The second involves categorical challenges, i.e., a particular penalty is
barred in some circumstances. Prior to Graham, categorical challenges involved only the
death penalty, and those analyses further broke down into (1) whether the conduct
warranted the death penalty; See, e.g., Enmund v. Florida, 458 U.S. 782 (1982) (holding
that death penalty is categorically prohibited for juveniles who commit nonhomicide
offenses); Kennedy v. Louisiana, 554 U.S. 407 (2008) (holding that death penalty is
unconstitutionally excessive penalty for crimes against individual persons where death
did not occur; striking down statute authorizing death penalty for rape of a child under
twelve), or (2) whether some characteristic inherent to the class of offender renders them
ineligible for the death penalty; See, e.g., Ford v. Wainwright, 477 U.S. 399 (1986)
[J-30-2022] - 25
(barring capital punishment upon insane prisoners); Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304
(2002) (barring death penalty for intellectually disabled individuals); Roper v. Simmons,
543 U.S. 551 (2005) (barring death penalty for offenders who committed homicide as
juvenile). Graham marked the first time that the court considered a categorical challenge
to a term-of-years sentence; the high Court held that a juvenile cannot be sentenced to
LWOP for a nonhomicide offense. See Miller, 567 U.S. 460 (holding that mandatory
sentence of LWOP for juvenile homicide offender is unconstitutional); Jones v.
Mississippi, __ U.S. __, 141 S. Ct. 1307, 1315 (2021) (holding that “permanent
incorrigibility is not an eligibility criterion akin to sanity or a lack of intellectual disability,”
and thus no separate factual finding is required before sentencing juvenile homicide
offender to LWOP).
Appellants wish to extend this case law to mandatory LWOP sentences.
Appellants’ Brief at 8 (“Appellants seek an analogous application of the longstanding
jurisprudence designating those who did not take a life or intend to take a life as having
categorically diminished culpability to Pennsylvania's complete prohibition on any
meaningful opportunity for release from prison.”). In terms of these precedents,
Appellants lodge a categorical challenge to a term-of-years sentence.13 Id. at 35
(maintaining that Section 6137(a)(1) is unconstitutional “as applied to Appellants due to
their categorically-diminished culpability because they did not take a life or intend to take
13 We need not go into detail on the merits of their claims, but at various times the petition
for review alluded to an as-applied challenge instead of a categorical. See Graham, 560
U.S. at 91-94 (Roberts, C.J., concurring) (rejecting categorical ban on LWOP for
nonhomicide offender but concluding that, under the circumstances of the particular case,
the sentence was grossly disproportionate).
[J-30-2022] - 26
a life[.]”). As Graham recognized, an assertion that “a particular type of sentence as it
applies to an entire class of offenders who have committed a range of crimes” is
unconstitutional attacks the “sentencing practice itself[.]” Id. at 61. Indeed, these Eighth
Amendment precedents are simply irrelevant unless Appellants are challenging the
“sentencing practice” scheme in Pennsylvania that results in their ineligibility for parole.
In Montgomery v. Louisiana, 577 U.S. 190, 201 (2016), the United States Supreme Court
held that States must give retroactive effect to Miller because the case “eliminated [the]
State's power to … impose a given punishment.” Appellants seek to build on these cases
by eliminating the Commonwealth’s ability to impose their punishment, i.e., they challenge
the legality of their sentence. As Hudson made clear, “in view of the mandatory nature of
the life sentence associated with his offense, [the trial court] was required to sentence
Appellant to life without parole.” Hudson, 204 A.3d at 399. This is a “sentencing practice”
that yields a mandatory LWOP sentence, which renders the Appellants categorically
ineligible for parole. Appellants are free to challenge the constitutionality of that
sentencing practice, but at the end of the day the arguments supporting the instant petition
for relief principally test the legality of Appellants’ continuing confinement in light of
evolving Eighth Amendment law.
The Miller Court readily understood that our Crimes Code and Parole Code work
in tandem to supply a sentence of life imprisonment without parole, with parole ineligibility
a part of the sentence itself. “Of the [twenty-nine] jurisdictions mandating life without
parole for children, more than half do so by virtue of generally applicable penalty
provisions, imposing the sentence without regard to age.” Miller, 567 U.S. at 486. In the
accompanying footnote, the Court listed Pennsylvania as one of those jurisdictions, citing
[J-30-2022] - 27
18 Pa. C.S. §§ 1102(a), (b), and 61 Pa. C.S. § 6137(a)(1). Id. at n.13. These “generally
applicable penalty provisions” plainly result in a mandatory sentence of not just life
imprisonment, but of life imprisonment without parole and reflect a legislative
determination that offenders who receive a life sentence may never be released through
the Board’s parole process. Indeed, the United States Supreme Court used the term
“sentencing scheme” as opposed to “a sentence of life in prison without parole,”
recognizing that many jurisdictions, including this Commonwealth, impose the punitive
measure of forever barring parole eligibility through statutes that jointly operate to ensure
an offender is ineligible for release. Id. at 479 (“We therefore hold that the Eighth
Amendment forbids a sentencing scheme that mandates life in prison without possibility
of parole for juvenile offenders.”) (emphasis added). The term “scheme” captures the
fundamental point that “mandatory sentencing schemes … by definition remove a judge’s
or jury’s discretion.” Id. at 483 n.10. Obviously, the same is true here. The trial judge
was barred from imposing anything other than life imprisonment, and, in turn, the Parole
Code ensures that these offenders are ineligible for parole. Our “sentencing scheme”
therefore results in a sentence of life imprisonment without parole, not simply life
imprisonment.14 We thus find Appellants’ argument that their ineligibility of parole is not
part of the “true” sentence to be unavailing.
14 This is not a novel concept. For example, in Michigan, pre-Miller adult offenders were
treated no differently than juveniles whose cases were adjudicated in the adult courts.
“Because an adult convicted of first-degree murder ‘shall be punished by imprisonment
for life,’ MCL 750.316(1), and is not eligible for parole, MCL 791.234(6)(a), defendants
were ultimately sentenced to terms of life without parole.” People v. Carp, 852 N.W.2d
801, 812 (Mi. 2014). Thus, even though the Michigan statute specified only a sentence
of “life imprisonment,” the court acknowledged that the actual sentence was life without
parole. As stated by the Supreme Court of Louisiana:
[J-30-2022] - 28
D.
Analogous federal law
Our analysis tracks the federal cases relied upon by Appellants, which deal with
the interaction of 42 U.S. § 1983 and the federal habeas corpus statute. Both statutes
“provide access to a federal forum for claims of unconstitutional treatment at the hands
of state officials, but they differ in their scope and operation.” Heck v. Humphrey, 512
U.S. 477, 480 (1994). As relevant here, a “potential overlap” occurs when a state prisoner
files a Section 1983 claim but “challenges the fact or duration of his confinement and
seeks immediate or speedier release[.]” Id. at 481. These claims “may come within the
literal terms of [Section] 1983” by asserting a deprivation of constitutional rights but may
nonetheless be barred due to the overlap with the habeas statute. Heck was an example
of a suit barred due to that overlap. Heck, serving a prison sentence based on a
conviction for voluntary manslaughter, filed a Section 1983 claim seeking monetary
damages from prosecutors and a police investigator, alleging that the officials committed
various constitutional violations during the prosecution of his case, including knowingly
destroying exculpatory evidence. Heck argued that the claim could proceed under
Section 1983 because he did not seek release from custody. Heck had relied on Preiser
In a similar situation, this Court noted that since Section
15:574.4(B) provides unequivocally that no inmate serving a
life sentence shall be eligible for parole, parole consideration
would be withheld from the defendant, by operation of law,
despite the fact that the applicable penalty provision did not
include the words “without benefit of parole.”
Bosworth v. Whitley, 627 So. 2d 629, 635 (La. 1993). The same is true here: by operation
of law parole was withheld from these Appellants, and any challenge to that statutory bar
necessarily seeks to challenge the legality of their continued confinement.
[J-30-2022] - 29
v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 475 (1973), which stated in dictum that a Section 1983 suit could
proceed if only monetary damages are at issue. The Heck Court disavowed that theory.
“That statement may not be true, however, when establishing the basis for the damages
claim necessarily demonstrates the invalidity of the conviction.” Heck, 512 U.S. at 481-
82. If so, the plaintiff is attacking the fact or length of confinement and the claim must
follow the habeas corpus procedures.
That follows our analysis today. As in Heck, Appellants’ petition for relief does not
explicitly seek immediate release from custody nor a declaration that their sentences are
unconstitutional. But the inevitable consequence of extending the Eighth Amendment
case law to Appellants would result in a holding that their mandatory sentences of life
imprisonment without parole are unconstitutional. The same was true in Heck. Even
though the litigant did not directly challenge the conviction, the Heck Court recognized
that a successful Section 1983 claim for damages would have that effect.
[W]hen a state prisoner seeks damages in a § 1983 suit, the
district court must consider whether a judgment in favor of the
plaintiff would necessarily imply the invalidity of his conviction
or sentence; if it would, the complaint must be dismissed
unless the plaintiff can demonstrate that the conviction or
sentence has already been invalidated. But if the district court
determines that the plaintiff's action, even if successful,
will not demonstrate the invalidity of any outstanding criminal
judgment against the plaintiff, the action should be allowed to
proceed, in the absence of some other bar to the suit.
Id. at 487 (footnote omitted).
Requiring courts to “consider whether a judgment in favor … would necessarily
imply the invalidity of his conviction or sentence” requires a court to consider the result in
light of the arguments presented. In fact, the case that Appellants rely on proves the
point. In Hill, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit addressed various
[J-30-2022] - 30
claims stemming from a suit filed in 2010 by numerous juvenile offenders which correctly
anticipated the outcomes in Miller and Montgomery. The litigants raised several claims,
including, as pertinent here, a categorical claim that juvenile offenders can never be
sentenced to LWOP for homicide offenses, and a separate claim that the available
“policies and procedures” for parole were constitutionally defective. The former count
was barred by the holding in Heck, while the latter was not. The former “functionally asks
us to declare sentences of life without parole for juvenile offenders unconstitutional. Such
a ruling would necessarily implicate the duration of Plaintiffs' impending sentences by
imposing a ceiling, and Heck therefore requires Plaintiffs to follow a different legal path to
obtain the relief.” Hill, 878 F.3d at 208-09. The latter claim, however, could proceed
under Section 1983.
Appellants quote the disposition of the latter claim but ignore the first. The flaw in
that selectivity is that the latter claim could proceed only because of Montgomery’s
holding that Miller was a substantive rule that must be given retroactive effect by the
States. Montgomery, 577 U.S. at 201 (“Substantive rules … place certain criminal laws
and punishments altogether beyond the State's power to impose. It follows that when a
State enforces a proscription or penalty barred by the Constitution, the resulting
conviction or sentence is, by definition, unlawful.”). Thus, a substantive rule has “the
automatic consequence of invalidating a defendant's conviction or sentence.” Id.
(emphasis added). Indeed, the Hill Court’s discussion of this count approvingly cited a
case that involved a prisoner who “had been convicted of possession of more than 650
grams of cocaine and was made technically eligible for parole when the Michigan
Supreme Court eliminated a parole limitation for possession offenses[.]” Hill, 878 F.3d at
[J-30-2022] - 31
209. Thus, those claims could proceed under Section 1983 only because the criminal
sentence had already been invalidated. Heck, 512 U.S. at 487 (stating that “the complaint
must be dismissed unless the plaintiff can demonstrate that the conviction or sentence
has already been invalidated”). There is no case holding that Appellants’ sentences are
automatically invalidated. Appellants seek to have the Commonwealth Court issue that
holding. The General Assembly, however, deprived the Commonwealth Court of the
needed subject-matter jurisdiction to do that since the PCRA is the only venue available
for these litigants.15
15 The Dissent fears that “future legislative reforms will now be hamstrung” by our holding
that the ineligibility of parole is deemed part of the judgment of sentence. Dissenting Op.
at 13 (Wecht, J.). Our holding recognizes that the General Assembly was empowered to
set the punishment for second degree murder as life imprisonment without the possibility
of parole, and that the PCRA reflects its judgment that the timeframe for seeking collateral
relief from those sentences was deliberately curtailed.
Nothing we say today addresses the General Assembly’s “ability to expand parole
eligibility to lifers with a simple change to the Parole Code.” Id. at 14. We acknowledge
that in Commonwealth v. Sutley, 378 A.2d 780 (Pa. 1977), this Court addressed a statute
permitting offenders who were convicted under a harsher statute the right to be
resentenced under a more lenient amended statute. The Sutley Court held that the
statute was unconstitutional by violating the separation of powers. Again, these issues
go far beyond the limited issue presented here and we thus briefly note only that the
Sutley decision has been criticized for its focus on the judiciary’s authority. See Villani v.
Seibert, 159 A.3d 478, 487 n.6 (Pa. 2017) (“We note that several Justices, as well as
other judges and commentators, have expressed substantial discomfort with decisions,
such as Sutley, which have evaluated legislative social policy judgements having broad-
scale, substantive impacts mainly in terms of a concern for judicial power.”). Moreover,
the Sutley decision was largely concerned with the fact the judge had previously
exercised judicial discretion. 378 A.2d at 786 (“The judicial discretion is the determination
of the period of control over the person of the offender in view of the nature of the crime,
the background of the defendant and the other pertinent considerations for such a
decision.”). Those concerns have no applicability where the General Assembly had
completely removed that discretion in the first place by enacting a statutory scheme
resulting in a mandatory minimum of life imprisonment without parole. In sum, whatever
[J-30-2022] - 32
IV.
Conclusion
If the Commonwealth Court credited the legal theories argued in support of the
parole eligibility claims, it would necessarily invalidate the criminal punishment imposed
by our “sentencing practices.” Appellants’ sentences can, of course, be challenged.
Because each Appellant’s sentence became final long ago, those challenges must
proceed, as Appellants admit, under the PCRA. Appellants’ Brief at 31 (“If Appellants are
indeed attacking their sentences as the Commonwealth Court found, then their
challenges must be brought under the PCRA.”).16 Accordingly, we affirm.17
the merits of these points and distinctions, this case does not involve legislative reforms
to LWOP sentences.
16 Judge Leadbetter’s dissenting opinion observed that any PCRA petitions filed by these
Appellants “have been time-barred for many years and when they were timely, the pled
circumstances which now give rise to potential Eighth Amendment claims did not exist.”
Scott, 256 A.3d at 496 (Leadbetter, J., dissenting). The “potential Eighth Amendment
claims” did exist, they were merely foreclosed, then and now, by precedent. The PCRA
exists to provide finality to the criminal process and the General Assembly did not intend
to permit an end-run around the time-bar through creative pleading.
17We decline to remand the case to the Commonwealth Court with directions to transfer
the petitions to the relevant courts of common pleas, as set forth by the Judicial Code:
If an appeal or other matter is taken to or brought in a court or
magisterial district of this Commonwealth which does not
have jurisdiction of the appeal or other matter, the court or
magisterial district judge shall not quash such appeal or
dismiss the matter, but shall transfer the record thereof to the
proper tribunal of this Commonwealth[.]
42 Pa.C.S. § 5103. We believe that transfer is not warranted because Appellants
concede that their petitions would be dismissed as untimely. As there is no possibility
that the result would be any different, judicial economy dictates that we affirm the order.
[J-30-2022] - 33
Chief Justice Todd and Justice Dougherty join the opinion.
Justice Mundy files a concurring opinion.
Justice Wecht files a dissenting opinion.
The Late Chief Justice Baer did not participate in the decision of this matter.
Justice Brobson did not participate in the consideration or decision of this matter.
[J-30-2022] - 34