Resources

Pennsylvania's PCRA deadline is one year from the date the judgment of sentence became final. How that date is calculated, the three exceptions, and why the deadline is jurisdictional.

A direct appeal challenges errors on the trial record. A PCRA petition raises what the record does not show, such as ineffective counsel or new evidence. Which comes first, and why order matters.

How Pennsylvania courts decide whether a trial lawyer was constitutionally ineffective: the three-prong Pierce test, common examples, and what evidence a PCRA petition needs.

A denied PCRA petition can be appealed to the Superior Court within 30 days. What the Rule 907 notice means, how the appeal works, and when a second petition or federal habeas corpus is possible.

How new evidence reopens a Pennsylvania conviction: the difference between the newly-discovered-facts exception to the PCRA deadline and the after-discovered-evidence claim on the merits, and the four-part test.

When a Pennsylvania state prisoner can file a federal habeas petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2254, how the one-year federal deadline is tolled by a PCRA petition, exhaustion, and the deferential standard of review.

What to expect when a PCRA petition is filed in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas: where it is filed, who reviews it, the DA's PCRA Unit, timelines, and the role of the Conviction Integrity Unit.

What Brady v. Maryland requires prosecutors to disclose, the three-part test Pennsylvania courts apply, how police knowledge is imputed to the prosecution, and how a Brady claim fits the PCRA's grounds and timeliness exceptions.

What the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania held in Commonwealth v. Lee (March 26, 2026), what it did not decide, who serving a second-degree murder life sentence can act now, and how the PCRA deadline will run once retroactivity is decided.

What the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania held in In re Alisha Shepard Smith (May 27, 2026), a case John Julian briefed, argued, and won: when the Commonwealth keeps property after dismissing the charges, the denial of a Rule 588 motion is a de facto forfeiture, and forfeiture requires a statute.

What the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania held in Commonwealth v. Jenkins (October 1, 2026): a prosecutor may not use a defendant's pre-arrest retention of counsel as a sign of guilt, but the error is subject to harmless-error review. Summary, separate opinions, and what it means for direct appeals and PCRA petitions.

What the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania held in Commonwealth v. Gaspard (October 1, 2026): to convict for theft by deception over a benefits application, the Commonwealth must prove the false statement mattered to eligibility or the amount paid. Summary, the overruling of Volk, and what it means for appeals and PCRA petitions.

What the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania held in Commonwealth v. Worzel (October 1, 2026): 75 Pa.C.S. § 3807(e)(2) does not force a judge to terminate DUI ARD after a violation, because Rule 318(C) discretion applies. Summary and what it means for ARD participants.

Arizona's Court of Appeals vacated a manslaughter sentence after the judge relied on an AI video of the victim. What the court held, and what it means for sentencing in Pennsylvania.

Whether a mandatory sentence of life without parole for second-degree (felony) murder violates the Eighth Amendment or the cruel punishments clause of Article I, Section 13 of the Pennsylvania Constitution, where the defendant did not kill or intend to kill.

Whether the PCRA court properly granted a capital defendant a new guilt-phase trial based on trial counsel's cross-examination of a jailhouse informant, Brady and Napue violations concerning that informant, and counsel's failure to seek suppression of two police statements.

On King's Bench review, whether the PCRA court properly granted a new trial on a facially untimely Brady claim that the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office conceded, and what safeguards apply to conceded PCRA relief.

Whether a capital petitioner was entitled to guilt-phase or penalty-phase relief on a timely first PCRA petition based on Brady and Napue violations involving a jailhouse informant, multiple ineffectiveness claims, the PCRA judge's refusal to recuse, and cumulative prejudice.

Whether a PCRA petition may be used to challenge the constitutionality of sexual offender registration under Subchapter I of SORNA II.

Whether capital resentencing counsel was ineffective for failing to object adequately to evidence that the defendant read books about murder and aspired to be a serial killer.

Whether a third-party confession can serve as a newly discovered fact under the timeliness exception in 42 Pa.C.S. § 9545(b)(1)(ii), and whether the petitioner must establish that fact with evidence admissible at a PCRA hearing.

Whether a trial court may reinstate direct appeal rights nunc pro tunc by agreement of the parties when no PCRA petition requesting that relief has been filed.

Whether trial counsel was ineffective for misadvising Warfel about a mandatory minimum, causing him to reject a plea of 3.5 to 7 years and receive 10 to 20 years after trial, where the offer and the mandatory minimum had been stated on the record at a pretrial hearing.

Whether first PCRA counsel was ineffective for filing a Turner/Finley no-merit letter rather than pursuing claims that preliminary-hearing counsel was ineffective for stipulating to the medical examiner's testimony and that standby counsel was ineffective at a pro se murder trial.

Whether a PCRA court may grant nunc pro tunc permission to file an untimely PCRA petition based on prior PCRA counsel's failure to file a timely first petition, when no statutory exception was pleaded.

Whether a pro se petitioner whose first petition was dismissed after a Turner/Finley letter was entitled to relief on layered claims that PCRA counsel and PCRA appellate counsel were ineffective for failing to raise trial and appellate counsel's ineffectiveness.

Whether a PCRA court properly granted a new trial on an after-discovered-evidence claim based on a deceased witness's affidavit recanting his trial testimony, over the Commonwealth's objection that the affidavit was inadmissible hearsay.

Whether a PCRA court had jurisdiction to correct an admittedly illegal probation-revocation sentence when the petition was untimely and the only claimed exception was that former direct-appeal counsel misinformed the petitioner about the PCRA deadline.

Whether a pro se petitioner may raise PCRA counsel's ineffectiveness for the first time on appeal when he could have raised it in a response to the Rule 907 notice but did not.

Whether trial counsel was ineffective for failing to move to suppress iPhone evidence after police, without a warrant, powered on the phone and called a suspected number to confirm it rang, then used that confirmation to obtain a search warrant.

Whether PCRA relief reinstating only the right to file a petition for allowance of appeal resets the PCRA's one-year clock so that a later petition counts as a timely first petition.

Whether Smith v. Arizona (2024) recognized a new, retroactive constitutional right satisfying the exception in § 9545(b)(1)(iii) for a second petition challenging a medical examiner's testimony under the Confrontation Clause.

Whether a pro se filing attacking the IDSI statute as void for vagueness and the limitations tolling provision as ex post facto is a PCRA petition or a habeas petition, and whether the claims are cognizable in habeas.

On remand under Commonwealth v. Hardy, whether a petitioner who pleaded guilty to a 1992 rape and murder made the prima facie showing of actual innocence required for post-conviction DNA testing under 42 Pa.C.S. § 9543.1.

Former detective, Philadelphia Police Department Homicide Unit. Convicted in 2022.

Former detective, Philadelphia Police Department Homicide Unit; described in petitions as partnered with Detective Omar (also spelled Ohmarr) Jenkins. Convicted of perjury and obstruction in 2024.

Former detective, Philadelphia Police Department Homicide Unit. Pleaded guilty in 2017.

Former officer, Philadelphia Police Department Narcotics Field Unit; with former Officer Jeffrey Walker. Police Board of Inquiry finding; the Commonwealth has said it will not call him as a witness.

Officers Thomas Liciardello, John Speiser, Brian Reynolds, Perry Betts, Michael Spicer, and Linwood Norman, Philadelphia Police Department Narcotics Field Unit. Indicted in 2014 and acquitted of all charges in 2015; the District Attorney stopped calling five of the six as witnesses in 2012.

Philadelphia Police Department Homicide Division. In the decisions reviewed, no court has found misconduct by either detective; the PCRA petitions built on their names have been denied.