Justia Pennsylvania Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

PPM Atlantic Renewable (“PPM”) unsuccessfully requested that the Fayette County Zoning Board grant it numerous special exceptions and variances for it to build 24 windmill turbines on leased land. This matter involved whether an objector must comply with a county court order to post bond as a condition of appealing to the Commonwealth Court, where the developer was the appellant in the county court. Upon review, the Supreme Court concluded the Commonwealth Court should not have quashed the objector's merits appeal based on the the objector's failure to post bond. Accordingly, the Supreme Court reversed the Commonwealth Court’s order and remanded the case for further proceedings. View "PPM Atlantic Renewable v. Fayette County Zoning Hearing Board" on Justia Law

In this appeal, the issue before the Supreme Court was whether Act 152 of 2004 (“Act 152”) violated the “single subject” rule of Article III, Section 3 of the Pennsylvania Constitution,3 and, if so, whether the portions of Act 152 amending Pennsylvania’s “Megan’s Law” could be severed from the other provisions of the Act and remain in force. The Court concluded that Act 152 did violate Article III, Section 3, since its various provisions do not all relate to a single unifying subject. Furthermore, the Court struck Act 152 in its entirety. View "Pennsylvania v. Neiman" on Justia Law

The issue before the Supreme Court in this case was the interpretation of Section 602 of the Real Estate Tax Sale Law, which concerned the notice requirements for an upset tax sale for non-payment of delinquent taxes. Specifically, the issue centered on whether the Commonwealth Court correctly held that “proof of mailing” in subsection 602(e)(2) referred exclusively to United States Postal Service Form 3817 (a Certificate of Mailing). Upon review of the facts of this case, the Supreme Court concluded that although the Washington County Tax Claim Bureau did not obtain a Certificate of Mailing, it did proffer other documents from the USPS as evidence to establish “proof of mailing.” The Court held that these USPS documents satisfied the statutory mandate for “proof of mailing” in subsection 602(e)(2).View "Horton v. Washington County Tax Claim Bureau" on Justia Law

Appellees (husband and wife) created The Dorothy M. Miller Family Irrevocable Trust, naming Mrs. Miller as settlor, and her and her husband as co-trustees. The sole beneficiaries of the trust were appellees and their only child. Appellees transferred title to their house and farm to the trust, but did not pay realty transfer tax on the transfer, claiming it was an excluded transaction under the Realty Transfer Tax Act as a transfer to a "living trust." The Department of Revenue issued a Realty Transfer Tax Notice of Determination providing the transfer was subject to realty transfer taxes, plus applicable interest and fees. Appellees unsuccessfully petitioned for redetermination with the Department’s Board of Appeals. The Commonwealth Court reversed, finding that Mrs. Miller's testimony that she intended the Trust to be a substitute for her will was sufficient to define it as a living trust. The Commonwealth appealed. The Supreme Court found the Miller Trust failed to meet the statutory definition of a living trust or will substitute. As such, the Court reversed and remanded for calculation of transfer tax. View "Miller v. Pennsylvania" on Justia Law

Appellant was convicted on two counts of first-degree murder for the shooting deaths of Mendez Thomas and Lisa Diaz. On appeal, appellant challenged the sufficiency of the evidence presented against him at trial. After review of the trial court record, the Supreme Court found the evidence sufficient to support appellant's murder convictions. View "Pennsylvania v. Sanchez" on Justia Law

Appellant Alexander Keaton appealed the denial of his petition for post-conviction relief. He claimed the PCRA court erroneously denied the underlying claim that his invoking a Fifth Amendment right to counsel during custodial interrogations on a rape charge invalidated his uncounseled, incriminating statements given weeks later in an unrelated murder and rape case. Upon review of the matter, the Supreme Court found appellant never invoked his right to counsel in the initial rape case, and as such, the PCRA court did not err in denying appellant relief.View "Pennsylvania v. Keaton" on Justia Law

Appellants appealed a Commonwealth Court decision which considered the application of personal income tax (PIT) to various nonresidents, who invested as limited partners in a Connecticut limited partnership, which existed for the sole purpose of owning and operating a skyscraper in Pittsburgh, which ultimately went into foreclosure in 2005. The Commonwealth Court held that the partnership was subject to PIT commensurate with the total debt discharged as a result of the foreclosure, and therefore the nonresident limited partners were liable for PIT in an amount proportionate with their shares in the partnership. The Partnership incurred net operating losses for accounting, federal tax, and PIT purposes in every year of its existence. For PIT purposes, the Partnership allocated those losses to Appellants (and all of the other limited partners) and, because Appellants had no Pennsylvania-based income for 1985-2004, they did not file Pennsylvania PIT returns for those years. By June 30, 2005, the compounded, accrued interest totaled $2.32 billion, thus making the total liability on the Purchase Money Note more than $2.6 billion. When the Note matured given the insurmountable debt that had accrued, the Partnership was unable to sell the Property. Accordingly, the lender foreclosed, and, because the Partnership no longer owned the Property, the Partnership soon after liquidated. None of the limited partners, including Appellants, received any proceeds from the Property’s foreclosure or the Partnership’s liquidation, and therefore lost their entire investments in the Partnership. Following the Property’s foreclosure, but prior to the Partnership’s liquidation, the Partnership reported a gain as a result of the foreclosure on its federal and state tax filings that consisted of the unpaid balance of the Purchase Money Note’s principal and the accrued, compounded interest. Despite their individual investment losses, the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue assessed PIT against Appellants, plus interest and penalties, related to the foreclosure on the Property for the 2005 tax year. The Supreme Court empathized with Appellants who found "themselves with significant financial burdens because of the loss of their investments, the liquidation of the Partnership, and the foreclosure of the Property." Nevertheless, the assessment of PIT by the Department was proper, as a matter of constitutional, statutory, and regulatory law. Therefore, the Court affirmed the order of the Commonwealth Court sustaining the assessment of PIT. View "Wirth v. Pennsylvania " on Justia Law

Appellees are former Community College of Beaver County students who, according to their allegations, enrolled in and completed substantial work in CCBC's police training program. Their academic progress was cut short when, in 2002, CCBC’s alleged malfeasance caused state officials to decertify the program, thereby rendering their educational and financial investments largely worthless. Appellees filed actions in the Court of Common Pleas of Beaver County, asserting claims of breach of contract, breach of warranty, and a claim under the Unfair Trade Practices and Consumer Protection Law 's (UTPCPL) provisions providing a private cause of action for "persons" injured by other "persons'" employment of unfair trade practices. In this appeal, the issue before the Supreme Court centered on whether the UTPCPL defined a "person" subject to liability as including both private entities and political subdivision agencies. After careful review, the Supreme Court held that the UTPCPL defined a "person" as including private entities, but not political subdivision agencies. Accordingly, the Court reversed the Commonwealth Court's order affirming the trial court's denial of partial summary judgment on this issue and remanded to the Commonwealth Court for further proceedings. View "Meyer v. Community College of Beaver County" on Justia Law

The issue this case presented to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court centered on the interpretation of Sections 6152(a)(1) and (a)(2)(i) of the Medical Records Act ("MRA,"42 Pa.C.S. secs. 6151-6160), which requires businesses such as appellee MRO Corporation, which reproduces medical records for patients and their representatives, to limit their copying charges to their estimated actual and reasonable expenses of reproducing requested charts or records (subject to a statutory ceiling rate), or whether such businesses may simply charge the statutory ceiling rate. Appellant asked the Court to review the Superior Court's finding that, where a medical records reproducer fails to disclose and charge its estimated actual and reasonable expenses and instead charges the MRA's ceiling rates which the records requestor then pays, the defenses of "voluntary payment" and "prior approval" bars the records requestor from maintaining a breach of contract claim to recoup alleged overpayments. MRO did not dispute that the MRA requires the records reproducer to disclose to the requestor “the estimated actual and reasonable expenses” of reproduction. But, MRO argues that the "expenses" so disclosed do not represent actual costs of reproduction; rather, MRO argues that "expenses" refers to the cost to the party making the request, and that expense is determined by the pricing schedule. In MRO's view, the pricing schedule establishes the "expense" to be estimated and then passed on to the requestor. "MRO's construction of the Act is intricate and ingenious in some respects, and it articulates what may be a rational and legitimate approach to the general question of how best and fairly to regulate the expenses of securing medical records." However, the Supreme Court did not believe that the structure and plain language of the provisions of the Act at issue here supported MRO's construction. The Supreme Court reversed the Superior Court and remanded the matter to the trial court for further proceedings. View "Wayne M. Chiurazzi Law, Inc., et al. v. MRO Corporation" on Justia Law

Appellee was arrested and charged with knowing and intentional possession of a controlled substance, possession with intent to deliver a controlled substance (PWID), and conspiracy with another to commit PWID. At appellee’s bench trial, the Commonwealth presented Officer Richard Cujdik’s testimony, money seized from the other person, and the drugs. The trial court found appellee guilty of conspiracy and possession of a controlled substance, but not guilty of PWID. Appellee was then sentenced to six to 23 months imprisonment followed by two years' probation for conspiracy, and a concurrent six to 23 months imprisonment and one year of probation for possession. Four days after the trial, the Philadelphia Daily News published an article alleging police misconduct by Officer Cujdik, his brother (also a narcotics officer), and other officers during a raid of a convenience store in 2007. In this appeal, the issue on appeal to the Supreme Court was whether a newspaper article submitted as the sole support for a motion for new trial on the basis of after-discovered evidence warranted the grant of a hearing. Finding allegations in an article did not constitute evidence, the Supreme Court reversed the Superior Court’s order remanding for a hearing on appellee’s after-discovered evidence claim. View "Pennsylvania v. Castro" on Justia Law