Opinion
May 23, 2003.
No. 981 MAL 2002, Petition for Allowance of Appeal from the Order and Memorandum Opinion of the Superior Court (Del Sole, PJ., Hudock, Popovich, JJ.) dated August 19, 2002, quashing the appeal from the Order of the Court of Common Pleas of Lehigh County at No.s 2265-2268/1976, dated December 21, 1999.
ORDER
AND NOW, this 23rd day of May 2003, the Petition for Allowance of Appeal is granted. The initial order granting petitioner leave to appeal nunc pro tunc granted him 60 days to file that appeal. See Order dated 12/21/99 (filed 11/14/01). As the appeal was filed within that 60 day period, the Superior Court's quashal order is vacated and the appeal is remanded for consideration on the merits.
Justice SAYLOR files a concurring statement.
I respectfully disagree with the implication that a PCRA court has the authority to extend a sixty-day period for the filing of a nunc pro tunc appeal. Given the jurisdictional underpinnings of the statutory thirty-day period allowed for appeal of a judgment of sentence, see Pa.R.A.P. 903(a); 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 5571(b), I would hold that a post-conviction court has no more authority to extend such period than does the trial court in the first instance. See generally Pa.R.A.P. 105(b); State Farm Mut. Auto. Ins. Co. v. Schultz, 281 Pa. Super. 212, 215, 421 A.2d 1224, 1225 (1980) ("Neither the lower court nor this court may enlarge the time for the filing of" a notice of appeal).
That said, and although the PCRA court's original order was dated December 21, 1999, it was not entered onto the docket until November 14, 2001. In light of these circumstances, I would hold that Petitioner's December 14 appeal was timely. See Commonwealth v. Jerman, 762 A.2d 366, 368 (Pa.Super. 2000) ("In a criminal case, the date of entry of an order is the date the clerk of courts enters the order on the docket, furnishes a copy of the order to the parties, and records the time and manner of notice on the docket"); see also Commonwealth v. Parks, 768 A.2d 1168, 1171 (Pa.Super. 2001) (same); Commonwealth v. Gordon, 438 Pa. Super. 166, 173, 652 A.2d 317, 320 (1994) (holding that the date of entry of the order and notification of counsel serves as the date of entry for a previously issued order), aff'd, 543 Pa. 513, 673 A.2d 866 (1996); Pa.R.Crim.P. 114 (requiring the clerk of the court to immediately docket an order and to note on the docket that a copy of the order has been furnished to the parties); Pa.R.A.P. 108(a) (specifying that the date of entry of an order shall be the day the clerk of the court mails or delivers a copy of the order to the parties); Pa.R.A.P. 301(a), (c).