Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Appellee v. Lenwood Mason, Appellant

Summary

Writing for the Court in this capital PCRA appeal, Justice Stevens held that claims first raised in supplemental pleadings filed without the PCRA court's authorization — the heat-of-passion component of the guilt-phase ineffectiveness claim, the improper-hearsay claim, and the gender-discriminatory-peremptory-strikes claim — are waived, and that a Pa.R.A.P. 1925(b) statement cannot cure that omission. On the merits, the Court found no arguable merit in a heat-of-passion defense (no contemporaneous provocation; past-infidelity revelations legally insufficient with an intervening cooling period) and concluded that trial counsel reasonably investigated and presented a voluntary-intoxication defense while a mental-deficit diminished-capacity defense was unsupported by the record, defeating both layers of Claim 1; the excerpt ends amid the Court's consideration of Claim 4 (penalty-phase mitigation ineffectiveness), so the ultimate disposition is not visible. Chief Justice Saylor concurred in the guilt-phase result but dissented as to penalty, finding deficient penalty-phase representation warranting a new penalty proceeding and renewing his objection to prosecutorial 'mercy' appeals.