Commonwealth v. Watson

1

COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA v. ALEX WATSON Appellant

No. 787 EDA 2022

No. J-S43021-22

Superior Court of Pennsylvania

March 27, 2023

NON-PRECEDENTIAL DECISION - SEE SUPERIOR COURT I.O.P. 65.37

Appeal from the PCRA Order Entered February 24, 2022, in the Court of Common Pleas of Philadelphia County, Criminal Division at No(s): CP-51-CR-0001353-2017.

BEFORE: DUBOW, J., KUNSELMAN, J., and NICHOLS, J.

MEMORANDUM

KUNSELMAN, J.

Alex Watson appeals pro se from the order denying his first petition filed pursuant to the Post Conviction Relief Act. 42 Pa.C.S.A. §§ 9541-9546. We affirm.

On May 18, 2015, Watson shot and killed the victim. Following his arrest, he was charged with first-degree murder and related charges. He appeared for a jury trial on October 30, 2018. However, the jury could not reach a unanimous verdict, and the trial court declared a mistrial. Prior to his second trial, Watson filed a motion to proceed pro se which the trial court granted. The court appointed Watson's counsel from his first trial as standby counsel.

Watson's second jury trial commenced on April 29, 2019. Previously this Court reproduced the trial court's detailed account of the evidence presented at the second trial as follows:

On May 18, 2015, at approximately 10:12 p.m., [the victim] was with his sister, Shaheen Ahmed, at her home on Allison Street in Philadelphia. Before [the victim] left Ahmed's home, he told [Ahmed] he was "going to meet Dil and Master and Conestoga." Ahmed did not know Dil's real name, but knew he was "Aaron's little brother, Leslie." [Watson] whose legal name is Leslie Williams, also lived on Allison Street. Both [Watson's] and Ahmed's homes are about two blocks from the 1300 block of Conestoga Steet, where [the victim's] murder later occurred.

At approximately 11:41 p.m., on the 1300 block of Conestoga Street, between Master and West Thompson Streets, [Watson shot the victim] eighteen times, killing him. Within seconds of hearing the gunshots, Philadelphia Police Officers Michael Carey and Michael Paige arrived at the crime scene, where [the victim] was lying on his back with no sign of life. They observed multiple fired cartridge casings []. [The victim] who suffered from multiple gunshot wounds to the chest, was pronounced dead at the scene. The officers secured the crime scene and waited for the other responding officers to arrive.

Philadelphia Police Officers Andre Dunkley and Marvin Wilkins arrived to the scene about one minute after Officers Carey and Paige. Officer Dunkley observed the 18 [fired cartridge casings] on the ground trailing from [the victim's] body, in the middle of the block, to the rear of a silver Buick Enclave that was parked at the end of the block, near the corner of Conestoga and West Thompson Street. When looking inside the passenger side window, Officer Dunkley saw a silver handgun with a black handle and the slide locked back. At 12:40 a.m., the Philadelphia Crime Scene Unit arrived and recovered all 18 [fired cartridge casings] from the street, [the victim's] cell phone, and a 9 millimeter [R]uger handgun from the car.

Around 2:45 a.m., Officer Wilkins, who remained at the scene to guard the Buick, observed a [Nissan] car pull up to the corner of Conestoga and West Thompson Streets. Quinn Wise got out of the car, walked towards the Buick and attempted to open the front driver's side door. When stopped by officers, Wise claimed it was her vehicle. When questioned by detectives at the Homicide Unit, Wise stated that her daughter's father, [Watson], told her that the vehicle was on Conestoga Street and asked her to go get it for him. A swab of Wise's DNA was taken.

Keith Schofield arrived in the Nissan with Wise. During an interview with Homicide Detectives, Schofield told detectives that earlier in the evening, he was near Fairmount Park on Kelly Drive with Diashauna Coleman. At approximately 1:34 a.m., after Schofield drove Coleman home, he returned to a missed call from [Watson]. [Watson] asked Schofield to meet him on Master Street between 52^nd and 53^rd Street. When Schofield arrived, [Watson] proclaimed, "I f***ed up . . . I might have f***ed up." [Watson] then instructed Schofield to take Wise to get the car from Conestoga Street. Schofield identified [Watson] in a photograph as the individual that told him to retrieve the car.

The Homicide Unit focused their investigation on [Watson]. On November 20, 2015, in an attempt to locate [Watson] and obtain his DNA, Philadelphia Detective Joseph Bamberski and Untied States Marshals Fugitive Task Force Agent Timothy Stevenson went to 1336 N. Allison Street, [Watson's] approved parole residence. [Watson's] mother and brother, Aaron Williams, indicated that [Watson] was not home. On November 23, 2015, Detective Bamberski and Agent Stevenson went back to [Watson's] address, and were again unsuccessful in locating him. On February 24, 2016, [Watson] was located by Detective Bamberski and Agent Stevenson at an apartment on the 5100 block of Regent Street in Philadelphia, In furtherance of their investigation, [Watson] was brought to the Homicide Unit for questioning and a buccal swab.

A search of [Watson's] cell phone [] revealed that on November 21, 2015, [Watson] had taken a screenshot of a conversation in which he was discussing the United States Marshals waiting outside his home with a search warrant. On November 27, 2015, [Watson] downloaded a PDF of the "Most Wanted" list from the Pennsylvania State Police website.

Detective [James] Dunlap reviewed the phone records for [Watson's] phone number and discovered that on the night of the murder between 10:01 p.m. and 1:53 a.m., [Watson's] phone was within the geographical area of the crime scene.

Brittany Rehrig, a forensic scientist at the Philadelphia Forensic Lab, conducted DNA analysis of the handgun and the Buick. [Watson's] DNA was found on the handgun's slide, grip, and trigger, and the Buick's steering wheel. Wise's DNA was detected as a major source on the handgun's magazine. Her DNA was also found on the gearshift and radio control area. The results for [Watson's] DNA on the front and rear driver's side door handles, magazine, gearshift, and radio control area were determined to be inconclusive, but his DNA was not excluded as a source. A defense expert, Katherine Cross, concurred with Rehrig's overall conclusions that [Watson's] DNA was present as a major source on the handgun. On December 13, 2016, after [Watson's] DNA was confirmed as a match, an arrest warrant was prepared.

According to Police Officer Kelly Walker, an expert in the Firearms Identification Unit, all 18 [cartridge casings] were fired from the same handgun, the 9mm Ruger recovered from the Buick. The firearm was capable of holding 18 bullets, 17 in the magazine and one in the chamber.

At trial, the Commonwealth presented a Certificate of Non-Licensure showing that on May 18, 2015, [Watson] was not licensed to carry a firearm.

[In his defense, Watson] presented two lifelong friends as witnesses, Joshua Edwards and Bayyan Finney, who attempted to provide an alibi defense. Finney, who was in custody at the time of trial, also testified that the night before his testimony, he made a phone call to his friend, "Mock," who was on the phone with [Watson] at the time of his call. Mock put Finney on speakerphone so the three of them could have a conversation. [Watson] asked Finney to trade shoes with him before court, because Finney had dress shoes, and [Watson] did not want to wear his Reebok Classic sneakers to trial. During cross-examination, Finney denied that [Watson] attempted to bribe him with a new pair of shoes in exchange for his testimony.

Commonwealth v. Watson, 240 A.3d 906 (Pa. Super. 2020), non-precedential decision at 2-5).

On May 3, 2019, the jury convicted Watson of all charges. That same day, the trial court sentenced him to an aggregate sentence of life in prison without parole. Watson filed a timely post-sentence motion, which the trial court denied on May 13, 2019. Watson appealed, raising four issues, including a challenge to the sufficiency of the evidence supporting his convictions. On September 4, 2020, we rejected Watson's claims and affirmed his judgment of sentence. Watson, supra. On March 31, 2021, our Supreme Court denied Watson's petition for allowance of appeal. Commonwealth v. Watson, 251 A.3d 780 (Pa. 2021).

On September 2, 2021, Watson filed a pro se PCRA petition and the PCRA court appointed counsel. On October 13, 2021, PCRA counsel filed a "no-merit" letter and motion to withdraw pursuant to Commonwealth v. Turner, 544 A.2d 927 (Pa. 1988), and Commonwealth v. Finley, 550 A.2d 213 (Pa. Super. 1988) (en banc). On October 14, 2021, the PCRA court issued Pa.R.Crim.P. 907 notice of its intent to dismiss Watson's petition without a hearing.

On November 29, 2021, Watson filed a response to the court's Rule 907 notice in which he claimed that PCRA counsel was ineffective for not filing an amended petition and claimed that the trial court's April 27, 2019, waiver-of-counsel colloquy was defective.

Thereafter the PCRA court permitted PCRA counsel to withdraw and appointed replacement counsel to conduct an independent investigation of Watson's claims. On January 20, 2022, replacement counsel filed a Turner/Finley "no-merit" letter and motion to withdraw. That same day, the PCRA court issued another Rule 907 notice of its intent to dismiss Watson's petition without a hearing. The PCRA court granted Watson's motion for an extension of time in which to file a response. Watson filed his response on February 7, 2022. By order entered February 24, 2022, the PCRA court permitted new counsel to withdraw and denied Watson's petition.^[1] This appeal followed. Both Watson and the PCRA co...