SUPERIOR COURT OF PENNSYLVANIA ORDERS NEW TRIAL FOR MAN CONVICTED OF AGGRAVATED ASSAULT AND CARRYING FIREARM WITHOUT A LICENSE DUE TO ERRONEOUS JURY INSTRUCTIONS

Following a jury trial, the defendant was convicted of Aggravated Assault and Carrying a Firearm Without a License. Attorney Noel was retained to represent the defendant on appeal. Within 10 days of sentencing, Attorney Noel filed a post-sentence motion that would become the roadmap for the appeal to follow.

In those motions and on appeal, Attorney Noel argued that the trial court’s jury instruction regarding the offense of Carrying a Firearm Without a License was legally deficient because it erroneously defined that crime as a strict liability offense. More specifically, Attorney Noel contended that the trial court failed to instruct the jury as to the mens rea—or mental state—applicable to that offense.

Attorney Noel further alleged that the trial court’s legally deficient instruction as to the offense of Carrying a Firearm Without a License irreparably tainted the jury’s determination of the defendant’s guilt as to the crime of Aggravated Assault. This was so, Attorney Noel argued, because the trial court instructed the jury that it could consider the defendant’s use of an illegally carried firearm as circumstantial evidence of his intent to commit additional crimes. Of course, the jury was unable to determine whether the defendant carried a firearm illegally because it was improperly instructed as to the essential elements of the crime of Carrying a Firearm Without a License.

The Superior Court of Pennsylvania adopted Attorney Noel’s arguments in full, and granted relief to Attorney Noel’s client by vacating his convictions for Aggravated Assault and Carrying a Firearm Without a License and remanding for a new trial.