After successfully petitioning for reinstatement of post-sentence and appellate rights, Attorney Noel, with the help of a 20-year retrospective data analysis conducted by Penn State professor Jeffery Ulmer, argued that the original sentence of 56 to 112 years was manifestly excessive and clearly unreasonable considering other sentences imposed in similar cases. The sentencing judge was persuaded that the original sentence was too harsh and agreed to reduce the sentence to 9 to 18 years.

Attorney Noel filed a PCRA Petition on behalf of a client who had been convicted of burglary, rape and related offenses. His prior counsel failed to file a timely direct appeal, which impacted the client’s right to seek post-conviction relief. Attorney Noel advanced a novel and creative theory for why the PCRA Court had jurisdiction over her client’s case, but to no avail. The PCRA Court dismissed the petition, purportedly because it lacked jurisdiction. While on appeal, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania issued a decision that strongly supported Attorney Noel’s novel jurisdictional theory. Months later, the Superior Court agreed that Attorney Noel’s theory was the correct one, and reversed the Butler County Judge’s Order.

Attorney Noel and her co-counsel were retained to litigate post-conviction claims on behalf of their client after his previous attorney abandoned him. This abandonment by prior counsel impacted the state court’s jurisdiction to consider the defendant’s claims for post-conviction relief. Attorney Noel creatively assembled four distinct arguments for why the PCRA Court had jurisdiction over the case.

The PCRA Court accepted all four proffered theories for jurisdiction, finding that Attorney Noel and her co-counsel successfully pled and proved claims of interference by government officials and newly discovered evidence, both of which are statutorily enumerated exceptions to the PCRA’s one-year time bar. The PCRA Court, therefore, promptly entered an Order reinstating the defendant’s right to pursue post-sentence remedies, a direct appeal, and post-conviction relief.

In December 2022, Attorney Noel obtained PCRA relief in the form of a new trial on behalf of her client, who had been convicted of third-degree murder. Dissatisfied with that result, the Commonwealth exercised its right to appeal the PCRA court’s order to the Superior Court of Pennsylvania.

Following robust briefing by Attorney Noel, the Superior Court sided with Attorney Noel’s client, and affirmed the PCRA court’s order awarding him a new trial.

Upon filing a robust PCRA Petition on her client’s behalf, the PCRA Court scheduled an evidentiary hearing on each of the ineffective assistance of counsel claims raised. However, months later, without warning or explanation, the PCRA Court issued an Order dismissing the PCRA Petition. Attorney Noel was forced to take an appeal on her client’s behalf and the Superior Court of Pennsylvania quickly reversed, finding that the PCRA Court violated numerous established Rules of Criminal Procedure governing the disposition of PCRA Petitions.

Attorney Noel was retained to litigate a claim under Pennsylvania’s Post Conviction Relief Act involving newly discovered evidence of judicial bias. Attorney Noel’s client had been sentenced to a draconian 60 to 150 years of incarceration for non-violent drug sales. Attorney Noel’s task was to bring her client home. To learn how she accomplished that task, read Attorney Noel’s article, published in For the Defense, the quarterly publication for Pennsylvania Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.

Attorney Noel’s client was convicted of attempted murder and aggravated assault, and was sentenced to serve 15 to 30 years in prison. Attorney Noel was retained to litigate a petition under Pennsylvania’s Post Conviction Relief Act, and alleged several claims involving ineffective assistance of trial and appellate counsel. Attorney Noel argued that her client’s trial attorney was ineffective for failing to object to the omission of a “no-adverse-inference” instruction from the trial court’s closing instructions to the jury. Attorney Noel further argued that her client’s appellate attorney was ineffective for failing to raise the issue on direct appeal, which would have resulted in automatic reversal of her client’s convictions and sentences. The trial court agreed and granted Attorney Noel’s client relief in the form of a new trial.

Attorney Noel was retained to investigate whether the defendant had potentially meritorious claims under Pennsylvania’s Post Conviction Relief Act, also known as the “PCRA.” After completing a diligent and thorough investigation of her client’s criminal history and the facts of the case, Attorney Noel realized that her client’s offense should have been graded as a misdemeanor of the first degree, not a felony of the first degree.

Following the submission of a robust Post-Conviction Relief Act Petition, of which Attorney Noel was the sole author, and an evidentiary hearing on the claims raised, the PCRA Court found that trial counsel had no reasonable strategic basis for failing to request an “imperfect” self-defense jury instruction, when requesting such an instruction had been the plan all along. As a result, the PCRA Court vacated Attorney Noel’s client’s murder conviction and granted him a new trial based on ineffective assistance of counsel.

Following a sentencing hearing where the trial court imposed a sentence of over 20 to 40 years, private counsel withdrew as counsel of record and requested the appointment of court appointed counsel to represent the client on appeal. The trial court granted counsel’s motion to withdraw and appointed the Fayette County Office of the Public Defender. An attorney from that office was assigned, but failed to take any action to protect the client’s constitutional right to appeal and, unfortunately, allowed the statutory timeframe within which to file a direct appeal lapse.

Attorney Noel’s client was convicted of aggravated assault and sentenced to 7 to 14 years in state prison.  Attorney Noel’s client used force to defend himself against his brother, who, at the time of the incident, was on parole for the robbery and murder of a man he beat to death.