A ruling Thursday in McKean County Court has restored appeal rights to Paul Morrisroe, who is serving a prison sentence for a DUI-related fatal hit-and-run incident.
Morrisroe, 42, incarcerated in State Correctional Institution-Albion, is serving 7½ to 15 years for the fatal hit-and-run crash that claimed the life of Dakota Heinaman in 2015 in Cyclone.
He had been represented at trial by Warren attorney Robert Kinnear, Bradford attorney Dan Lang and Smethport attorney James P. Miller.
Miller had represented Morrisroe on appeal. However, in April of 2018, Morrisroe filed his own a post-conviction relief act petition “asking that his right to an appeal before the Pennsylvania Superior Court be reinstated after his former attorney took no action on appeals he previously filed with the Pennsylvania Superior Court.”
On May 3, 2018, the state Superior Court had dismissed the appeal because deadlines in the case had been missed by the defense.
On July 24, 2018, the court appointed attorney Christopher Martini to Morrisroe’s case.
“I filed a motion to file an appeal … requesting that President Judge (John) Pavlock reinstate his appellate rights,” Martini explained.
That motion had been filed in August 2018.
A hearing had been set for October, but was postponed at Martini’s request. In January, Martini filed a motion to hold an immediate status conference in the case “to argue whether Mr. Morrisroe was entitled to have his appellate rights reinstated,” the attorney explained to The Era on Thursday. “After a hearing today, (Pavlock) concluded that Mr. Morrisroe was entitled to have his appellate rights restored and granted both my motion and his petition under the Post Conviction Relief Act.”
The attorney said the appeal will ask for a “new trial and/or a reversal of his convictions.”
Martini said he has to file a statement of errors complained of on appeal in McKean County Court before the case is sent to the state Superior Court for consideration.
When Miller filed an appeal in the case, he cited 38 alleged errors on behalf of the trial judge, Pavlock. Those included failure to exclude evidence, the decision to limit questioning of some witnesses, and the alleged insufficiency of evidence. The appeal also said Pavlock erred by imposing consecutive sentences and failing to merge various offenses for sentencing.
When the appeal was dismissed by the Superior Court in 2018, it was with the stipulation that it could be filed again.
The case has been ongoing since June 2, 2015, when a pickup truck driven by Morrisroe, who was under the influence of alcohol and marijuana, struck the rear of a motorcycle, operated by Heinaman, who was slowed and waiting to turn into his driveway in Cyclone.
After striking the motorcycle, Morrisroe drove away without stopping. The front tire came off the rim of his truck, leaving a gouge mark in the road from the site of the crash to Morrisroe’s garage in Marshburg, some 15 miles away.
It was a circuitous path to justice, as multiple hearings had been held and motions argued since the case was first filed. And in 2016, a trial was attempted in McKean County, but failed when the court was unable to seat a jury.
The trial was then scheduled in Venango County, with Pavlock hearing the case. The trial lasted nearly two weeks before the Venango County jury found Morrisroe guilty of charges including homicide by vehicle while driving under the influence of alcohol and marijuana, accidents involving death, homicide by vehicle, DUI, and numerous traffic offenses.
Morrisroe has been incarcerated since the verdict was read in January 2017.
