May. 16.

2016

No. 8482

: 22Ml

Clerk of the Court

of Common Pleas

DALE E. KLElN
CLERK OF 1'HE COURT
DAUPHIN COUNTY
COURT OF COl\ofMON PLEAS

SECOND JILOOR
ROOM202
101 MARKE'J'Sl ,
HARR ISBURG, PA 17101
(117) 780-6530

Dauphin County

Date:

FROM:

DAUPHIN COUNTY COURTHOUSF.

S - \\jl ~\u

\.J~

Clerk of Courts
101 Market Street

Harrisburg, PA 17101
Phone: (717) 780-6530
Fax: (717) 780~6472

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No. 8482

P. 2

ORIGINAL . .
I

~~

. . . . ,.~

: IN THE COURT OF COMMON PLEAS

: DAUPHIN COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA

COMMONWEALTH

vs.

: CRIMINAL DIVISION
: CP-22-CR-5068-2015

STEPHEN R. REED

OPINION AND ORDER

Hess, S.J., May

/14' , 2016

Before this Court is the Omnibus Pre~Trial Motion of the Defendant, Stephen R. Reed.
The Motion seeks dismissal of the charges on two grounds. First, the Defendant contends that
the applicable statute of limitation bars the majority of the charges. Secondly, the Defendant
contends that the information is facially defective because, while it charges crimes, it does not
allege any acts which are, in fact, criminal. The procedural and factual background of this case
is as follows:
The Defendant, Stephen R. Reed, is the former mayor of the capital city of Harrisburg.
He was first elected to office in 1981 and was reelected every four years until May of2009. At
that time, he lost the Democratic primary and left office on January 4, 2010. In 2015, the Office
of the Attorney General convened a Statewide Investigating Grand Jury. Following the .issuance
of a presentment by the Grand Jury, the Attorney General' s Office filed a criminal complaint.
The complaint was filed on July 14, 2015. On Novemher 16, 2015. the Office of the Attorney
General filed an Information which, like the criminal complaint, relied on the Grand Jury
presentment in terms of setting forth the specifics of the criminal acts alleged. The information

May. 16. 2016 ' 1:22Ar/

No. 8482

contains 449 counts, which focus, inter alia, on certain activities of the Defendant in his capacity
as the mayor of Harrisburg.
In his Omnibus Pre-Trial Motion, the Defendant alleges that many of the activities now
deemed to be criminal were carried out in a non~ secretive fashion and occurred with the appJOval
of other parts ofHarrisb\U'g government. As previously noted, the Omnibus Pre-Trial Motion
goes on to assert that the presentment does not describe specific acts which are elements of
crime. The Office of the Attorney General vehemently contends the opposite. We do not reach
this issue with respect to at least 305 of the counts because we believe they are clearly barred by
the statute of limitations.
The Defendant has been charged with numerous offenses, including Dealing in Proceeds
of Unlawful Activities, Bribery, Theft by Deception, Deceptive Business Practices, Criminal
Solicitation, Theft by Receiving Stolen Property, etc. The offenses implicated by the statute of
limitations are alleged to have been committed as early as September 2003 and no later than
January 2010. The statute oflimitation~ for all of these offenses is either two or five years.
Thus, for offenses committed in January of2010, the statute oflimitations would expire in either
January of2012 or January of2015. In cases involving offenses committed by a public officer,
such as the mayor of a major city, there is, however, a provision of the law which potentially
extends the applicable statute of limitations by an additional eight years. This provision of the
law can be found at 42 Pa.C.S.A. 5552(c)(2). In fact, there is no dispute between the parties
that this statutory provision is applicable to this case. It reads:
(c) Exceptions.-Ifthe period prescribed ...has expired, a prosecution rnay
nevertheless be commenced for:

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No. 8482

P. 4

(2) any offense committed by a pubJic officer or employee in the course of or in

connection with his office or employment at any time when the defendant is in
public office or employment or within five years thereafter, but in no case shall
this paragraph extend the period of limitation otherwise applicable by more than
eight years.
The Commonwealth construes this statute to mean that in prosecutions involving public
officials, where the statute of limitations is five years, this section operates to extend the statute
of limitations to thirteen years regardless of the time which has elapsed since the official left
office. This is not what Section 5552(c)(2) says. It says that in order for there to be an extension
of the period of the statute of limitations, the prosecution must be commenced, <<when the
defendant is in public office or employment or within five years thereafter." In our opinion, this
meaning is so plain as to require no judicial interpretation.
In these regards, we are put .in mind of now well established pdnciples of statutory
construction. The task of the coUJ.t is to determine "the will of the General Assembly using the
language of the statute as our primary guide." Terra Technical Serv. v. River Station Land, 124
A.3d 289, 298 (Pa. 2015). When the words of a statute are clear and precise, reviewing courts
may not disregard those words under the pretext of pursuing the 'spirit' of the enactment." Jd.
In addition, statutes must be read in their totality. In other words, a statute must be
construed so as to give effect to all of its provisions. !d. at 299. It is true that one of the
provisions of Section 5552(c)(2) is to extend the period of limitation by up to eight years. To say
that that is true in every case involving a former public official is to ignore, entirely, that portion
of the statute that precedes the language regarding the eight-year extension. That language gives
effect to the extension when the charges are filed within five years of leaving office. In this case,
the charges against the Defendant were not filed during the five years after he left office. Thus,

f~o .

May. 16. 2016 11 :23M/

8482

P. 5

by virtue of what we regard as the clear language of the statute. there is no triggering of an
extension of the period of limitation in this case. 1
The Commonwealth cites appellate case law, particularly court opinions regarding the so~
called Orie sisters. The case of Commonwealth v. Melvin, 103 A.3d 1 (Pa. Super. 20 14),
involved charges which were filed against Joan Orie Melvin alleging that she illegally used her
judicial staff in connection with the 2003 and 2009 campaigns for the Supreme Court of
Permsylvania. The charges in the case we1e filed on May 18, 2012. In 1990, Ode Melvin was
appointed to fill a vacancy on the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny County and was elected
as an Allegheny County judge in 1991. In 1997, she was elected as a judge on the Superior
Court of Pennsylvania and won retention in 2007. In 2009, she ran for the Supreme Court of
Pennsylvania and was elected to a ten-year term. Thus, when charges were brought, she was still
in office, clearly aBowing for an extension of the statute of limitations pursuant to 42 Pa.C.S.A.
5552(c)(2). In fact, the length of the statute of limitations was not an issue in her case.

Instead, she argued that she was not a ''public officer or employee" but rather was, instead, a
"judicial officer," The Superior Court, not surprisingly, held that a judicial officer was, in fact. a
public officer.

In Commonwe'!lth v. Janine Orie, 2013 W.L. 9745387(Pa. Com. P.L.) (September 12,
2013), Allegheny County Judge Nauhaus applied 42 Pa.C.S.A. 5552(c)(2) in a manner which
extended the statute of limitations for a total of thirteen years. At the time of the investigation in
her case, Ms. Orie was an employee in the office of her sister, Supreme Cow1 Justice Joan Orie
Melvin. For the ten years preceding, she had been on the Judge's staff during her term on the

We understand the Commonwealth's well considered argument that if a public official wete to commit a
serious offense on h.is or her last day of office, there would be virtually no extension of a five year statute
of limitations. The fact, however, that a statute presents with an anomaly does not mean that we ;:u-e at

libe1ty to rewrite it.

May. 16. 2016

No. 8482

: 23M/

Supedor Court. Thus, the charges were not only filed within five years of her employment, but
were, in fact, filed at a time when she was a public employee?
Given the foregoing disposition with respect to 305 counts in the info1mation, there
remain 144 counts, of which 142 are the subject of the Defendant's second stated ground for .
relief. This is in the form of a motion to quash the information. The counts at issue are charges
of theft by receiving stolen property. The statute, 18 Pa.C.S.A. 3925, makes it unlawful to
receive, retain, or dispose of property knowing that it has been stolen or believing that it had
probably been stolen. It is axiomatic that a jury may find a person guilty of receiving stolen
property even though the jury is satisfied that it was the defendant, himself, who stole the
property. In fact, "an accusation of theft may be supported by evidence that it was committed in
any manner that would be theft .. . notwithstanding the specification of a different manner in the
complaint or indictment ..." 18 Pa.C.S.A. 3902. Theft, fundamentally, is the unlawful taking
or exelcising of unlawful control over property of another "with intent to deprive him thereof."
l8 Pa.C.S.A. 3921.

The thrust of the Grand Jury presentment is that the Defendant, while mayor, purchased
numerous items and artifacts intending that they be eventually housed in some sort of museum.
The presentment, moreover,.alleges that these various items were diverted from this purpose and
were found to be in the possession and control of the Defendant. Whether the evidence as
ultimately presented will support convictions for theft by receiving stolen property is for a jury to
determine. In the meantime, we agree with the Commonwealth that a motion to quash the
information would be improper. As the Attorney General has noted, ''a motion to quash an
information is neither a guilt-determining procedure nor a pre-trial means for determining the
2

We are also mindful of the case of Commonwealth v. O'Donnell, 542 A.2d 1025 (1988). That was a
case dealing with an earlier version of the statute which allowed a prosecution to be commenced within
one year after its discovery. Issues of discove1y are not presented in this case.

May. 16. 2016 11 : 24M/

No. 8482

P. 7

sufficiency ofthe Commonwealth' s evidence. Commonwealth v. Meoli, 452 A.2d 1032 (Pa.
Super. 1982),

No. 8482

May. 16. 2016 ' 1:24M/

P. 8

: IN THE COURT OF COMMON PLEAS

: DAUPHIN COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA

COMMONWEALTH

: CRIMINAL DIVISION

VS.

: CP-22-CR-5068-2015

STEPHEN R. REED

IN RE: OMNIBUS PRE-TRIAL MOTION FOR RELIEF

ORDER

., ,..

/
AND NOW this---~-day of May, 2016, following argument thereon, the

Omnibus Pre-Trial Motion of the Defendant is GRANTED to the extent that Information Counts
1 through 3, 5 through 35, 56 through 82, 110 through 207, 303 through 444, and 446 through

449 are DISMISSED.

BY THE 'COURT:

Distribution: -sin. If<.- ~- ;;xtx<o

Henry E. Hockeimer, Jr., Esquire/Terence M. Grugan, Esquire
Ballard Spahr
1735 Market Street, 51 51 Floor
Philadelphia, PA 19103-7599

Neil A. Grover, Esquire, City Solichor

City ofHanisburg
City Govemment Center
10 North Second Street, Suite 402
Harrisburg, PA 17101
Court Administration - Robert Sisock ~
Cowt Administration - Deb Freeman
Honorable Ke\rjn A. Hess, Senior Jud
Judges, Chambets- Megan Klemi
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