Com. ex rel. Ventura v. Cavell

• Decision Date: 11 June 1958
• Parties: COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania ex rel. Arthur VENTURA, Appellant, v. Angelo C. CAVELL, Warden, Western State Penitentiary.
• Court: Pennsylvania Superior Court

Page 456

142 A.2d 456 186 Pa.Super. 204 COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania ex rel. Arthur VENTURA, Appellant,
v.
Angelo C. CAVELL, Warden, Western State Penitentiary. Superior Court of Pennsylvania. June 11, 1958.

[186 Pa.Super. 205] Arthur Ventura, in pro. per.

R. Eric Simons, First Asst. Dist. Atty., Beaver, for appellee.

Before RHODES, P. J., and HIRT, GUNTHER, WRIGHT, WOODSIDE, ERVIN and WATKINS, JJ.

[186 Pa.Super. 206] WRIGHT, Judge.

On August 26, 1957, Arthur Ventura, an inmate of the Western State Penitentiary, petitioned the Court of Common Pleas of Beaver County for a writ of habeas corpus. The purpose of the application was to demand that a sentence imposed upon relator by the Court of Oyer and Terminer of Beaver County on March 22, 1950, on a

Page 457

charge of burglary at No. 30 June Term 1948, and which sentence was directed to commence at the expiration of a prior existing sentence from Washington County, should to the contrary be directed to commence as of, and run without interruption from, February 20, 1948, the date of relator's original commitment to the Beaver County jail. The court below scheduled a hearing, at which relator was represented by counsel and testified in person. The sentence in question was thereafter modified so as to give relator credit for various periods of time, totaling 311 days, he had been held in the Beaver County jail prior to March 22, 1950, and the petition was dismissed. Ventura has appealed.

The factual situation is extremely complicated, and we will endeavor to summarize it briefly. Following burglaries in Beaver, Washington, Greene, and Westmoreland Counties, appellant was apprehended and committed to the Beaver County jail on February 20, 1948. Prior to his trial in Beaver County, appellant was released from and returned to the Beaver County jail on five occasions in connection with the various prosecutions against him. On December 17, 1948, appellant was convicted in Beaver County. Prior to his original sentence in Beaver County, appellant was released from and returned to jail on three more occasions. On the last of these, May 9, 1949, appellant was sentenced in Washington County to a term of 7 1/2 to 20 years. This judgment of sentence was affirmed[186 Pa.Super. 207] in Commonwealth v. Romito, 166 Pa.Super. 158, 70 A.2d 444. On June 8, 1949, appellant was sentenced in Beaver County to a term of 10 to 20 years. Because of a trial error, this judgment of sentence was reversed and a new trial awarded in Commonwealth v. Ventura, 166...