Rule Text
(a) General rule.—An appeal authorized by law from a final order shall be taken to, and petitions for allowance of appeal from a final order shall be filed in, the appellate court vested by law with jurisdiction over appeals from such order.
(b) Matters tried with capital offenses.—If an appeal is taken to the Supreme Court under Pa.R.A.P. 1941 (review of death sentences), any other appeals relating to sentences for lesser offenses imposed on a defendant as a result of the same criminal episode or transaction and tried with the capital offense shall also be taken to the Supreme Court.
(c) Supervision of special prosecutions or investigations.—All petitions for specialized review under Pa.R.A.P. 1611 shall be filed in the Supreme Court.
Amendment history: The provisions of this Rule 702 amended through April 26, 1982, effective September 12, 1982, 12 Pa.B. 1536; amended January 7, 2020, effective August 1, 2020, 50 Pa.B. 505. Immediately preceding text appears at serial pages (231623) to (231624).
Plain-English Summary (for reference only — not a substitute for the rule text above)
This summary is not the rule. The rule text controls.
When a court case ends with a final order, you have the right to appeal that decision. Your appeal must go to the correct higher court based on what type of case it is. Different courts handle different types of appeals, so filing in the wrong court could cause problems for your case.
If someone is convicted of a crime that carries the death penalty, all appeals related to that case go to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. This includes any appeals about other, lesser crimes that were part of the same criminal case. This keeps everything together in one court.
Some special investigations and prosecutions have their own appeal process. If your case falls under that category, you must file your petition directly with the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.
Committee Notes
The Administrative Office of Pennsylvania Courts publishes from time to time at 204 Pa. Code § 201.2 an unofficial chart of the Unified Judicial System showing the appellate jurisdiction of the several courts of this Commonwealth, and it is expected that the several publishers of these rules will include a copy of the current version of such chart in their respective publications.
Paragraphs (b) and (c) are based upon 42 Pa.C.S. § 722(1) (direct appeals from courts of common pleas). Under Pa.R.A.P. 751, an appeal from a lesser offense improvidently taken to the Superior Court or the Commonwealth Court will be transferred to the Supreme Court for consideration and decision with the capital offense.
Under Pa.R.A.P. 701, the jurisdiction described in paragraph (c) extends also to interlocutory orders. See Pa.R.A.P. 102 where the term ‘‘appeal’’ includes proceedings on petition for review and petitions for specialized review. Ordinarily Pa.R.A.P. 701 will have no application to matters within the scope of paragraph (b), since that paragraph is contingent upon entry of a final order in the form of a sentence of death; the mere possibility of such a sentence is not a basis for Supreme Court direct appellate jurisdiction over interlocutory orders in homicide and related cases, because it is the imposition of the sentence of death that triggers Supreme Court direct review. See 42 Pa.C.S. § 9711(h).
