Com. v. Abner, P., 1322 EDA 2015

On November 12, 2010 two Temple students were robbed in their West Berks Street apartment: two men forced entry, one struck a victim with a firearm, the pair stole electronics and fled. Police recovered some stolen property and ammunition at a later-searched residence tied to a phone trace.
Victims gave initial descriptions and later identified Abner from a photo array soon after his arrest; at a lineup nearly a year later neither victim identified him (Abner’s appearance had changed), but both identified him at trial.
Abner was convicted after a non-jury trial of numerous offenses including robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, unlawful restraint, receiving stolen property, firearms offenses, and related counts.
The trial court sentenced Abner to an aggregate 5 to 12 years’ imprisonment plus four years’ probation; post-sentence motions were denied and Abner appealed.
On appeal Abner raised (1) a weight-of-the-evidence challenge to his identification, (2) a sufficiency-of-the-evidence challenge to identification, and (3) a challenge to the discretionary aspects of his sentence (failure to consider mental health/addiction and imposition of consecutive sentences).

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether verdict was against the weight of the evidence (identity)	Commonwealth relied on victims’ identifications and recovered property tying Abner to the scene	Abner argued identification was unreliable and weight of evidence favored acquittal	Waived for appellate review due to non-specific post-sentence motion and Rule 1925(b) statement
Whether evidence was sufficient to sustain conviction (identity)	Commonwealth argued photo ID, recovered items, and in-court IDs supported conviction	Abner argued hesitancy in photo/lineup and failure to ID at lineup made evidence insufficient	Waived for appeal by boilerplate Rule 1925(b) statement; appellate court noted evidence supported conviction if considered
Whether sentencing court failed to consider rehabilitative needs and improperly imposed consecutive sentences	Abner contended court ignored mental-health/addiction and imposed unduly excessive consecutive terms	Commonwealth and court pointed to presentence report, sentencing submissions, and Abner’s criminal history/violence	No abuse of discretion; court considered relevant factors and consecutive sentences were appropriate given history and gravity of offenses
Whether appellate review standards applied properly (preservation and standard of review)	N/A — procedural issue raised by court	N/A	Court applied preservation rules for weight/sufficiency and reviewed sentencing for abuse of discretion under established standards

Commonwealth v. West, 937 A.2d 516 (Pa. Super. 2007) (standard of review for weight claims)
Commonwealth v. Mikell, 968 A.2d 779 (Pa. Super. 2009) (preservation requirements for weight claims under Pa.R.Crim.P. 607)
Commonwealth v. Holmes, 461 A.2d 1268 (Pa. Super. 1983) (post-sentence motion must specify grounds to preserve weight claim)
Commonwealth v. Watley, 81 A.3d 108 (Pa. Super. 2013) (sufficiency standard and circumstantial evidence sufficiency)
Commonwealth v. Tyack, 128 A.3d 254 (Pa. Super. 2015) (boilerplate sufficiency claims in Rule 1925(b) statements are waived)
Commonwealth v. Caldwell, 117 A.3d 763 (Pa. Super. 2015) (four-part test for discretionary sentencing review and when consecutive-sentence claims raise substantial question)
Commonwealth v. Naranjo, 53 A.3d 66 (Pa. Super. 2012) (sentencing court’s review of presentence report indicates consideration of sentencing factors)
Commonwealth v. Yuhasz, 923 A.2d 1111 (Pa. 2007) (sentencing guidelines are advisory; court may impose sentence outside guidelines if reasonable)