Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v. Daren Wallace

Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v. Daren Wallace

Criminal Action-Constitutional Law-Sixth Amendment-Speedy Trial Rights-Motion to Dismiss-Excludable Time-Defendant Unavailability-Normal Progression of Case-Nominal Bail

Daren Wallace (“Defendant”) was convicted of charges including Involuntary Deviate Sexual in Lancaster County for which he was sentenced on July 1, 2004 to five (5) to ten (10) years’ imprisonment and was directed to register as a sex offender for a period of ten (10) years.  On March 27, 2023, Defendant was charged in Lebanon County for Failure to Comply with Registration Requirements by failing to verify his address and whereabouts between February 22, 2023 and March 3, 2023, upon which charge he was arrested and was arraigned on June 5, 2023.  Defendant filed a Motion to Dismiss pursuant to Pa.R.Crim.P. Rule 600 on the basis that the Commonwealth failed to bring him to trial with 365 days. 

1.  Pa.R.Crim.P. Rule 600 requires the Commonwealth to try every case within 365 days under penalty of dismissal for violation.

2.  Rule 600 entitles a defendant to release on nominal bail if the defendant is not tried within 180 days.

3.  Rule 600 specifically excludes time from the computation during which the defendant is unavailable or requests continuance, in which case the entire period of the delay caused by the unavailability is excludable.

4.  Time required to address defense pretrial motions is excludable.

5.  Where some of the time that passed reflects normal progression of the case, pendency of the Motion to Dismiss and defense requests for continuance, such time is excludable from the calculable time in which the Commonwealth was required to bring Defendant to trial so as to not support dismissal of the charge under Rule 600.

6.  Nominal bail is warranted in light of the fact that time not excludable has elapsed 180 days.

L.C.C.C.P. No. CP-38-CR-804-2023, Opinion by Bradford H. Charles, Judge, February 3, 2025.