### Sex Offender’s Late Appeal Shot Down Over PCRA Deadline
Pennsylvania’s Superior Court affirmed the dismissal of Keith Vernon Davis’s second bid for post-conviction relief, ruling his petition was filed years too late under the strict one-year PCRA time limit. Davis, serving 7½ to 15 years for involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and aggravated indecent assault, couldn’t overcome the jurisdictional barrier. The court had no power to even touch his ineffective counsel claims.
It all traces back to 2017, when Davis cut a deal: a guilty plea to horrific sex crimes against a victim, landing him that negotiated prison term after the judge rejected his plea-withdrawal bid. Appeals failed—Superior Court in 2019, state Supreme Court denial later that year—making his sentence final on November 14, 2019. Davis’s first PCRA shot in 2020, griping about his lawyer’s alleged alibi fumbles and conflicts, got hearings, a denial, and an affirmance in 2021.
Fast-forward to January 2025: Davis, now representing himself, files petition number two, again blasting trial counsel. But PCRA law is brutal on timing—file within one year of finality, or you’re out, unless you prove a rare exception like new evidence or government meddling. The Cambria County court slapped him with a dismissal notice, spotting zero exceptions pled or proven. No response from Davis; case closed March 6.
The Superior Court panel—Judges Olson, Dubow, and Bender—didn’t mince words. Davis’s petition was “facially untimely,” and courts lack jurisdiction without those exceptions. A footnote nuked his hail-Mary appeal argument about government interference: too late, never raised below. “No court has jurisdiction to hear an untimely PCRA petition,” they echoed longstanding precedent. Appeal denied; Davis stays locked up.