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The crushed windpipe was determined to be the cause of death.

An autopsy revealed that prior to death, the victim had sustained fifteen blows to the head with a jagged, blunt object, and had suffered various bruises, a broken nose, internal hemorrhaging in the neck, swollen eyes, and a crushed windpipe. After viewing the corpse, the County Coroner estimated that the victim had been dead for twelve to fifteen hours, placing the time of death between midnight and three o'clock, a.m., on July 24, 1981. A twenty-five foot tree branch lay across the throat which was wrapped in shirt material. On July 24, 1981, in a secluded wooded area of Lawrence Park Township, James Feeney found the victim's nude *219 body, its face drenched with blood. Our independent review of the entire record, giving all reasonable inferences to the Commonwealth, discloses sufficient evidence to support the conviction of murder of the first degree based upon the facts we have gleaned from the record. Post-verdict motions were argued before a court en banc which denied same, triggering this automatic appeal.Īppellant first argues that insufficient evidence exists to support a conviction of murder of the first degree. Immediately thereafter, a separate sentencing proceeding was conducted, following which the same jury determined that Appellant be sentenced to death. Jiuliante of the Erie County Court of Common Pleas presiding and, on January 26, 1982, the jury returned its verdict of murder of the first degree.

The corpse was nude, battered, and bloody.Īppellant was tried to a jury with the Honorable Jess S. Appellant was arrested on July 28, 1981, and charged with criminal homicide for the death of a thirteen-year-old boy, Christopher Brine, whose body was found in a wooded section of Lawrence Park Township, Erie County, Pennsylvania. We are presently required to review the conviction of murder of the first degree and the death sentence of Alan *218 Lee Pursell (Appellant) pursuant to 42 Pa.C.S.

Atty., Shad Connelly, Erie, for appellee.īefore NIX, C.J., and LARSEN, FLAHERTY, McDERMOTT, HUTCHINSON, ZAPPALA and PAPADAKOS, JJ.