McIntosh resentence a back-and-forth debate

As former Penn Neurosurgery professor Tracy McIntosh waits to see if the Pennsylvania Supreme Court will hear his case appealing a resentencing order from a Superior Court, the case seems to have become a battle of the briefs.

In December, a Superior Court ordered McIntosh to be resentenced by a lower court in connection to sexual-assault charges that he pled no contest to in 2004.

McIntosh appealed to the state Supreme Court following the decision, and Robert Graci, McIntosh's lawyer, said he and the Philadelphia District Attorney's office have both filed multiple documents to the Court concerning the case.

After McIntosh filed the petition for appeal, the prosecution had two weeks to respond with a brief in opposition and filed the brief within that time, Graci said.

He added that, generally, the petition and the opposing brief are the only documents the Supreme Court considers.

But in January, Graci took the additional step of filing an application for relief, requesting permission to reply to the prosecution's brief because of possible inaccuracies in that brief.

"It's an unusual step that we thought our circumstances warranted," he said. "We felt that there were matters that the DA had brought up in the brief of opposition that were not accurate, and we wanted the opportunity to correct and explain those."

The application for relief claims that the DA's brief includes "misstatements of law, fact and procedure" that are "designed to inflame the passions of the Court in its review of the petition."

Such misrepresentations, the document alleges, include the description of McIntosh as "a university professor and sexual predator who sexually assaulted one of his students," since McIntosh is no longer employed with Penn and never taught the case's victim as a student.

The prosecution then filed a response, stating that the brief included "no misstatements," and that the "defendant's creative effort to provide some amounts to word games."

A spokesperson for the District Attorney's office did not return requests for comment.

The Supreme Court usually takes six to 12 months to decide whether to grant review, a prospect that legal experts have said is highly unlikely.

If the Supreme Court does decide to hear his case, McIntosh could avoid the Superior Court's resentencing order, which carries a maximum sentence of five-and a half to 11 years in prison.

But Graci still has hope that the Court will consider the appeal.

"We believe we've asked them to address a number of timely and interesting issues, and we hope they will use their discretion and grant review," he said.

McIntosh was charged with sexually assaulting his former college roommate's 23-year-old niece when she visited him in September 2002. He pleaded no contest at his 2004 trial and was sentenced by Judge Rayford Means in March 2005 to 11 to 23 months of house arrest and eight years of probation.

That sentence was overturned by the Superior Court in November, and McIntosh's case was sent to a lower court for resentencing.

Both McIntosh and the University of Pennsylvania have reached settlements in a civil suit filed by the victim.

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.