Their summer break had begun but members of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives are heading back to Harrisburg Thursday to try to iron out an agreement with the state Senate on revisions to the state’s guidelines for second-degree murder convictions.
The state Supreme Court ruled earlier this year that a lifetime sentence was unconstitutional in second-degree murder cases. It gave the legislature 120 days to develop new sentencing guidelines for second-degree murders. The deadline is Friday. The Senate, in a bipartisan 30-20 vote approved an earlier proposal, House Bill 1042, on July 12, but the House did not take up the revised bill before members left Harrisburg on a summer break.
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