An offender’s deadline for challenging his conviction through postconviction relief was not determined by the date he filed the trial transcript in support of his application to reopen his appeal under appellate court rules, the Supreme Court of Ohio ruled today.

A Supreme Court majority affirmed two lower court decisions that found Trevor Fraley’s petition for postconviction relief was “untimely” because it was filed after the deadline set by state law. Fraley had argued that because his attorney missed a deadline to file a transcript of his trial court proceedings, the timeline for filing his petition should start from when he filed the transcript in an application to reopen his direct appeal under Rule 26(B) of the Ohio Rules of Appellate Procedure.

Writing for the Court majority, Justice Joseph T. Deters explained state law sets two deadlines for filing for postconviction relief: one if a transcript is filed in a direct appeal challenging the offender’s conviction, and another if no direct appeal is attempted. Fraley argued that the first deadline in R.C. 2953.21(A)(2)(a) applies to his case. Although Fraley’s appellate counsel did not file a transcript in his direct appeal, Fraley filed a transcript in support of an application to reopen his direct appeal, which the court of appeals eventually granted. He argued that filing a transcript in support of an application for reopening is tantamount to filing one in a direct appeal.

The Court disagreed, finding the first deadline does not apply to reopened appeals because, under established precedent , an application to reopen an appeal is not part of an offender’s direct appeal.  The ruling affirmed the decision of the Butler County Common Pleas Court and the Twelfth District Court of Appeals, which dismissed Fraley’s petition for postconviction relief.

Justice Deters wrote that Fraley did not argue that his case might fall under the second deadline, set in R.C. 2953.21(A)(2)(a), for cases where no direct appeal was filed. The Court did not consider whether that deadline would apply.

Chief Justice Sharon L. Kennedy and Justices R. Patrick DeWine, Daniel R. Hawkins, and Megan E. Shanahan joined Justice Deters’ opinion.

In an opinion concurring in judgment only, Justice Patrick F. Fischer wrote that the majority never analyzed which deadline would apply. Fraley’s case falls in a “gap” in state law, he noted. R.C. 2953.21(A)(2)(a) sets forth two deadlines. The first is based on an offender both filing a direct appeal and filing a transcript in a direct appeal. The second applies when the offender does not file a direct appeal.

Fraley filed a direct appeal, but his attorney missed the deadline for filing a transcript. The law is silent on a deadline in this situation, Justice Fischer noted. The General Assembly should address the scenario, he maintained, but until it does, the Court should decide which deadline applies in cases such as Fraley’s. He wrote that the second deadline should apply as if no direct appeal was taken.

In a dissenting opinion, Justice Jennifer Brunner wrote that neither deadline applied to Fraley’s case and the law is silent on the deadline for persons in his situation. She noted Fraley has a right under state law to seek postconviction relief, and the General Assembly has not set any deadline in state law for cases in which the transcript was filed in support of a reopened appeal. Because there is no deadline in the law, Fraley’s postconviction petition should have been considered by the trial court, she concluded.

2024-1038. State v. Fraley, Slip Opinion No. 2026-Ohio-1964.

View oral argument video of this case.

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