A former Erie County man who is serving a life sentence for the murder of his wife, the former Amanda Elizabeth Schmitt of Altoona, will receive another opportunity to appeal his conviction for first-degree murder, the Pennsylvania Superior Court ruled late last week.

Schmitt, 31, a school teacher, was married to John Grazioli, an investment broker, for only six months when, on March 8, 2018, he shot her in the back of the head while she was sleeping in their Millcreek home.

He claimed that he had bought her a handgun as a present for her birthday and was attempting to show her the gun when it mistakenly fired.

Granzioli, who was 44 at the time, then left a suicide note that stated, “I killed Amanda Schmitt Grazioli. I killed myself. I am profoundly sorry.”

However, Grazioli did not kill himself and instead locked the family dogs in the cellar of their home and, after eating lunch at a restaurant, went to St. Peter Cathedral in Erie where he confessed the killing to a priest.

Grazioli was convicted by a jury of first-degree murder, recklessly endangering another person and carrying a firearm without a license, and on April 5, 2019, was sentenced by Erie County Judge Daniel J. Barbender Jr. to life in prison without the possibility of parole, plus 10 to 20 years.

The Superior Court upheld his conviction and sentence, but the case ran into legal difficulty when Grazioli filed a post-conviction appeal seeking a new trial and contending his trial counsel was ineffective.

The legal odyssey that ensued came to an end when a Superior Court panel — that included Judges John T. Bender, Deborah A. Kunselman and James G. Colins — in an 11-page opinion, ordered Erie County to appoint a new attorney for Grazioli and instructed the judge to hold further hearings on the issues that have been raised on appeal.

The appeals court ruled that Grazioli’s present attorney raised nine issues on appeal but the court-appointed attorney cited no legal authority for five of the issues that were presented and failed to support his issues by citing locations in the trial record that support his points.

“Given these briefing deficiencies, we agree with (Grazioli) that (his attorney) has waived the majority of his issues for our review,” the Superior Court stated.

“When defects in a brief impede our ability to conduct meaningful appellate review, we may dismiss the appeal entirely or find certain issues to be waived.”

The court stated that “we cannot discern any reasonable basis for the … briefing errors.”

The attorney, identified by the Superior Court as William J. Hathaway, raised nine issues, noting for instance that Grazioli’s trial attorney failed to seek a change of venue for his trial.

Another challenge focused on the trial judge’s decision to allow testimony that Grazioli sent messages to other women.

Hathaway challenged the trial judge’s instructions to the jury, and noted the trial attorney presented a defense that was “logically inconsistent and disparate.”

The trial judge also dismissed Grazioli’s initial defense issues, presented by attorney Tina Fryling, without a hearing.

Grazioli contended Fryling was ineffective, and he has not yet been able to present his arguments focusing on her ineffectiveness.

The Superior Court panel concluded the appropriate relief was to send the Grazioli case back to Erie County for the appointment of new counsel, and for further development of the record regarding Grazioli’s ineffectiveness claims involving his trial counsel and his two post-conviction attorneys.

Schmitt was a 2004 graduate of Altoona Area High School and a graduate of Slippery Rock University.

Grazioli, now 49, remains incarcerated in the State Correctional Institution Rockview.