Case Title: PEOPLE OF MI V ROBERT JAMES ROSEBERRY

Citation: 

Docket Number: 218032

State: michigan

Court: Michigan Supreme Court

Date: 2002-04-09T00:00:00Z

Document:
____________________________________________________________________________________________ 
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 
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Michigan Supreme Court 
Lansing, Michigan 48909 
C hief Justice 
Justices 
Maura D. Corrigan  
Michael F. Cavanagh 
Elizabeth A. Weaver 
Marilyn Kelly 
Clifford W. Taylor 
Robert P. Young, Jr. 
Opinion 
Stephen J. Markman 
FILED APRIL 9, 2002  
PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN,  
Plaintiff-Appellee,  
v  
No. 115184  
ROBERT JAMES ROSEBERRY,  
Defendant-Appellant.  
BEFORE THE ENTIRE BENCH  
TAYLOR, J.  
Defendant pleaded guilty to OUIL-3d, as a third-felony  
habitual offender.  After being sentenced on the OUIL-3d  
conviction, defendant moved to set aside the conviction on the  
ground that his two earlier OUIL convictions were invalid  
because he was not afforded counsel in connection with them.  
The circuit court denied the motion, and the Court of Appeals  
denied defendant’s application for leave to appeal.  We  
affirm, because such an untimely collateral attack on a prior  
conviction cannot provide a basis for relief.  
 
 
I  
Pursuant to a plea agreement and while represented by  
counsel, defendant pleaded guilty in the circuit court to the  
felony 
of 
operating 
under the influence of intoxicating liquor  
or a controlled substance, third offense, MCL 257.625(8)(c)1,  
as well as being a third-felony habitual offender, MCL  
769.11.2  Thereafter, the circuit court sentenced defendant to  
80 to 120 months (six years, eight months to ten years) of  
imprisonment on the OUIL-3d conviction (with the habitual  
third enhancement).  
Defendant’s conviction of OUIL-3d was predicated on two  
prior OUIL convictions.  After sentencing in the present case,  
defendant, in a motion to vacate his OUIL-3d conviction and  
sentence, challenged for the first time the validity of his  
prior OUIL convictions on the basis of his claim that he was  
not properly afforded his right to counsel in connection with  
the prior convictions.3  The circuit court denied the motion.  
1 
 Defendant admitted at the plea proceeding that he had 
been driving on U.S. 23 while he was “way over the legal limit 
of intoxication” from having consumed a large amount of beer 
and that his consumption of alcohol had affected him to the 
point that he could not properly drive a motor vehicle.  
2 Defendant also pleaded guilty to two misdemeanors that 
are immaterial for present purposes.  
3  An indigent defendant is constitutionally entitled to 
appointed counsel to defend against a misdemeanor charge if 
the defendant is “actually imprisoned” as a result of being  
2  
 
  
The Court of Appeals denied defendant’s ensuing delayed  
application for leave to appeal. Unpublished order, entered  
June 9, 1999 (Docket No. 218032). We granted leave, limited  
to whether defendant’s collateral challenge to his earlier  
OUIL convictions “was timely where it was not made until after  
he had pleaded guilty of OUIL, third offense.” 463 Mich 976  
(2001).  
II  
A  
The present case presents a straightforward question of  
law, whether a defendant, after pleading guilty to a crime  
such as OUIL-3d that depends on the defendant having one or  
more prior convictions, may collaterally attack a prior  
conviction on the ground that it was improperly obtained  
because of a denial of the right to counsel.  We hold that  
such an untimely collateral attack on a prior conviction  
should not be entertained by Michigan courts.  
The present case involves a collateral, as opposed to a  
direct, attack on defendant’s two prior OUIL convictions  
because the attack is being made in the present OUIL-3d case  
rather than having been made in a direct appeal from the prior  
convictions. People v Ingram, 439 Mich 288, 291 n 1; 484 NW2d  
241 (1992) (“Collateral attacks encompass those challenges  
convicted of the charged misdemeanor. People v Reichenbach, 
459 Mich 109, 120; 587 NW2d 1 (1998).  
3  
 
 
raised other than by initial appeal of the conviction in  
question”).  
In People v Crawford, 417 Mich 607; 339 NW2d 630 (1983),  
the defendant, under a plea bargain, pleaded nolo contendere  
to forgery and guilty to being an habitual second offender.  
On appeal, the defendant in Crawford argued that the plea  
bargain was illusory because the plea-based prior conviction  
under the habitual offender charge was subject to attack  
because it was obtained without the defendant being advised of  
two of the constitutional rights required by People v  
Jaworski, 387 Mich 21; 194 NW2d 868 (1972).4  In affirming the  
defendant’s guilty plea to being an habitual offender, the  
Crawford Court stated:  
A conviction defective under Jaworski can be  
challenged by a timely motion by the defendant to 
quash the supplemental information or to strike 
from the supplemental information the defective 
conviction.  To be timely, such a motion must be 
made before a defendant’s plea of guilty or nolo 
contendere is accepted. [Id. at 613-614.]  
In light of the result in Crawford of affirming the  
4 In Jaworski, this Court, applying Boykin v Alabama, 395  
US 238; 89 S Ct 1709; 23 L Ed 2d 274 (1969), held that, in a 
plea proceeding conducted after the June 2, 1969 date of the 
Boykin opinion, a defendant must be informed by the trial 
court of and specifically waive (1) the right to trial by 
jury, (2) the right to confront one’s accusers, and (3) the 
right against compelled self-incrimination. Accordingly, in 
directly reviewing the plea-based conviction in Jaworski, in  
which the trial court failed to inform the defendant of the  
right against compelled self-incrimination, id. at 26, this 
Court vacated the conviction and remanded the case for further  
proceedings. Id. at 33.  
4  
 
 
 
defendant’s plea-based conviction, its actual holding is  
implicit in the second of these sentences.  While the first  
sentence says collateral challenges are possible, the second  
gives the deadline for when they must be presented to be  
considered.  Because the deadline was missed by the defendant  
in Crawford, that fact is dispositive of the case.  
Accordingly, the first sentence was mere dicta because the  
merits or nature of the collateral attack in Crawford were of  
no consequence to its resolution, given the untimeliness of  
the collateral attack in that case.  Thus, the dissent is  
simply incorrect in asserting that the first sentence was  
“part of the resolution of the case.” Post, p 8.  
This Court also stated in Crawford:  
Crawford not having moved to set aside the 
prior conviction of which he now complains or to 
quash the supplemental information, and it not 
appearing that the prosecutor was on notice that 
the prior conviction may have been deficient or 
subject to challenge, Crawford cannot properly 
complain that he might not or would not have pled 
guilty or might have worked out a better plea 
bargain if the facts had been developed and his 
legal position had been sustained. [Id. At 613.]  
While the dissent emphasizes the factual difference that  
Crawford did not involve a challenge to a prior conviction  
based on a violation of the right to counsel, the rationale of  
Crawford nevertheless applies with equal force to the present  
case. Because (1) defendant did not move in the trial court  
to set aside either of his prior OUIL convictions before  
5  
  
 
 
pleading guilty to OUIL-3d and (2) nothing in the record  
indicates that the prosecution in the present case should have  
been on notice of any alleged deficiency in the prior OUIL  
convictions, defendant was precluded from collaterally  
attacking the prior convictions after pleading guilty to the  
OUIL-3d charge.  
B  
Justice Brickley authored a concurrence in Crawford in  
which, joined by Justice Ryan, he expressed disagreement with  
the assertion in the Crawford majority’s dicta that a  
conviction defective under Jaworski may be collaterally  
attacked by a timely motion during an habitual offender  
proceeding. 
Crawford, supra at 614-615. 
Rather, Justice  
Brickley would have resolved Crawford by holding that only  
guilty pleas taken in violation of the right to counsel  
articulated in Gideon v Wainwright, 372 US 335; 83 S Ct 792;  
9 L Ed 2d 799 (1963),  would be subject to collateral attack.  
Crawford, supra at 615. 
It follows that, under this view,  
Jaworski violations would only be subject to direct attack.  
Later, in  Ingram, supra at 296-297, this Court adopted  
Justice Brickley’s concurrence in Crawford. Therefore, after  
Ingram, only Gideon violations could support a collateral  
attack 
on 
a 
plea-based conviction.  The remaining significance  
6  
  
 
  
of Crawford, after Ingram, was that Crawford had established  
a timeliness factor in bringing a collateral attack on a  
predicate conviction.  We today make clear that any collateral  
challenge to a prior conviction must be brought in a timely  
fashion.
 Accordingly, to be understood is that the adoption  
by this Court in Ingram of Justice Brickley’s concurrence in  
Crawford does not negate the actual holding of this Court in  
Crawford foreclosing an untimely collateral attack on a  
conviction.
 Rather, the holding of Crawford barring  
collateral attacks of whatever sort on a prior conviction that  
are not advanced until after a defendant tenders a plea in the  
present proceeding remains intact.  
III  
Contrary to the apparent view of the dissent, the present  
case is distinguishable from Burgett v Texas, 389 US 109; 88  
S Ct 258; 19 L Ed 2d 319 (1967), and United States v Tucker,  
404 US 443; 92 S Ct 589; 30 L Ed 2d 592 (1972). In Burgett,  
the United States Supreme Court reversed a defendant’s  
convictions following a jury trial on the basis of the use of  
prior convictions that were from all appearances obtained  
without the benefit of counsel in violation of Gideon, supra.  
In Tucker, the defendant was also convicted of a crime by a  
jury. Id. at 444-445. At sentencing, the federal district  
court expressly considered three prior felony convictions of  
7  
 
 
the defendant. The Tucker Court held that the defendant was  
entitled 
to 
resentencing 
because 
it 
subsequently was  
determined 
that 
the 
prior 
felony 
convictions 
were  
constitutionally invalid as they were obtained without the  
defendant having been provided the right to counsel as  
provided by Gideon, supra. Tucker, supra at 447.  
In contrast to Burgett and Tucker, both of which involved  
a defendant convicted after a jury trial, defendant in the  
present 
case 
pleaded 
guilty 
to 
OUIL-3d 
and 
thereby  
acknowledged the validity of his prior OUIL convictions. It  
is this acknowledgment that distinguishes our case, where a  
plea of guilty sanitized any earlier collateral error, and  
Burgett and Tucker where no such acknowledgment took place.  
The watershed importance of a plea of guilty in criminal  
procedure law was made clear by the United States Supreme  
Court in Tollett v Henderson, 411 US 258, 267; 93 S Ct 1602;  
36 L Ed 2d 235 (1973), where the Court held in the context of  
federal habeas corpus review of a state criminal conviction:  
[A] guilty plea represents a break in the 
chain of events which has preceded it in the 
criminal process.  When a criminal defendant has  
solemnly admitted in open court that he is in fact 
guilty of the offense with which he is charged, he 
may 
not 
thereafter 
raise 
independent 
claims  
relating to the deprivation of constitutional  
rights that occurred prior to the entry of the 
guilty plea.  
The parties have not cited, and we have not discovered,  
any precedent from the United States Supreme Court that carves  
8  
 
out an exception to this broad principle for possible Gideon  
violations in connection with an antecedent conviction.  
Therefore, contrary to the implication of the dissent, a  
defendant does not have the unlimited right under controlling  
precedent to raise at any time a claim that a prior conviction  
is “void” under Gideon.  Rather, the defendant is precluded  
from this if the time he chooses to raise his Gideon claim is  
after an intervening guilty plea to an offense such as OUIL­
3d, which inherently includes an admission of the validity of  
the prior conviction.  Accordingly, it is appropriate—and  
consistent with federal constitutional law as articulated by  
the United States Supreme Court—to preclude defendant in this  
case from collaterally attacking the prior OUIL convictions  
underlying his guilty plea to OUIL-3d on the basis of his  
claims of constitutional deprivations that occurred in  
connection with the prior convictions.  
We believe that the dissent’s reliance, post at 5, on  
Menna v New York, 423 US 61; 96 S Ct 241; 46 L Ed 2d 195  
(1975), to effectively reject the applicability of Tollett,  
supra, is misplaced. 
In its brief per curiam opinion in  
Menna, the United States Supreme Court held that a guilty plea  
to a charge does not foreclose a claim that the charge is  
barred by the federal Double Jeopardy Clause.  In this  
context, the Court included in a footnote the following  
9  
 
 
 
  
 
 
sentence which is relied on by the dissent:  
A guilty plea, therefore, simply renders  
irrelevant those constitutional violations not  
logically inconsistent with the valid establishment 
of factual guilt and which do not stand in the way 
of 
conviction 
if 
factual 
guilt 
is 
validly 
established. [Menna, supra at 62-63, n 2.]  
This 
language, 
considered 
in 
context, 
refers 
to 
constitutional  
violations in a case in which the guilty plea at hand is  
taken, not to alleged constitutional violations related to  
prior convictions.5  The point is that a double jeopardy  
challenge is not waived by a guilty plea because even the  
unquestionable establishment of factual guilt would not allow  
a conviction to be validly entered if the conviction would  
constitute a double jeopardy violation.  Further, defendant’s  
factual guilt in the present case was validly established by  
his guilty plea to OUIL-3d.  Thus, our reliance on Tollett is  
in no way inconsistent with the language cited from Menna.6  
5  This is especially so because Menna did not involve a  
guilty plea to an “enhanced” crime such as OUIL-3d that 
depends on the existence of prior convictions.  Thus, no issue 
involving the use or validity of an antecedent conviction was 
before the Menna Court.  
6 
We also disagree with the dissent’s effort to  
distinguish Tollett on the basis that it “involved a direct  
challenge to a plea” and “did not involve a collateral 
challenge.” 
Post at 5. 
While defendant is advancing a 
collateral challenge to his prior OUIL convictions, he is 
doing so in an effort to directly challenge his plea to OUIL­
3d in the present case. Accordingly, Tollett is on point in 
precluding 
defendant 
from 
raising 
claims 
of 
alleged 
constitutional 
violations 
that 
occurred 
before 
his 
guilty 
plea 
to OUIL-3d for the purpose of challenging his OUIL-3d 
conviction.  
10  
 
Further, after setting forth the above quotation from  
Menna, the dissent concludes:  
In this case, defendant’s conviction of OUIL­
3d depends on prior OUIL convictions, one or more 
of which were obtained in violation of the right to 
counsel.  As further analysis reveals, no precedent  
exists that sustains the majority’s implicit 
decision that defendant’s factual guilt of his 
prior 
counselless 
convictions 
was 
validly 
established. [Post at 6.]  
This confuses the issue that is properly before us because our  
concern is whether defendant’s factual guilt of OUIL-3d was  
validly established in the present case, not whether his  
factual guilt of the antecedent OUIL convictions was validly  
established in prior proceedings.  Defendant, with the  
assistance of counsel, pleaded guilty to OUIL-3d.  This  
constituted a valid establishment of his factual guilt of  
OUIL-3d because, as stated in Menna, supra at 62-63, n 2, “a  
counseled plea of guilty is an admission of factual guilt so  
reliable that, where voluntary and intelligent, it quite  
validly removes the issue of factual guilt from the case.”  
Thus, the critical point is that, in pleading guilty to OUIL­
3d (with the assistance of counsel), defendant acknowledged  
his prior OUIL convictions. Accordingly, there is simply no  
occasion for us to independently examine, as the dissent would  
do, whether defendant’s factual guilt was validly established  
in the proceedings that resulted in those prior convictions.  
11  
 
 
 
 
 
 IV  
Defendant’s argument that his two prior OUIL convictions  
should be treated as invalid because he was not properly  
afforded his right to counsel in connection with those  
convictions comes too late.  A collateral attack on a prior  
conviction underlying a present charge may not be made after  
a defendant’s plea of guilty to the present charge is  
accepted.  Thus, we affirm the judgment of the circuit court.  
CORRIGAN, C.J., and CAVANAGH, 
WEAVER, 
YOUNG, 
and MARKMAN, 
JJ.,  
concurred with TAYLOR, J.  
12 
___________________________________ 
v 
S T A T E O F M I C H I G A N  
SUPREME COURT  
PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN,  
Plaintiff-Appellee,  
No. 115184  
ROBERT ROSEBERRY,  
Defendant-Appellant.  
KELLY, J. (dissenting).  
Defendant Roseberry's conviction for the felony OUIL-3d  
is based on two earlier convictions for OUIL.  In at least one  
of them, defendant did not have counsel and did not validly  
waive his right to counsel.  To allow his conviction for OUIL­
3d to stand is to deny him a basic constitutional right that  
legal 
precedent 
guarantees him.  The majority's circumvention  
of it is tenuously based and troubling.  The conviction should  
be reversed.  
The Right to Counsel  
The Sixth Amendment right to counsel is unique in both  
its importance and the protections afforded to it. People v  
 
 
 
Carpentier, 446 Mich 19, 29; 521 NW2d 195 (1994); see also  
Custis v United States, 511 US 485; 114 S Ct 1732; 128 L Ed 2d  
517 (1994).  For example, the United States Supreme Court has  
limited the instances in which a judge may consider  
convictions obtained in violation of this right.  
In analyzing whether constitutionally infirm prior  
convictions may be used to impeach a criminal defendant at  
trial, the Court has noted that  
[t]he starting point in considering this question 
is, of course, Gideon v Wainwright, 372 US 335; 83 
S Ct 792; 9 L Ed 2d 799 [1963]. In that case the 
Court unanimously announced a clear and simple 
constitutional rule: In the absence of waiver, a 
felony conviction is invalid if it was obtained in 
a court that denied the defendant the help of a 
lawyer.[1] [Loper v Beto, 405 US 473, 481; 92 S Ct 
1014; 31 L Ed 2d 374 (1972).]  
The Court has held that a conviction obtained in  
violation of a defendant's right to counsel is void. Burgett  
v Texas, 389 US 109, 114; 88 S Ct 258; 19 L Ed 2d 319 (1967).  
Such a conviction cannot be rendered valid by failure of the  
person convicted to attack it on direct review. Life is not  
breathed into it when, as here, a defendant pleads guilty to  
a charge based on it.  It is not voidable; it is void.  The  
underlying error of the majority is in assuming the contrary.  
As Burgett explains:  
1This rule applies to misdemeanor convictions that result 
in actual imprisonment. Nichols v United States, 511 US 738, 
749; 114 S Ct 1921; 128 L Ed 2d 745 (1994).  
2  
 
 
 
 
To permit a conviction obtained in violation  
of Gideon v Wainwright to be used against a person 
either to support guilt or enhance punishment for 
another offense is to erode the principle of that 
case.
 Worse yet, since the defect in the prior 
conviction was denial of the right to counsel, the 
accused in effect suffers anew from the deprivation 
of that Sixth Amendment right.  [Id. at 115  
(internal citation omitted).]  
Burgett clearly prohibits using a conviction obtained in  
violation of a defendant's Sixth Amendment right to counsel to  
support another conviction.  
United States v Tucker  
The United States Supreme Court relied on Burgett in  
United States v Tucker, 404 US 443; 92 S Ct 589; 30 L Ed 2d  
592 (1972).  Tucker held that a judge may not consider  
convictions obtained in violation of Gideon when sentencing a  
defendant for a later offense.  At the time of sentencing, the  
defendant in Tucker had not claimed that his earlier  
convictions were constitutionally infirm. 
Instead, he  
challenged the earlier convictions in a collateral proceeding  
several years later. Id. at 445.  
This precedent undercuts the majority's conclusion here  
that defendants may not challenge the validity of convictions  
that are used as a basis for later convictions unless they do  
so  "timely." The majority undertakes to distinguish Burgett  
and Tucker on the facts. But the factual differences do not  
render their holdings inapplicable to this case.  
3  
 
The majority misapprehends my reasoning.  I do not  
contend that the current case is indistinguishable from  
Burgett and Tucker. 
The fact of defendant's prior guilty  
pleas differentiates it from them. However, the majority is  
incorrect in concluding that this factual distinction is so  
significant that it prevails over constitutional principles.  
Nor can I agree that defendant's acknowledgment that he  
had twice before been convicted of OUIL was an acknowledgment  
that these counselless convictions were constitutionally  
valid.  The transcript of the plea proceedings reveals that  
defendant 
admitted 
two convictions of similar offenses in 1994  
and 1996.  He was not asked about and he did not admit his  
guilt of those offenses.  There was no attempt to determine if  
he had counsel in 1994 and in 1996 or had waived the right to  
counsel.  Instead, like the defendant in Tucker, defendant  
merely acknowledged the fact of the prior convictions.  To  
characterize this as somehow correcting the underlying  
constitutional error  ignores the significance of the right to  
counsel and contradicts federal precedent establishing that  
right.  
Tollett v Henderson  
The majority's reliance on Tollett v Henderson2 to  
fortify its position is misplaced. Tollett, which held that  
2411 US 258; 93 S Ct 1602; 36 L Ed 2d 235 (1973).  
4  
 
 
a defendant may not assert a constitutional error that  
occurred before his counseled guilty plea, involved a direct  
challenge to a plea.  It did not involve a collateral  
challenge.
 More importantly, its discussion of the  
significance of guilty pleas is unmistakedly limited to pleas  
entered with the advice of counsel. Tollett does not stand  
for the proposition that a guilty plea waives a challenge to  
the validity of an earlier conviction when the challenge is  
based on denial of the right to counsel.  See Menna v New  
York, 423 US 61, 62-63, n 2; 96 S Ct 241; 46 L Ed 2d 195  
(1975).  
Here the conviction was based in part on a void  
conviction or convictions.  Tollett does not address that  
situation.  It certainly does not hold that a void conviction  
can be resuscitated by a counseled guilty plea in a later  
case.  
As we discussed in People v New,3 the United States  
Supreme Court clarified the holding of Tollett, saying that a  
counseled guilty plea  
"renders 
irrelevant those constitutional violations  
not 
logically 
inconsistent 
with 
the 
valid  
establishment of guilt and which do not stand in 
the way of conviction, if factual guilt is validly  
established."  [New, supra at 488, quoting Menna,  
supra (emphasis added).]  
3427 Mich 482; 398 NW2d 358 (1986).  
5  
 
 
In this case, defendant's conviction of OUIL-3d depends  
on prior OUIL convictions, one or more of which were obtained  
in violation of the right to counsel.  As further analysis  
reveals, no precedent exists that sustains the majority's  
implicit decision that defendant's factual guilt of his prior  
counselless 
convictions 
was 
validly 
established. 
 
Tollett 
does  
not extend to collateral challenges of underlying void  
convictions and is inapplicable.  
People v Crawford  
The 
majority 
justifies its disposition by relying on this  
Court's decision in People v Crawford, 417 Mich 607; 339 NW2d  
630 (1983).  However, it misquotes and misapplies that  
decision.  There, the defendant moved to set aside his guilty  
plea.  He asserted that he had not been advised of his rights  
to confront his accusers and not to be compelled to  
incriminate himself.4  This Court held that a  
conviction 
defective 
under 
Jaworski 
can 
be  
challenged by a timely motion by the defendant to 
quash the supplemental information or to strike 
from the supplemental information the defective 
conviction. To be timely, such a motion must be 
made before a defendant's plea of guilty or nolo  
4These rights are known as Boykin-Jaworski rights. Boykin  
v Alabama, 395 US 238; 89 S Ct 1709; 23 L Ed 2d 274 (1969); 
People v Jaworski, 387 Mich 21; 194 NW2d 868 (1972). Boykin 
and Jaworski held that a defendant entering a guilty plea must 
be advised by the trial judge of (1) the privilege against 
self incrimination, (2) the right to trial by jury, and (3) 
the right to confront one's accusers.  The record must show  
that the defendant was so informed.  
6  
 
 
contendere is accepted. [Id. at 613-614.]  
Crawford did not hold that collateral attacks on  
convictions obtained in violation of Sixth Amendment rights  
are foreclosed if not raised before a plea of guilty on a  
subsequent 
conviction. Crawford involved 
Jaworski rights. It  
held that challenges to convictions obtained in violation of  
those rights must be raised before a plea of guilty to a later  
offense is accepted.  
Contrary to the majority's interpretation, Crawford drew  
a careful distinction between convictions obtained in  
violation of a defendant's right to counsel and other defects  
in guilty plea proceedings.  It made a narrow ruling that  
explicitly noted limits on the use of convictions obtained  
without the advice of counsel, citing Burgett and Tucker. Id.  
at 614, n 14. The majority misses the distinction.  
The majority dismisses Crawford's reference to Jaworski  
rights as dicta.  But on closer examination, it becomes  
apparent that the holding cannot accurately be read to include  
Sixth Amendment violations.  The Court of Appeals ruling in  
the case affirmed Crawford's plea.  It rejected his claim that  
the underlying guilty plea was defective because Crawford had  
not been advised of his rights to confront witnesses and avoid  
self-incrimination.
 Significantly, the Court of Appeals  
stated that "only those prior guilty-plea convictions where  
7  
 
the defendant was not represented by counsel should be excised  
from one's prior conviction record for purposes of the  
habitual offender statute." See id. at 611.  
Rather than affirming because no right exists to  
collaterally 
challenge 
the 
plea, 
Crawford 
expressly  
acknowledged 
the 
viability of a timely collateral challenge to  
pleas obtained in violation of Jaworski rights.  It then  
concluded that "such a motion" was timely if made before the  
trial court accepted the plea. 
Id. at 613-614. 
This  
conclusion is relevant only if a collateral challenge can be  
made.  Reading these sentences in context, it becomes clear  
that the first, which regards challenges to defective  
convictions under Jaworski, is part of the resolution of the  
case.  
This conclusion is supported by Justice Brickley's  
accompanying opinion in which he stated:  
I concur in the result of the majority 
opinion, but cannot concur in the assertion that a 
conviction, although defective under Boykin v  
Alabama and People v Jaworski, but never directly 
attacked, may be challenged by a timely motion 
during an habitual offender proceeding.  I would  
hold that only those guilty pleas taken in  
violation of Gideon v Wainwright are subject to  
collateral attack in later habitual offender  
proceedings.  [Id. at 614-615 (internal citations 
omitted).]  
Reading the sentences regarding Jaworski rights and  
timeliness in the context of this concurrence confirms that  
8  
 
 
 
the language regarding challenging Jaworski violations was an  
integral limitation built into Crawford. Thus, I cannot agree  
that Crawford's holding is so broad as to apply to all  
collateral challenges. Instead, given the importance of the  
right 
to 
counsel, 
considerations of timeliness must yield when  
a conviction has been obtained in violation of that  
fundamental safeguard.  
Conclusion  
Given the clarity and simplicity of the constitutional  
rule involved in this case, the majority should not be shy  
about applying it.  The majority has found no United States  
Supreme 
Court 
opinion that qualifies or diminishes the Court's  
holding in Gideon. 
The instant case should not be used to  
plant precedent in Michigan law that may later be cited to  
justify watering down the constitutional rule enunciated by  
Gideon, reaffirmed by Burgett, Loper, and Tucker, among  
others, and adopted by this Court in People v Moore, 391 Mich  
426; 216 NW2d 770 (1974).  
In deciding the matter before us, the majority carves  
serious inroads into the Sixth Amendment constitutional right  
to counsel in Michigan.  It relies erroneously on Crawford to  
circumvent the well-established principle that convictions  
obtained where a defendant was without counsel and did not  
waive his right to counsel are void.  Yet, as demonstrated  
9  
 
above, Crawford does not apply to convictions obtained in  
violation of the Sixth Amendment.  
I would remand this case to the trial court with  
instructions to reverse defendant's conviction.  Because at  
least 
one 
of 
his 
two 
earlier 
OUIL 
convictions 
is  
constitutionally 
infirm, hence void, he cannot be convicted of  
OUIL-3d.  
10