Case Title: MATTHEW CHRISTOPHER KURTENBACH v. THE STATE OF WYOMING

Citation: 

Docket Number: S-07-0289

State: wyoming

Court: Wyoming Supreme Court

Date: 2008-09-18T00:00:00Z

Document:
MATTHEW CHRISTOPHER KURTENBACH v. THE STATE OF WYOMING2008 WY 109192 P.3d 973Case Number: No. S-07-0289Decided: 09/18/2008
APRIL 
TERM, A.D. 2008

 
 
MATTHEW 
CHRISTOPHER KURTENBACH,Appellant(Defendant),v.THE 
STATE OF WYOMING,Appellee(Plaintiff).

 
 
Appeal 
from the DistrictCourtofWestonCounty

The 
Honorable Dan R. Price II, Judge

 
 

Representing 
Appellant:

Diane 
Lozano, State Public Defender; Tina N. Kerin, Appellate Counsel; and Eric M. 
Alden, Sr. Assistant Appellate Counsel.  
Argument by Mr. Alden.

 
 

Representing 
Appellee:

Bruce 
A. Salzburg, Wyoming Attorney General; Terry L. Armitage, Deputy Attorney 
General; D. Michael Pauling, Senior Assistant Attorney General; Eric Johnson, 
Faculty Director, PAP; Brian Hunter, Student Director; and Laura J. Derry, 
Student Intern.  Argument by Ms. 
Derry.

 
 
Before 
VOIGT, C.J., and GOLDEN, HILL, KITE, and BURKE, 
JJ.

 
 

HILL, 
Justice.

 
 
[¶1]      Appellant, 
Matthew Christopher Kurtenbach (Kurtenbach), entered a conditional plea of 
guilty to the crime of making a false statement to obtain credit, in violation 
of Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 6-3-612(a) (LexisNexis 2007).1  The condition was that Kurtenbach be 
authorized to appeal the district court's denial of his motion to dismiss the 
information based upon a claim that his right to a speedy trial was 
violated.  

 
 
ISSUE

 
 
[¶2]      The only issue 
raised by Kurtenbach is that the district court erred in denying his motion to 
dismiss based on lack of a speedy trial.  
The State contends that when the analysis articulated in Barker v. Wingo, 407 U.S. 514, 92 S. Ct. 2182, 33 L. Ed. 2d 101 (1972), is applied to the circumstances of this case, 
Kurtenbach's speedy trial claim fails.

 
 
FACTS 
AND PROCEEDINGS

 
 
[¶3]      Kurtenbach 
committed the crime at issue on October 7, 2004.  On March 2, 2005,2 an information was filed in the circuit court of Weston 
County charging Kurtenbach with three felonies that he was alleged to have 
committed in the process of applying for a loan from a bank to buy a motor 
vehicle.  A warrant for Kurtenbach's 
arrest was signed and filed in the court on March 9, 2005.  The warrant was entered into NCIC on 
July 28, 2006, and he was arrested on that date.  It is the delay in entering the arrest 
warrant into NCIC that forms the core of Kurtenbach's speedy trial issue.  It is acknowledged by the State that 
Kurtenbach would likely have been arrested much sooner if the warrant had been 
timely entered into NCIC. 

 
 
[¶4]      Kurtenbach was 
arraigned on August 31, 2006, and released on bond, after which he returned to 
South 
Dakota.  In 
a letter mailed from the South Dakota Penitentiary on December 26, 2006, and 
filed in the district court on December 28, 2006, Kurtenbach stated that: "I am 
stating on record that I do not waive my right to a speedy trial."  On May 2, 2007, Kurtenbach filed a 
motion to dismiss for lack of a speedy trial.  That motion was denied by order entered 
on May 14, 2007.  The district 
court's basis for denying the motion was orally delivered at the conclusion of 
the hearing on the motion and was premised on the circumstance that Kurtenbach 
failed to demonstrate that he had been prejudiced in any significant way by the 
State's failure to more promptly serve the arrest warrant.  The plea agreement was entered of record 
on May 10, 2007, reserving Kurtenbach's right to appeal the denial of his speedy 
trial motion.  The hearing on that 
motion was conducted on May 10, 2007.  
Judgment was entered on September 5, 2007, and sentence was entered on 
October 3, 2007.  An amended notice 
of appeal was filed on October 22, 2007.

 
 
[¶5]      From March 2005 
until October 2005, Kurtenbach was in the South Dakota State Penitentiary in 
Springfield, South Dakota.  Thereafter, Kurtenbach was placed on 
parole status in South 
Dakota.  He 
lived and worked in Rapid 
City, had weekly contact with his parole officer, and his 
name was in the phone book.  In 
January of 2005, Kurtenbach contacted the Weston County Attorney's Office to 
find out if there were charges pending against him, and he was informed that there were none.  Kurtenbach's parole was revoked, and he 
was returned to prison in South 
Dakota.  He 
remained there until he was arrested upon his release from South Dakota's custody in 
July of 2006.  It was Kurtenbach's 
theory that had Wyoming afforded him a more speedy disposition 
of the charges against him, he would have been arrested in October of 2005 at 
the very latest.  However, because 
the South Dakota authorities did not become 
aware of the Wyoming arrest warrant, Kurtenbach was 
prejudiced because he was not able to resolve that matter in a timely fashion 
and was, perhaps, denied the opportunity to be able to serve his sentences 
concurrently.

 
 
DISCUSSION

 
 
[¶6]      Kurtenbach's 
argument is premised on the application of the speedy trial right guaranteed by 
the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution.  The Wyoming Constitution contains a 
virtually identical right in art. 1, § 10.  
Since 1972, we have treated those two provisions as identical, i.e., our 
state constitution provides no greater rights than those found in the Sixth 
Amendment, and we have used the analysis adopted by the United States Supreme 
Court whether speaking of the Sixth Amendment or art. 1, § 10 of the Wyoming 
Constitution.  Cosco v. State, 503 P.2d 1403, 1405 
(Wyo. 1972); Harvey v. State, 774 P.2d 87, 91-98 
(Wyo. 1989); Phillips v. State, 835 P.2d 1062, 
1068-70 (Wyo. 
1992); Potter v. State, 2007 WY 83, 
158 P.3d 656, 664-66 (Wyo. 2007).  
That analytical framework was first articulated in Barker.  We have employed that test many 
times:

 
 
            
 Every criminal defendant is entitled to a speedy and public trial under 
the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article 1, § 10 of the 
Wyoming Constitution.  Walters v. State, 2004 WY 37, ¶ 10, 
87 P.3d 793, 795 (Wyo.2004).  In 
reviewing a district court's decision on whether a defendant's constitutional 
right has been violated, we apply the de novo standard of review.  Berry v. State, 2004 WY 81, ¶ 17, 
93 P.3d 222, 227-28 (Wyo.2004).  The 
district court's findings of fact on the speedy trial issue are reviewed for 
clear error.  Walters, ¶ 9.

 
 
The 
test enunciated in Barker v. Wingo, 
407 U.S. 514, 92 S. Ct. 2182, 33 L. Ed. 2d 101, (1972) applies to constitutional speedy trial claims.  Berry, 
¶ 31.  "Under that test, we 
consider four factors in determining whether a speedy trial violation has 
occurred:  1) the length of the 
delay; 2) the reason for the delay; 3) the defendant's assertion of his right; 
and 4) the prejudice to the defendant."  
Id. We consider 
the factors together and balance them in relation to all of the relevant 
circumstances of the delay in bringing a defendant to trial.  Walters, ¶ 10; Barker, 407 U.S.  at 533, 92 S. Ct. 2182.   The ultimate 
question is "whether the delay in bringing the accused to trial was 
unreasonable, that is, whether it substantially impaired the right of the 
accused to a fair trial."  Walters,¶ 10 quoting Warner v. State, 2001 WY 67, ¶ 10, 
28 P.3d 21, 26 (Wyo.2001).  When a 
defendant's constitutional right to a speedy trial is violated, the charges must 
be dismissed with prejudice.  Walters, 
¶ 10.

 
 

Sisneros 
v. State, 
2005 WY 139, ¶¶ 16-17, 121 P.3d 790, 796-97 (Wyo. 2005); also see Strandlein v. State, 2007 WY 66, 
¶¶ 5-19, 156 P.3d 986, 989-92 (Wyo. 2007).

 
 
[¶7]      It was alleged 
that Kurtenbach committed the crime at issue on October 4, 2004.  His claim of delay is the elapsed time 
between the date the information was 
filed in the circuit court (March 2, 2005)3 and the time he was arrested (July 
28, 2006), combined with the time between his arrest and the time he entered a 
conditional plea of guilty (May 14, 2007).  
Kurtenbach's guilty plea is identified in the record as an Alford plea, i.e., a plea that allows an 
accused to voluntarily, knowingly, and understandingly consent to the imposition 
of a prison sentence even if he is unwilling or unable to admit his 
participation in the acts constituting the crime.  See North Carolina v. Alford, 400 U.S. 25, 91 S. Ct. 160, 27 L. Ed. 2d 162 (1970).  
As noted above, Kurtenbach does not claim a violation of speedy trial as 
required by W.R.Cr.P. 48.  This is 
not the usual sort of speedy trial claim that we see, but there are many such 
cases from other jurisdictions that provide guidance for us here.  C.C. Marvel, Annotation, Delay Between Filing of Complaint or Other 
Charge and Arrest of Accused as Violation of Right to a Speedy Trial, 85 
A.L.R.2d 980 (1962; Later Cases A.L.R.2d, at 199-221 (2001) and Supp. 
2008)).  In Doggett v. United States, 505 U.S. 647, 112B S.Ct. 2686, 2689-94, 
120 L. Ed. 2d 520 (1992), Doggett was arrested 8 ½ years after he was 
indicted.  The Supreme Court held 
that:  (1) The 8 ½-year lag sufficed 
to trigger a speedy trial inquiry (it was six times as long as that generally 
deemed sufficient to trigger judicial review); (2) the government was to blame 
for the delay; (3) Doggett asserted his speedy trial right in a timely manner; 
and (4) the delay presumptively prejudiced his ability to prepare an adequate 
defense.  This detail from the Doggett opinion provides us with a 
template for analyzing Kurtenbach's claims in the instant 
case:

 
 
Our 
speedy trial standards recognize that pretrial delay is often both inevitable 
and wholly justifiable.  The 
government may need time to collect witnesses against the accused, oppose his 
pretrial motions, or, if he goes into hiding, track him down.  We attach great weight to such 
considerations when balancing them against the costs of going forward with a 
trial whose probative accuracy the passage of time has begun by degrees to throw 
into question.  See Loud Hawk, 
supra, at 315-317, 106 S.Ct., at 656-657.  Thus, in this case, if the Government 
had pursued Doggett with reasonable diligence from his indictment to his arrest, 
his speedy trial claim would fail.  
Indeed, that conclusion would generally follow as a matter of course 
however great the delay, so long as Doggett could not show specific prejudice to 
his defense.

 
 
The 
Government concedes, on the other hand, that Doggett would prevail if he could 
show that the Government had intentionally held back in its prosecution of him 
to gain some impermissible advantage at trial.  See Brief for United States 28, n.21; 
Tr. of Oral Arg. 28-34 (Feb. 24, 1992).  
That we cannot doubt. Barker stressed that official bad faith in 
causing delay will be weighed heavily against the government, 407 
U.S., at 531, 92 S.Ct., at 2192, and 
a bad-faith delay the length of this negligent one would present an overwhelming 
case for dismissal.

 
 
Between 
diligent prosecution and bad-faith delay, official negligence in bringing an 
accused to trial occupies the middle ground.  While not compelling relief in every 
case where bad-faith delay would make relief virtually automatic, neither is 
negligence automatically tolerable simply because the accused cannot demonstrate 
exactly how it has prejudiced him.  
It was on this point that the Court of Appeals erred, and on the facts 
before us, it was reversible error.

 
 

Barker 
made it clear that "different weights [are to be] assigned to different reasons" 
for delay. Ibid.  Although 
negligence is obviously to be weighed more lightly than a deliberate intent to 
harm the accused's defense, it still falls on the wrong side of the divide 
between acceptable and unacceptable reasons for delaying a criminal prosecution 
once it has begun.  And such is the 
nature of the prejudice presumed that the weight we assign to official 
negligence compounds over time as the presumption of evidentiary prejudice 
grows.  Thus, our toleration of such 
negligence varies inversely with its protractedness, cf. Arizona v. 
Youngblood, 488 U.S. 51, 109 S. Ct. 333, 102 L. Ed. 2d 281 (1988), and its consequent threat to the fairness of the accused's 
trial.  Condoning prolonged and 
unjustifiable delays in prosecution would both penalize many defendants for the 
state's fault and simply encourage the government to gamble with the interests 
of criminal suspects assigned a low prosecutorial priority.  The Government, indeed, can hardly 
complain too loudly, for persistent neglect in concluding a criminal prosecution 
indicates an uncommonly feeble interest in bringing an accused to justice; the 
more weight the Government attaches to securing a conviction, the harder it will 
try to get it.

 
 
To 
be sure, to warrant granting relief, negligence unaccompanied by particularized 
trial prejudice must have lasted longer than negligence demonstrably causing 
such prejudice.  But even so, the 
Government's egregious persistence in failing to prosecute Doggett is clearly 
sufficient.  The lag between 
Doggett's indictment and arrest was 8 1/2 years, and he would have faced trial 6 
years earlier than he did but for the Government's inexcusable oversights. The 
portion of the delay attributable to the Government's negligence far exceeds the 
threshold needed to state a speedy trial claim; indeed, we have called shorter 
delays "extraordinary."  See 
Barker, supra, 407 U.S., at 533, 92 S.Ct., at 2193.  When the Government's negligence thus 
causes delay six times as long as that generally sufficient to trigger judicial 
review, see n.1, supra, 
and when the presumption of prejudice, albeit unspecified, is neither 
extenuated, as by the defendant's 
acquiescence, e.g., 
407 U.S., at 534-536, 92 S.Ct., at 2194-2195, nor persuasively 
rebutted, the defendant is entitled to 
relief.

 
 

Doggett, 
112 S. Ct.  at 2693-94 (footnotes omitted).

 
 
[¶8]      In this case, we 
first identify the "delay" problem as being about 17 months in length.  During much of that time, Kurtenbach was 
incarcerated in South 
Dakota and could readily have been located.  The reason for the delay is best 
categorized as negligence in the nature of oversight, a simple failure to enter 
the arrest warrant in the NCIC system.  
Once the arrest was entered into that system, Kurtenbach was located and 
arrested within hours.  Kurtenbach 
asserts that he contacted the Weston County Attorney's Office on one occasion to 
determine if there were charges pending against him there.  He claims that he was told there were no 
charges pending.  Once he was 
arrested, Kurtenbach, a man well experienced with the criminal justice system, 
immediately demanded a speedy trial.  
The delays thereafter are largely attributable to Kurtenbach, and he does 
not press any issue with the delay between the date of his arrest and the date 
he pled guilty (and/or the date he would have been tried had he not pled 
guilty).  The district court did not 
make detailed findings about Kurtenbach's claim of prejudice in defending 
against the charges against him, other than calling them speculative.  Kurtenbach claimed that he had no 
recollection of the events of October 4, 2004.  He also claimed that his landlord had 
disposed of a journal that might have aided him in recapitulating what he was 
doing on that date and, perhaps, developing an alibi defense.  While Kurtenbach accepted that the State 
established a factual basis for his guilty plea, he made no admissions of guilt 
at the time he entered his guilty plea.

 
 
[¶9]      We have 
considered these facts and circumstances in their totality, and we conclude that 
no presumption of prejudice arises because of them.  Kurtenbach's claims of prejudice are 
speculative and not credible.  We 
can perceive no apparent prejudice to his ability to defend against the charges 
made against him by the State of Wyoming because of the delay in serving the 
arrest warrant on him.  Furthermore, 
we are unable to conclude that Kurtenbach's right to a fair trial was 
substantially impaired by the State's delay in effecting his 
arrest.

 
 
CONCLUSION

 
 
[¶10]   The judgment and sentence of the 
district court are affirmed.

 
 
FOOTNOTES

 
 

1§ 6-3-612. False written 
statements to obtain property or credit; penalties.

            
(a)  A person is guilty of a felony punishable by imprisonment 
for not more than five (5) years, a fine of not more than five thousand dollars 
($5,000.00) or the amount of the credit sought or obtained, whichever is 
greater, or by both fine and imprisonment, if he knowingly makes or uses a false 
written statement of the financial condition of himself or another person with 
intent that the statement be relied upon to procure the delivery of property, 
the payment of cash, the making of a loan, the extension of credit, the discount 
of an account receivable or the making, acceptance, discount, sale or 
endorsement of a bill of exchange or promissory note for the benefit of himself 
or another person.

            
(b)  A person is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by 
imprisonment for not more than one (1) year, a fine of not more than one 
thousand dollars ($1,000.00) or the amount of the credit sought or obtained, 
whichever is greater, or by both fine and imprisonment, if he knowingly makes or 
uses a false written statement to a pawnbroker with respect to the ownership of 
property with intent that the statement be relied upon to procure from the 
pawnbroker the payment of cash, the making of a loan, the extension of credit or 
the discount of an account receivable for the benefit of himself or another 
person.

 
 

2The 
information was signed by the 
prosecutor on Monday, February 28, 2005, but was not filed in a court until 
Wednesday, March 2, 2005.

 
 

3Kurtenbach 
asks that the delay be counted beginning with February 28, 2005, the day the 
prosecuting attorney signed the information, rather than the day it actually was 
filed in the circuit court.  
However, this difference in counting the length of the delay does not 
affect our reasoning or the outcome of this case.