Case Title: State v. Evans

Citation: 259 N.W.2d 789

Docket Number: 59282

State: iowa

Court: Iowa Supreme Court

Date: 1977-11-23T00:00:00Z

Document:
259 N.W.2d 789 (1977) STATE of Iowa, Appellee, v. Herman EVANS, Appellant. No. 59282. Supreme Court of Iowa. November 23, 1977. Philip M. Reisetter of Iowa City, and Thomas P. Curran of Minneapolis, Minn., for appellant. Richard C. Turner, Atty. Gen., J. Susan Carney, Asst. Atty. Gen. and Jack W. Dooley, Johnson County Atty., for appellee. Heard by MOORE, C. J., and RAWLINGS, REES, UHLENHOPP and McCORMICK, JJ. UHLENHOPP, Justice. This appeal involves guilty-plea proceedings on a charge of malicious injury to a *790 building. Defendant Herman Evans suffers from schizophrenia with manic depressive components. At times, especially when off medication, he loses touch with reality and suffers severe mood problems. Defendant has a history of being in and out of mental health institutions and of some criminal activity. On November 20, 1975, neighbors made a complaint to the Iowa City police that defendant was creating a disturbance at an apartment. When the police arrived, defendant was shouting and muttering incoherently, and the police observed burning papers against a door. They took defendant to the station house where, during booking, defendant held a plastic evidence envelope over a burning lighter "to form a light like a falling star." As a result of the latter incident the county attorney charged defendant with attempting to burn the booking room. The officers placed defendant in jail, where he tore a lavatory and a commode from their moorings. The trial court appointed an attorney for defendant, and thereafter entered an order reciting that defendant "committed acts of arson and vandalism while within the confines of the Jail, such as to bring into serious doubt Defendant's sanity at this time" and transferring defendant to Iowa Security Medical Facility (ISMF) for psychiatric examination, evaluation, and treatment and for return upon completion. On January 21, 1976, ISMF through Dr. R. T. Lara reported to the court. We quote portions of the report: The defense attorney appointed by the trial court investigated the case and recommended that defendant plead not guilty to the charge of attempted burning. Defendant, however, insisted on pleading guilty. On January 26, 1976, defendant tendered a guilty plea, but after a hearing the trial court refused to accept it. On January 30 following, the county attorney dismissed the attempted burning charge and charged defendant with malicious injury to the jail. Defendant was unable to make bail on the charge, and the officers believed that the jail was not equipped to handle him. The Veterans Administration hospital located in Iowa City would only accept defendant if committed under the Iowa statute on civil commitment of mentally ill persons (see Code 1977, ch. 229). Defendant was so committed and placed in that hospital on February 2, 1976. Subsequently the hospital placed defendant on outpatient basis but did not discharge him. On February 5, 1976, the trial court arraigned defendant on the malicious injury charge. Defendant again insisted on pleading guilty against his attorney's advice. The trial court conducted a lengthy hearing and extensively interrogated defendant. The court then accepted the plea, ordered a presentence investigation, subsequently passed sentence, and committed defendant to the penitentiary. Defendant later moved in arrest of judgment. He did not attend the hearing on that motion, as the deputy sheriff who went to the penitentiary to transport him could not get him to leave his cell. The deputy testified: Dr. Lara among others testified at the hearing on the motion in arrest. He was of the opinion that defendant could stand trial. He also acknowledged, however, the contents of his report from which we have quoted. Dr. Richard Fowler of the Veterans Administration Hospital also testified at the hearing on the motion. He had known defendant from four or five previous hospital admissions. Dr. Fowler engages in medical care of psychiatric patients, research, and teaching medical students. His diagnosis of defendant was manic depressive illness. He testified inter alia regarding defendant, "He has also stated a belief at times when he's been quite active that he is a religious figure who has been directed by God to save the world." He also testified, in part: The record contains considerable other testimony touching upon defendant's mental ability to stand trial, some favorable and some unfavorable. The trial court overruled the motion in arrest. In this court defendant assigns a number of errors, but in view of our disposition of the case we decide only one of the assignments. I. Section 783.1 of the Code provides: Proceedings upon a guilty plea constitute "any stage of the trial of a criminal prosecution" within this section. Hickey v. District Court of Kossuth County, 174 N.W.2d 406 (Iowa). In prosecutions such as the present one, the legislature has not entrusted judges or physicians with the ultimate determination of whether a defendant is competent to stand trial, but has rather left that decision to juries. § 783.2; Hickey v. District Court of Kossuth County, supra. The judge's function is a preliminary one: to ascertain whether a reasonable doubt has arisen as to sanity. If so the judge must order a jury trial on that issue. 21 Am.Jur.2d Criminal Law § 68 at 150; 23 C.J.S. Criminal Law § 940 at 730. The judge must act on his own motion in instances where a reasonable doubt arises as to the defendant's sanity. State v. Stoddard, 180 N.W.2d 448 (Iowa). This court set out the rules on the present subject in the Hickey case: initially the trial court exercises its discretion on whether a reasonable doubt has arisen so as to necessitate a jury trial on sanity, but its discretion "is a judicial discretion and must be guided by the law so as to do substantial equity and justice," Hickey, supra, 174 N.W.2d at 409; "sanity," under § 783.1, "is defendant's mental capacity to appreciate the charge against him, understand the proceedings, and conduct his defense," id.; a judge has a "reasonable doubt" when his mind "is left in such a condition that he cannot honestly say he feels an abiding conviction to a moral certainty as to the truth of a matter," id.; and the reasonable doubt question must be answered "by a consideration of all the facts and circumstances obtained from reasonably trustworthy sources and which are in themselves sufficient to warrant a man of reasonable caution to believe the accused in a criminal matter can or cannot appreciate the charge against him, understand the proceedings, and help conduct his defense," id. 174 N.W.2d at 410. The trial court found that a reasonable doubt as to defendant's sanity did not exist. Upon examination of the entire record on the issue, we are constrained to hold that this finding cannot stand. We hold on this record that the question of defendant's competency to appreciate the charge, to understand the proceedings, and to help conduct the defense should have been submitted to a jury for determination. Hickey v. District Court of Kossuth County, supra; State v. Bordovsky, 183 N.W.2d 170 (Iowa). The trial court should not have accepted the guilty plea or gone forward with the guilty-plea proceedings unless and until a jury found defendant competent, but having gone forward with the guilty plea, the trial court should have sustained the subsequent motion in arrest. *793 II. The conclusion we have reached renders consideration of defendant's other assignments unnecessary. As to defendant's last assignment we will say, however, that criminal proceedings including a conviction, if a conviction occurs, cut across civil commitment proceedings. The civil commitment chapter contemplates that criminal proceedings may occur. Code 1977, § 229.20. See In the Matter of Cawley, 369 Mich. 611, 120 N.W.2d 816; State v. Hagerty, 152 Minn. 502, 189 N.W. 411. Defendant's guilty plea and the proceedings thereon are of no effect. We return the case to district court for jury trial under § 783.1. REVERSED AND REMANDED.