Title: State v. Perry

State: north-dakota

Issuer: North Dakota Supreme Court

Document:

182 N.W.2d 860 (1971) STATE of North Dakota, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. Randall PERRY, Defendant and Respondent. STATE of North Dakota, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. Scott PERRY, Defendant and Respondent. Crim. Nos. 409, 410. Supreme Court of North Dakota. January 19, 1971. Helgi Johanneson, Atty. Gen., Dale H. Jensen, State's Atty., Richard B. Bear, *861 Asst. State's Atty., Bismarck, for plaintiff and appellant. Vogel, Bair & Brown, Mandan, for defendants and respondents. ERICKSTAD, Judge. A grand jury summoned to convene in Burleigh County by the Honorable W. C. Lynch, one of the district judges in and for the fourth judicial district, began its deliberations on September 14, 1970. On the 25th of September, 1970, it brought in an indictment charging Randall Perry with having sold marijuana and hallucinogenic drugs. On that date it also brought in a similar indictment against Scott Perry. The grand jury was discharged on the 25th of September, 1970. Counsel filed on behalf of each of the defendants the following pre-arraignment motions: The Honorable M. C. Fredricks, another one of the district judges for the fourth judicial district, after hearing the motions and receiving briefs from the parties, denied motions I, III, and IV and granted motion II. The State has appealed from that part of the order which granted motion II and quashed the indictment against each of the defendants. The first and basic issue we must consider on this appeal is whether the defendants are accused persons within the meaning of Section 29-10-25, N.D.C.C. That section reads: The defendants were not asked by the grand jury to appear before it or to submit evidence on their behalf to it, nor were they notified that they were subjects of investigation by the grand jury so that they might request of the grand jury an opportunity to appear before it and submit evidence on their own behalf. All agree that the defendants are now accused persons after having been indicted, but were they accused persons within the meaning of Section 29-10-25 before the indictments, when they had not been arrested or charged or held to answer for the crimes for which they are now indicted? *862 It is the position of the State that an accused within the meaning of Section 29-10-25, N.D.C.C., is a person who has been arrested or charged with a crime, but who has not yet had a preliminary hearing, or against whom a criminal information has not yet been filed. It is the position of the defendants that a person becomes an accused, within the meaning of Section 29-10-25, when he becomes the target of an investigation. They argue that inasmuch as indictments were made by the grand jury before it was discharged they became the target of investigation sometime prior to that action, and that accordingly at that time they became entitled to present evidence on their behalf before the grand jury, and that not having been given that opportunity they were entitled after appropriate motion to have the indictments quashed. The State argues that the trial court was in error in quashing the indictment because the motion of the defendants was not brought within one of the statutory grounds for the quashing of an indictment. The defendants point out that Section 29-14-04, relied upon by the State, provides that, "A motion to quash the indictment * * * shall be available on the ground that * * * It is not found, endorsed, presented, nor filed as prescribed by this title; * * *" It is their position that an indictment is not found as prescribed by Title 29 if it is found in violation of the language of Section 29-10-25, which is a part of Title 29. They assert that the language of Section 29-10-25 requires the grand jury to permit the accused to appear before it. Section 29-10-25 has its origin in Title V, Section 190, of the Revised Codes of the Territory of Dakota, 1877, which reads: Title V is described in said Codes as "of proceedings after commitment and before indictment". Section 161 of Title V reads: Section 162 refers to proceedings for the removal of certain officers and is unrelated to the issues in this lawsuit. It is obvious then that at the time Section 190 came into being prosecutions of criminal charges triable in district court proceeded by indictment rather than information. Under the initial law of the Territory in 1877, the grand jury was not bound to hear evidence for the defendant, even though the defendant was a person who had been committed to custody prior to the indictment. The language which is in issue today came into our law first as Section 8015 of the Revised Codes of North Dakota of 1895 without any apparent legislative authority. Notwithstanding that fact, the language now in issue was adopted by our Legislature when it adopted the Century Code in 1961. Its meaning, however, has not heretofore been construed. Lacking precedent in case law on this issue in this State and having no knowledge of the existence of statutes with similar language in other states, we think it important to consider the practice prevailing under the federal system, which has had the grand jury as a part of that system since the adoption of the Bill of Rights. *863 The pertinent part of the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, for the purposes of this appeal, reads, "No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; * * *" It is conceded that one indicted under the federal system is not entitled as a matter of right to appear and submit evidence to a grand jury on his own behalf. It is, in fact, stated in the defendants' brief that a grand jury indictment under the federal system can deprive of a preliminary hearing a person who has been arrested and who has demanded one. It is stated that this is possible because a federal indictment imports probable cause and, therefore, supposedly makes a preliminary hearing unnecessary. It is the contention of the defendants that the deprivation of a preliminary hearing results in manifest injustice under the federal system, and that the plain language of Section 29-10-25, N.D.C.C., prevents such an injustice under our state law. Notwithstanding the importance of a preliminary hearing which includes the defendant's right to submit testimony before a magistrate, who has the duty to determine whether a crime has been committed and if so, whether it is probable that the crime was committed by the defendant, we believe that it should be pointed out that there is a safeguard built into the procedure which provides for the bringing of criminal charges through the grand jury rather than through the filing of an information by the prosecuting attorney subsequent to a preliminary hearing. In the first method of prosecution the decision to indict must be concurred in by at least twelve of the grand jurors and only after they are convinced that the evidence before them would warrant a conviction of the accused by the trial jury; whereas under the latter method of prosecution an accused is bound over to the higher court and an information is presented by the prosecution upon the decision of a single magistrate when he is convinced that a public offense has been committed and that there is sufficient cause to believe that the defendant is guilty of it. The sections of our Code pertinent to compare in this regard are Sections 29-10-39 and 29-10-40, relative to grand jury indictment, and Section 29-07-18 and Subsection 4 of Section 29-01-13, relating to the latter procedure. In support of their contention that one becomes an accused when one becomes the target of an investigation and that the defendants became a target of an investigation sometime prior to their indictments and thus became at that time entitled to submit evidence on their behalf, the defendants refer us to the cases of United States v. Wainwright, 284 F. Supp. 129 (1968); Mallory v. United States, 354 U.S. 449, 77 S. Ct. 1356, 1 L. Ed. 2d 1479 (1967); and Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S. Ct. 1602, 16 L. Ed. 2d 694 (1966). We believe that all of those cases are distinguishable from the instant case on their facts. In Wainwright the defendant was charged in an indictment with violating a certain section of the Internal Revenue Code of 1954. He moved for the return and suppression of all books, documents, papers, records, memoranda and statements delivered, explained, or given by him or through his agents, together with all potential evidence, the leads to which were acquired by the government up to and including the date at which he was asked to appear at a question and answer session, at which time he was advised of his right to refuse to answer any question or make any statement which might tend to incriminate him. The facts and the issue in Wainwright are much different from the facts and the issue in the instant case, as is obvious from the following excerpt from Wainwright: The district court concluded in Wainwright that the defendant became an accused at the time his case was referred by the revenue agent in the Civil Division of the Internal Revenue Service to the Intelligence Division of the Internal Revenue Service, and that at that time he was entitled to be informed of his constitutional rights. In the instant case, no constitutional right is involved. No evidence has been obtained from the defendants in violation of their right to remain silent or to have the advice of counsel. In Mallory the United States Supreme Court found that the defendant had not been given his rights under Rule 5(a) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. The court, speaking through Justice Frankfurter, said: The court found that under the circumstances of that case, where the defendant was arrested between 2:00 and 2:30 p. m., was thereafter interrogated, later submitted to a lie-detector examination, subsequently dictated a confession to a typist between 11:30 p. m. and 12:30 a. m., and was not brought before a commissioner for arraignment until the next morning, he was not arraigned "without unreasonable delay". There is nothing in that case comparable to the instant case. Without going into the facts in Miranda, we find it to be inapplicable to this case, it being a case based upon in-custody interrogation where the defendant had not been informed of his constitutional rights. The defendants urge that a decision of the Supreme Court of Utah supports their view that the target of an investigation is an accused within the meaning of our grand jury statutes. The pertinent part of that decision reads: Without taking a position as to whether the quoted statement constitutes a correct statement of the law, we observe that the basic point made by the Utah court is that when one is detained in any significant way he may not be interrogated unless he is advised of the charges against him then under consideration. In the instant case, the defendants were not detained or interrogated by the grand jury or anyone on its behalf. Accordingly, it is difficult for us to see how Ruggeri has any application to the instant case. In Ruggeri the defendant was subpoenaed to appear before a grand jury and at the time of his appearance before the grand jury, he indicated he would like counsel. He was informed that the statutes of Utah forbid the presence of counsel in the grand jury room. The Utah court said that unbeknown to him he was at that very time a target of the grand jury investigation which subsequently indicted him. Under those circumstances the Supreme Court of Utah affirmed the trial court's suppression of the testimony given by the defendant at the grand jury. Because of the difference in the circumstances in Ruggeri and the circumstances in the instant case, we find Ruggeri of no aid to us in determining the issues of this case. The defendants also refer us to statutes and decisions in the states of New York and Georgia, which they believe support them in their position. We have studied those statutes and decisions and conclude that because of the difference in the statutes that the decisions have no relevance to this case. Sections 29-09-11 and 29-10-45, N.D. C.C., relate to the duration of a grand jury term. The pertinent parts of those sections read: Section 29-09-09, N.D.C.C., sets forth the basic circumstances under which a grand jury may be called in our State: Sections 29-10-11 and 29-10-12, N.D. C.C., provide for the calling of another grand jury or a special grand jury. The pertinent parts of those sections read: Our Legislature has designated the areas in which a grand jury should function. The general area is outlined in Section 29-10-18, N.D.C.C. It reads: The specific areas are set forth in Section 29-10-19, N.D.C.C. It reads: In light of the impediments the Legislature has placed in the way of calling a grand jury; its obvious intention of keeping the grand jury's duration short; the early territorial legislation which gave the defendant no right to submit evidence before the grand jury; the practice in the federal system since the adoption of the Bill of Rights, which affords the defendant no right to submit evidence before the grand jury; and the obvious intention of the Legislature of retaining two methods of prosecution, one by indictment of a grand jury and the other by information, to make the grand jury workable, we conclude that the Legislature intended by the term accused in Section 29-10-25 to give a person imprisoned in a jail of a county who is charged with the commission of a crime and has not had a preliminary hearing the right to submit evidence on his behalf to the grand jury. The defendants in the instant case, not having been arrested *868 or committed to jail prior to their indictments, do not come within that section. Accordingly, we hold that the district court was in error in quashing the indictments. Both cases are therefore remanded to the district court, where the defendants are entitled to a trial on the merits. STRUTZ, C. J., and PAULSON, KNUDSON and TEIGEN, JJ., concur.