Title: Haines v. State

State: mississippi

Issuer: Mississippi Supreme Court

Document:

428 So. 2d 590 (1983) Roy W. HAINES v. STATE of Mississippi. No. 54018. Supreme Court of Mississippi. March 23, 1983. Boyce Holleman, Michael B. Holleman, Gulfport, Thomas L. Goldman, Meridian, for appellant. Bill Allain, Atty. Gen. by Carolyn B. Mills, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Jackson, for appellee. En banc. ROY NOBLE LEE, Justice, for the Court: Roy W. Haines was convicted in the Circuit Court of Lauderdale County on a charge of murder and was sentenced to life imprisonment. He perfected an appeal to this Court on August 13, 1982, which appeal is presently pending. Haines died on December 29, 1982, and the State of Mississippi has filed a Suggestion of Haines' Death and has requested that the appeal be dismissed as moot. Attorneys for Haines have responded to the State's Suggestion of Death and have countered with a motion to dismiss the appeal, vacate the judgment of the lower court, and remand the cause to the lower court with instructions to dismiss the indictment. In other words, the motion requests that all proceedings be declared void ab initio. The majority of jurisdictions in the United States, including the Federal courts, apply the rule requested by Haines' attorneys and hold that, in such case, an appeal should be dismissed as moot, and the case should be remanded to the trial court with instructions to vacate the judgment and dismiss the indictment. No less than four Federal Circuit Courts of Appeal have so held. In *591 United States v. Pauline, 625 F.2d 684, 685 (5th Cir.1980), in discussing the question, the court stated its reasons for abatement as follows: This Court has held that a judgment of conviction in a lower court removes the presumption of innocence and the judgment is considered to be valid. In Nicholson v. State, 254 So. 2d 881, 884 (Miss. 1971), the Court said: See also Jackson v. State, 418 So. 2d 827 (Miss. 1982). The Indiana Supreme Court in Whitehouse v. State, 266 Ind. 527, 364 N.E.2d 1015, 1016 (Ind. 1977), expressed the minority view as follows: Although the question presented here was not raised, in five recent cases this Court dismissed the appeals as moot without vacating the judgment. We believe that the minority rule is sound when considering our decisions on the validity of judgments.[1] Therefore, the motion to abate and vacate the judgment of conviction is overruled and the State's motion to dismiss the appeal as moot is sustained. APPEAL DISMISSED AS MOOT. PATTERSON, C.J., WALKER and BROOM, P.JJ., and BOWLING, HAWKINS, DAN M. LEE, PRATHER and ROBERTSON, JJ., concur. [1] Suppose a so-called "mad dog killer" was convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death for an atrocious, heinous and especially cruel crime. His conviction was appealed here as required by law, but before decision by this Court he died. Under the majority rule, the judgment of conviction and indictment would be vacated and dismissed an obvious miscarriage of justice.