Title: State ex rel. Duncan v. Driscoll

State: ohio

Issuer: Ohio Supreme Court

Document:

[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as State 
ex rel. Duncan v. Driscoll, Slip Opinion No. 2023-Ohio-3113.] 
 
 
 
 
NOTICE 
This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in an 
advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports.  Readers are requested to 
promptly notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of Ohio, 65 
South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or other 
formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be made before 
the opinion is published. 
 
 
SLIP OPINION NO. 2023-OHIO-3113 
THE STATE EX REL. DUNCAN, APPELLANT, v. DRISCOLL, PROS. ATTY., 
APPELLEE. 
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it 
may be cited as State ex rel. Duncan v. Driscoll, Slip Opinion No.  
2023-Ohio-3113.] 
Mandamus—Appellant’s claim seeking to enforce alleged contractual duty is not 
cognizable in mandamus—Court of appeals’ denial of writ affirmed. 
(No. 2023-0027—Submitted May 16, 2023—Decided September 7, 2023.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Clark County, 
No. 2022-CA-71, 2022-Ohio-4625. 
__________________ 
Per Curiam. 
{¶ 1} In this appeal, appellant, Johnny T. Duncan, seeks a writ of mandamus 
compelling the Clark County Prosecuting Attorney to join in the filing of a motion to 
vacate guilty pleas Duncan entered in two criminal cases.  The Second District Court 
of Appeals denied the writ, concluding that Duncan had adequate remedies in the 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
 
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ordinary course of the law and that his claim was barred under the doctrine of res 
judicata.  We affirm but for a different reason. 
Background 
{¶ 2} In 1992, Duncan entered into a plea agreement with the state, agreeing 
to plead guilty to, among other charges, two counts of aggravated murder.  Duncan 
had been charged in two cases.  He and the state agreed that he would be sentenced 
in the first case to a life prison term with parole eligibility after 30 years and that he 
would be sentenced in the second case to a life prison term with parole eligibility 
after 20 years.  The plea agreement provided that “if any other sentence is imposed 
other than that contemplated by the Plea Agreement, Stipulation and Waiver, then 
[the state and Duncan] will join in a motion to vacate the guilty pleas entered pursuant 
to this agreement.” 
{¶ 3} The trial court issued judgment entries imposing the agreed-upon 
sentences.  At the sentencing hearing, however, the court stated that Duncan was 
being sentenced in the first case to a life prison term with parole eligibility after 
20—not 30—years.  In February 2022, based on that discrepancy, Duncan filed in 
the trial court a motion for leave to withdraw his guilty pleas or, alternatively, to 
grant specific performance of his plea agreement. 
{¶ 4} In October 2022, Duncan filed a mandamus action in the court of 
appeals, naming as the respondent “Stephen A. Schumaker, Judge.”  Schumaker 
was the prosecuting attorney who signed Duncan’s plea agreement but now is a 
municipal-court judge.  Duncan argued that the trial court failed to impose the 
agreed-upon sentence in one of his cases, and he sought a writ of mandamus 
compelling the prosecuting attorney to join him in filing a motion to vacate his 
guilty pleas.  Neither Schumaker nor the current prosecuting attorney responded to 
the mandamus complaint. 
{¶ 5} Duncan filed a motion for default judgment, which the court of 
appeals denied.  The court noted that under Civ.R. 55(D), default judgment could 
January Term, 2023 
 
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not be entered against the prosecuting attorney unless Duncan established a right to 
relief with sufficient evidence.  The court concluded that Duncan had not 
established a right to relief, because he had adequate remedies in the ordinary 
course of the law.  According to the court of appeals, Duncan could have raised the 
alleged breach of his plea agreement in a direct appeal of his conviction and he 
already had sought to enforce the plea agreement by filing motions in the trial court.  
The court of appeals also concluded that because Duncan could have pursued—and 
in fact had pursued—other remedies, his claim was barred under the doctrine of res 
judicata. 
{¶ 6} Duncan appealed to this court.  Shortly after Duncan filed his notice 
of appeal, current Clark County Prosecuting Attorney Daniel P. Driscoll filed a 
motion to be substituted as the appellee.  We granted the motion.  169 Ohio St.3d 
1440, 2023-Ohio-482, 203 N.E.3d 728. 
Analysis 
{¶ 7} “Mandamus is a writ, issued in the name of the state to an inferior 
tribunal, a corporation, board, or person, commanding the performance of an act 
which the law specially enjoins as a duty resulting from an office, trust, or station.”  
R.C. 2731.01.  To be entitled to a writ of mandamus, the relator must establish a clear 
legal right to the requested relief, a clear legal duty on the part of the respondent to 
provide it, and the lack of an adequate remedy in the ordinary course of the law.  State 
ex rel. Waters v. Spaeth, 131 Ohio St.3d 55, 2012-Ohio-69, 960 N.E.2d 452, ¶ 6. 
{¶ 8} The court of appeals held that Duncan was not entitled to relief in 
mandamus, because he had adequate remedies in the ordinary course of the law.  
The court cited State ex rel. Phelps v. McClelland, 159 Ohio St.3d 184, 2020-Ohio-
831, 149 N.E.3d 500, ¶ 12-13, in which we recognized that (1) a prosecutor’s 
alleged breach of a plea agreement may be challenged in a direct appeal and (2) a 
defendant may seek to enforce a plea agreement by filing a motion in the trial court.  
The court of appeals’ reliance on Phelps was misplaced. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
 
 
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{¶ 9} Phelps brought a mandamus claim against the trial-court judge who 
convicted him, seeking to enforce an agreement the state had reached with Phelps’s 
wife to secure her testimony against him.  Phelps argued that the state had breached 
the agreement by prosecuting him on death-penalty specifications after it had 
promised his wife that those charges would be dropped in exchange for waiver of her 
spousal privilege.  We affirmed the court of appeals’ denial of the writ because the 
alleged breach was evident at the time of Phelps’s direct appeal (and therefore could 
have been raised then), id. at ¶ 12, and Phelps already had filed a motion in the trial 
court seeking a new trial based on the alleged breach, id. at ¶ 6, 13. 
{¶ 10} Here, in contrast, Duncan is seeking an order compelling the 
prosecuting attorney to join in the filing of a motion.  Duncan could not have been 
expected to raise in a direct appeal the alleged breach of his plea agreement, because 
the prosecutor’s apparent refusal to join in filing a motion had not yet occurred.  
Moreover, because Duncan’s sole objective in this mandamus case is to compel the 
prosecutor to join in filing a motion—and not to vacate the guilty pleas or obtain a 
new trial—Phelps does not support the conclusion that filing a motion in the trial 
court is an alternative remedy for Duncan to obtain the relief he seeks.  Finally, 
Phelps does not support the court of appeals’ application of res judicata in this case.  
“[R]es judicata is an affirmative defense that is not a proper basis for dismissal for 
failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.”  State ex rel. Newell v. 
Cuyahoga Cty. Court of Common Pleas, 165 Ohio St.3d 341, 2021-Ohio-3662, 179 
N.E.3d 84, ¶ 10. 
{¶ 11} But “this court will not reverse a correct judgment merely because 
erroneous reasons were given for it.”  State ex rel. Neguse v. McIntosh, 161 Ohio 
St.3d 125, 2020-Ohio-3533, 161 N.E.3d 571, ¶ 10.  And there is a more 
fundamental problem with Duncan’s mandamus claim: Duncan wants to enforce 
an agreement between himself and the state, claiming that the prosecuting attorney 
has a contractual duty to join in the filing of a motion.  See State v. Dye, 127 Ohio 
January Term, 2023 
 
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St.3d 357, 2010-Ohio-5728, 939 N.E.2d 1217, ¶ 21.  But an obligation that arises 
only under contract is not enforceable in mandamus.  Zanesville Gas-Light Co. v. 
Zanesville, 47 Ohio St. 35, 51, 23 N.E. 60 (1889).  We affirm the court of appeals’ 
judgment because Duncan has not established a clear legal duty enforceable in 
mandamus. 
Conclusion 
{¶ 12} We affirm the court of appeals’ judgment because Duncan’s claim 
seeking to enforce an alleged contractual duty is not cognizable in mandamus. 
Judgment affirmed. 
KENNEDY, C.J., and FISCHER, DEWINE, DONNELLY, STEWART, BRUNNER, 
and DETERS, JJ., concur. 
_________________ 
Johnny T. Duncan, pro se. 
Daniel P. Driscoll, Clark County Prosecuting Attorney, and Andrew P. 
Pickering, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee. 
_________________