Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/312/329/
Timestamp: 2019-04-23 04:41:43+00:00

Document:
1. The remedy by habeas corpus is available in the courts of Nebraska for determining whether the petitioner's incarceration is in violation of the Federal Constitution. P. 312 U. S. 331.
by counsel, was tricked by state officer, states a cause of action under the due process clause of the Fourteenth amendment. P. 312 U. S. 334.
Certiorari, 311 U.S. 633, to review the affirmance of a judgment dismissing an application for writ of habeas corpus.
The question presented is whether petitioner's application for writ of habeas corpus filed in a Nebraska state court alleged facts which, if proven, entitled him to release from prison because he was held pursuant to a court judgment rendered in violation of rights guaranteed him by the federal Constitution. The trial court declined to issue the writ, holding that the petition failed to state a cause of action justifying the relief prayed. Without requiring the state to answer and without giving petitioner an opportunity to prove his allegations, the application was dismissed. A motion for reconsideration, setting out additional facts, was similarly dismissed. On appeal, the Supreme Court of Nebraska affirmed without opinion.
his imprisonment was illegal under the federal Constitution. And, in denying the writ, the Nebraska court necessarily held that petitioner's allegations -- even if proven in their entirety -- would not entitle him to habeas corpus, even if the petition showed a deprivation of federally protected rights. [Footnote 1] It was to review this question that we granted certiorari. 311 U.S. 633.
the opinions of the Nebraska courts do not mark clearly the exact boundaries within which Nebraska confines the historic remedy of habeas corpus, the Nebraska Supreme Court has held that the writ was properly invoked to obtain release from imprisonment resulting from deprivation of constitutional rights. [Footnote 3] Because of this, and because a contrary conclusion would apparently mean that Nebraska provides no judicial remedy whatsoever for petitioner, even though he can show he is imprisoned in violation of procedural safeguards commanded by the federal Constitution, [Footnote 4] we are unable to reach the conclusion that habeas corpus is unavailable to him under Nebraska law.
"summarily arraigned, and, upon his prearranged plea of guilty, sentenced, to his surprise and consternation, to a term of twenty years' imprisonment in the Nebraska State Penitentiary."
and because of the trial court's failure to appoint, and his inability to obtain, counsel, the original sentence was not appealed.
These allegations, if true, undermine and invalidate the judgment upon which petitioner's imprisonment rests. The circumstances under which petitioner asserts he was entrapped and imprisoned in the penitentiary are wholly irreconcilable with the constitutional safeguards of due process. For his petition presents a picture of a defendant, without counsel, bewildered by court processes strange and unfamiliar to him, and inveigled by false statements of state law enforcement officers into entering a plea of guilty. The petitioner charged that he had been denied any real notice of the true nature of the charge against him, the first and most universally recognized requirement of due process; that, because of deception by the state's representatives, he had pleaded guilty to a charge punishable by twenty years' to life imprisonment; that his request for the benefit and advice of counsel had been denied by the court, and that he had been rushed to the penitentiary, where his ignorance, confinement, and poverty had precluded the possibility of his securing counsel in order to challenge the procedure by regular processes of appeal. If these things happened, petitioner is imprisoned under a judgment invalid because obtained in violation of procedural guaranties protected against state invasion through the Fourteenth Amendment. [Footnote 5] The state court erroneously decided that the petition stated no cause of action. If petitioner can prove his allegations, the judgment upon which his imprisonment rests was rendered in violation of due process and cannot stand.
It is suggested that the Nebraska Supreme Court's final judgment of affirmance rested on petitioner's failure to file a printed brief in that court, and that this was an adequate nonfederal ground, precluding our review of the federal question raised. But this contention is obviously not sound, because the Supreme Court denied petitioner's motion for relief from the rule requiring printed briefs solely in the ground that, upon examination of the whole record, the court had found the appeal to be without merit.
Mooney v. Holohan, 294 U. S. 103, 294 U. S. 113.
In re Resler, 115 Neb. 335, 338-340, 212 N.W. 765. And see Kuwitzky v. O'Grady, 135 Neb. 466, 468, 282 N.W. 396. Cf. Darling v. Fenton, 120 Neb. 829, 235 N.W. 582.
See Newcomb v. State, 129 Neb. 69, 261 N.W. 348.
Cf. Walker v. Johnston ante, p. 312 U. S. 275; Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U. S. 458; Mooney v. Holohan, 294 U. S. 103. And see Chambers v. Florida, 309 U. S. 227.

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