Source: https://openjurist.org/159/f3d/4/united-states-v-barnes
Timestamp: 2019-02-16 19:26:05
Document Index: 293122820

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 3161', '§ 3161', '§ 3162', '§ 3161', '§ 3161', '§ 3161', '§ 3161', '§ 3161']

159 F3d 4 United States v. Barnes | OpenJurist
159 F. 3d 4 - United States v. Barnes
159 F3d 4 United States v. Barnes
159 F.3d 4
Marla BARNES, Defendant, Appellant.
No. 97-2251.
Marla Barnes appeals from her conviction for conspiracy to smuggle cocaine into the United States and criminal forfeiture of $2,900 in drug proceeds. Her appeal presents a single question: whether she was tried within the 70-day time limit imposed by the Speedy Trial Act, 18 U.S.C. § 3161 (1985).
On December 3, 1996, after two months had passed, the parties jointly moved the court for a status conference for the purpose of setting a trial date. The motion included an odd statement: "the parties jointly move to exclude the period of delay in the interests of justice and due to continuing plea negotiations, from the date of entry of an Order on defendant's pre-trial motions until such date as this Court sets for trial." (Emphasis added.) By its terms, the motion sought a retroactive and an unlimited forward-looking exclusion of time. The motion was signed only by the Assistant United States Attorney ("AUSA") on behalf of both the government and Barnes. Barnes's attorney, Mr. Hrones, did not sign the papers.
Seven days later, Barnes filed a "Motion to Correct a Joint Motion for Status Conference" protesting the government's effort to have time excluded by the court. This document stated that "although [her] attorney authorized the Joint Motion for Status Conference he did not give authority to [the AUSA] to add a paragraph indicating that the defendant had agreed to exclude the period of delay." Barnes indicated that she opposed any exclusion of the delay, having "made clear for some time now to [the AUSA] that [sh]e want[ed] a trial." Accordingly, Barnes requested that the court "strike the defendant's name from her request to exclude the delay." The government did not oppose defendant's motion to correct.
On March 7, 1997--some three months later--the court sent defendants and the government a notice informing them that a conference had been scheduled for March 25, 1997. The court did not exclude any time, either forward or backward, as requested in the purported joint motion.
The Speedy Trial Act "commands that a defendant be tried within 70 days of the latest of either the filing of an indictment or information, or the first appearance before a judge or magistrate." Henderson v. United States, 476 U.S. 321, 322, 106 S.Ct. 1871, 90 L.Ed.2d 299 (1986); see 18 U.S.C. § 3161(c)(1). The sanction for failure to adhere to this time limit is severe--the indictment is dismissed on motion of the defendant. See 18 U.S.C. § 3162(a)(2). In determining whether a violation of the Act has occurred, certain "periods of delay shall be excluded in computing the time within which ... the trial ... must commence." 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h).
[a]ny period of delay resulting from other proceedings concerning the defendant, including but not limited to--
We review the district court's denial of defendant's motion to dismiss based on the Speedy Trial Act de novo. See United States v. Rodriguez, 63 F.3d 1159, 1162 (1st Cir.1995), cert. denied, 516 U.S. 1032, 116 S.Ct. 681, 133 L.Ed.2d 529 (1995). Barnes's motion to dismiss was denied by the court on the first day of trial without any calculation of the Speedy Trial Act timetable. Accordingly, on this appeal "[w]e must start from scratch in the computation of excludable and nonexcludable time under the Act." United States v. Pringle, 751 F.2d 419, 429 (1st Cir.1984). We do so in two steps. First, we must "do the basic mathematics and determine the aggregate time elapsed awaiting trial." United States v. Staula, 80 F.3d 596, 600 (1st Cir.1996), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 117 S.Ct. 156, 136 L.Ed.2d 101 (1996). Second, we then ascertain how many days should be excluded from the total time. See id.
Barnes, relying on a separate provision of the Act that governs the tolling of time for unreasonable delays associated with the transfer of defendants, argues that any amount of time above and beyond the 10 days between the entry of the order compelling her removal from New York and her actual arrival in Massachusetts should count toward the 70-day limit. Section 3161(h)(1)(H) provides that any unreasonable delay resulting from the transfer of a defendant is includable, and mandates that any such delay in excess of ten days from the date of the order directing transportation and "the defendant's arrival at the destination" be presumed unreasonable.
Applying the terms of the Act, we conclude that time on Barnes's speedy trial clock began to accrue on September 26, 1995, the day after her first appearance before a magistrate judge in the District of Massachusetts. The date of the conference, is, of course, excludable as a "proceeding concerning the defendant." United States v. Santiago-Becerril, 130 F.3d 11, 16 (1st Cir.1997). The clock stopped on May 19, 1997, Barnes's first day of trial. A total of 601 days passed between the start of the speedy trial clock and the date it stopped for good on May 19, 1997. We now evaluate which of these days are excludable and which must be counted toward the 70-day deadline.
While September 26, 1995 must be counted, the entire period between September 27, 1995 and December 14, 1995 must be excluded from the final tally. On September 27, 1995 Barnes's codefendant moved for an extension of time to file pretrial motions. The motion was granted until October 13, 1995, and the deadline was later extended again until October 20, 1995. It is well-settled that an exclusion of time attributable to one defendant is applicable for all codefendants. See id. at 19. Therefore, this time is not counted toward the 70 days. See United States v. Jodoin, 672 F.2d 232, 237 (1st Cir.1982) (excluding time that elapsed due to defendant's request for an extension of time as "directly attributable to [his] ... motion"). The magistrate judge also properly excluded the period between the actual filing of the motions (October 20, 1995) and the hearing on the motions (November 13, 1995), for it falls under section 3161(h)(1)(F) as "delay resulting from any pretrial motion, from the filing of the motion through the conclusion of the hearing on, ... such motion." Similarly, the magistrate judge correctly excluded the thirty days between November 14 and December 14 during which she had the initial batch of pretrial motions under advisement. See 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(J).
We hold that a motion requesting the scheduling of a pretrial conference is a "pretrial motion" so as to trigger an exclusion under the Speedy Trial Act. Section 3161(h)(1)(F) states, rather expansively, that delay resulting from "any pretrial motion" shall be excluded. It does not distinguish between more significant or complex "pretrial motions" and simple or routine motions. For this reason, we have read the term "pretrial motion" broadly to encompass all manner of motions, ranging from informal requests for laboratory reports, see United States v. Jorge, 865 F.2d 6, 11 (1st Cir.1989), cert. denied, 490 U.S. 1027, 109 S.Ct. 1762, 104 L.Ed.2d 198 (1989), to "implied" requests for a new trial date, see Santiago-Becerril, 130 F.3d at 17. A motion requesting the scheduling of a status conference has undeniable "pretrial" significance: all kinds of matters affecting the course of trial, including discovery, motions, and trial dates may be discussed at such a conference. Cf. Fed.R.Crim.P. 17.1 ("[T]he court upon motion of any party or upon its own motion may order one or more conferences to consider such matters as will promote a fair and expeditious trial."). There seems to be no good reason to exclude a motion for a status conference from the universe of possible pretrial motions. See, e.g., United States v. Bellucci, 737 F.Supp. 706, 710 (D.Mass.1990) (Tauro, D.J.) (holding that motion for status conference was pretrial motion for purposes of tolling Speedy Trial Act). Hence, in this case, the clock stopped as soon as the government filed its motion seeking a status conference on January 24, 1996.
The next question is how much time should be tolled. The Supreme Court has construed subsection (F) as setting forth a two-tiered approach to determining the extent of excludable delay caused by the submission and disposition of pretrial motions. See Henderson, 476 U.S. at 329-30, 106 S.Ct. 1871. For a pretrial motion on which a hearing is held, the entire period from the filing of the motion to the date of the hearing, regardless of when the hearing is scheduled, plus up to 30 additional days while the motion is "under advisement" is automatically excluded. See id.; Rodriguez, 63 F.3d at 1163. By contrast, when "motions that require no hearing" are involved, time is tolled only until the "prompt disposition" of the motion, which ordinarily cannot exceed the 30-day "under advisement" period.3 Henderson, 476 U.S. at 329, 106 S.Ct. 1871; see Santiago-Becerril, 130 F.3d at 17; S.Rep. No. 96-212, 96th Cong., 1st Sess., at 34 (1979) ("[I]f motions are so simple or routine that they do not require a hearing, necessary advisement time should be considerably less than 30 days."). A motion is deemed to be taken under advisement when " 'the court receives all the papers it reasonably expects.' " Rodriguez, 63 F.3d at 1163 (quoting Henderson, 476 U.S. at 329, 106 S.Ct. 1871).
Because a motion requesting only the scheduling of a status conference requires no "hearing"--marked by oral argument, factual findings, or legal rulings--but involves merely the simple administrative act of setting a date, it must be resolved within 30 days of the date the Court has received all it expects to properly consider the request. See Rodriguez, 63 F.3d at 1165-66; United States v. Ferris, 751 F.2d 436, 440 (1st Cir.1984); 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(J). It follows that such a motion is resolved as soon as the conference is actually scheduled--not when the various matters for possible discussion, in fact, are broached--and that the clock will start again the following day. The government disagrees, arguing that the clock should be tolled until the actual date of the conference, which it calls a "hearing"; but to adopt this reasoning would contravene the language of the Act. Because the setting of the date resolves the motion in its entirety, the conference cannot possibly represent a "hearing on ... such motion." 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(F).
In United States v. Staula, 80 F.3d 596 (1st Cir.1996), we held that "a hearing is any on-the-record colloquy in which the district court hears the arguments of counsel and considers those arguments prior to deciding a pending motion." Id. at 602. Our reasoning today is entirely consistent with that decision. Once a conference has been set down on a court's calendar, there is no longer any "pending motion" to decide. The motion seeking a status conference has already been resolved.
Applying the foregoing principles to the present facts, we find that the clock was tolled from January 24 until January 31, 1996. The clock ran for the next six days and stopped again on February 7, 1996, when Reynaldo Barnes moved to adjourn the conference. Although the court made no express findings in granting the motion, the letter motion itself makes clear that Reynaldo Barnes's counsel was unavailable until at least the first of March due to conflicts with his work and personal schedules. Thus, the court's decision to grant the continuance comports with the requirements of section 3161(h)(8)(A). See United States v. Rush, 738 F.2d 497, 507 (1st Cir.1984) ("[I]t is not necessary for the court to articulate the basic facts when they are obvious and set forth in a motion for a continuance."), cert. denied, 470 U.S. 1004, 105 S.Ct. 1355, 84 L.Ed.2d 378 (1985). The clock resumed on March 5, 1996, the day after the conference. The clock temporarily stopped again on March 18 due to defendants' two overlapping requests to postpone the trial, and remained stopped until October 8, 1996.
This case turns on the period starting with the October 8, 1996 trial date. Frankly, we, like the attorneys for both sides, are confused as to the exact circumstances surrounding the adjournment of the October 7, 1996 trial date. It is a mystery. Neither the government nor any of the defendants formally moved for a continuance, although it is theoretically possible that someone so moved informally. One would, however, usually expect one party to accuse the other of requesting a continuance if an informal request had been made by one of the lawyers; but no illuminating bout of finger-pointing has erupted. This suggests that the court, on its own volition, ordered the adjournment without date.4 The government contends that the trial was adjourned upon consent of defendant, but the record reflects no such consent. To accept the government's position therefore requires us to infer from silence that defendant's consent was given. This we cannot do. What is apparent is that even assuming a trial date was set for October 7 and then continued by the court without objection, the grant of such a continuance--of which there is no contemporaneous written or oral record--fails to comply with the Act. See Amended Speedy Trial Act Guidelines, Aug. 28, 1981, reprinted in Robert L. Misner, Speedy Trial Federal and State Practice, App. B, at 775 ("The fact that the defendant has requested the continuance or consents to it is not in itself sufficient to toll the operation of the time limits."). Whether time resulting from a continuance may toll the Act depends on whether the court abused its discretion by granting the continuance. See Pringle, 751 F.2d at 432.
We find that the court should not have adjourned the trial date in the manner that it did. A trial court's discretion to invoke the ends of justice exception by granting a continuance is exceedingly "narrow," and should not be done "lightly or routinely." United States v. Mitchell, 723 F.2d 1040, 1044 (1st Cir.1983).
While a continuance may have been entirely justified under the circumstances, the court failed to set forth "in the record of the case ... its reasons for finding that the ends of justice served by the granting of such continuance outweigh the best interest of the public and defendant in a speedy trial." 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(8)(A). There is simply no record of the continuance. Although we have held that there is no need to articulate the basic facts critical to a motion for a continuance when they are set forth in the motion papers, see Rush, 738 F.2d at 507, here, no one moved to continue the trial. Consequently, we cannot say with any reasonable certainty that the continuance met the ends of justice standard, especially where the parties themselves have offered no explanation for why or when the trial date was adjourned. The lack of findings is particularly troubling because of the open-ended nature of the continuance granted here.5 A firm trial date was not set until the March 25, 1997 conference--more than five months after it was last continued. For these reasons, we find that the trial court abused its discretion in granting (or sua sponte ordering) the continuance, and the resulting delay of 56 days must be counted against the speedy trial clock.
Defendants generally may not elect to waive the protections of the Act. The reason is that the public has at least as great an interest as the defendant in an expeditious criminal trial. See United States v. Hastings, 847 F.2d 920, 923 (1st Cir.) (noting that society has a "general interest in resolving the guilt or innocence of those accused of crime rapidly (consistent with fundamental fairness) and punishing those found to be guilty"), cert. denied, 488 U.S. 925, 109 S.Ct. 308, 102 L.Ed.2d 327 (1988).
In United States v. Pringle, 751 F.2d 419 (1st Cir.1984), we crafted a limited unclean hands exception to this rule. Cf. United States v. Gambino, 59 F.3d 353, 360 (2d Cir.1995) ("[T]hose courts recognizing the [Pringle ] exception have placed tight restrictions on the finding of waiver."), cert. denied, 517 U.S. 1187, 116 S.Ct. 1671, 134 L.Ed.2d 776 (1996). In Pringle, defendants had sought to continue the trial, declaring that "all defendants waive[d] their rights to a speedy trial." 751 F.2d at 433. Defendants later moved to dismiss the indictment based on the delay that ensued in selecting a new trial date. The district court denied the motion. We affirmed, holding, inter alia, that although a defendant cannot waive the right to speedy trial, he or she cannot "lull[ ] the court and prosecution into a false sense of security only to turn around later and use the waiver-induced leisurely pace of the case as grounds for dismissal." Id. at 434.
Third, no one was "lull[ed]" to sleep by the waiver. The "joint motion for a status conference" later drafted by the government proves this. In the motion, the parties purportedly sought an exclusion of time "from the date of an entry of an Order on defendant's pre-trial motions until such date as this Court sets for trial." (A.37). But if the government had truly believed that Barnes had already provided an open-ended waiver on June 6, 1996, such a broad and seemingly retroactive exclusion of time would have been unnecessary. The government's own actions therefore suggest that the government itself believed that there might still be a speedy trial problem even after defendants signed the waiver.
In addition, the trial court acted on defendants' motions (including the waiver) by continuing the trial only until October 7, 1996, showing that it, too, understood that Barnes wished to be tried by October 1996. The date set by the court stood at the very end of the spectrum of Barnes's waiver. At best, Barnes may be said to have consented to and caused the delay throughout the fall of 1996, tolling the clock under Pringle until early October, but certainly no later. In other words, the limited waiver did not "create the delay[ ]" that transpired when the date was adjourned from October 7. Id. at 434.
The final inquiry is whether the indictment should now be dismissed with or without prejudice. Our usual practice is to remand to the trial court to address this question, for it is best situated to assess the degree of the violation and its likely effect on the parties involved. Nevertheless, we find that the only proper remedy in this case is to dismiss the indictment without prejudice. For this reason, as well as for the sake of judicial economy, we make this determination in the first instance. See United States v. McAfee, 780 F.2d 143, 146 (1st Cir.1985) (deciding proper remedy on appeal).
As to the severity of the offenses, we find that this factor weighs strongly in favor of dismissal without prejudice. We have often observed that "the graver the crimes, the greater the insult to societal interests if the charges are dropped, once and for all, without a meaningful determination of guilt or innocence." Hastings, 847 F.2d at 925. The government charged Barnes with conspiracy to import 110 kilograms of cocaine into the United States in the type of drugs-for-profit scheme that Congress has deemed a serious felony. See, e.g., United States v. Munoz, 36 F.3d 1229, 1239 (1st Cir.1994) ("Conspiracy to distribute a large quantity of cocaine ... is a serious crime"), cert. denied, 513 U.S. 1179, 115 S.Ct. 1164, 130 L.Ed.2d 1120 (1995); Hastings, 847 F.2d at 925 ("By their very nature, drugs-for-profit offenses are extremely serious.").
We next consider the relative blame each side bears in producing the unexcused delay. The portrait of delay is somewhat complex. There is no question that the primary blame must be assigned to the court. The district court should have articulated its reasons for indefinitely continuing the trial date from October 8, 1996 and should not have let several months slip by before scheduling a new conference, much less a firm date for trial. Likewise, the prosecutor, who should already have been aware that, as of the fall of 1996, at least 61 nonexcludable days had elapsed, failed to monitor scrupulously the passing days and alert the court that the deadline fast approached. "Even though a prosecutor does not bear the burden of monitoring the court's compliance with the [Speedy Trial Act] in absence of an announced rule, district courts do look to prosecutors for assistance as officers of the court." United States v. Ramirez, 973 F.2d 36, 39 (1st Cir.1992).
At the same time, however, there is no evidence that the delay was caused by bad faith conduct on the part of the prosecutor. We do note, without so finding, that government's motion seeking a status conference and a broad exclusion of time could be viewed as causing some of the post-violation delay. A plausible interpretation of the facts certainly is that as December 1996 drew near, the government's lawyer suddenly realized that there might be a speedy trial problem and hastily added a retroactive and open-ended exclusion in an attempt to remedy the perceived difficulty. The language contained in the motion may have misled the court into believing that Barnes had no objection as to when she might be tried. But we do not attach too much weight to this possibility, for even if the government's counsel mischaracterized the extent of defendant's consent for the December 3, 1996 motion, the speedy trial violation had already occurred. Thus, the government's conduct did not actually bring about the violation. There is nothing in the record to suggest that prosecutorial misconduct rather than administrative negligence caused the 70-day deadline to be exceeded in the first place. Where, as here, the actual speedy trial violation resulted solely from neglect rather than intentional misconduct, that circumstance tips ever so slightly in favor of dismissal without prejudice. See, e.g., Hastings, 847 F.2d at 925-26.
Finding reason to spread the blame, we note, too, that Barnes herself could have pushed the proceedings along at various crucial junctures but chose not to do so. She did not behave like a defendant who wanted her day in court posthaste. Instead, she requested several continuances in the spring of 1996. Furthermore, she could have objected to the adjournment of the October 7, 1996 trial date or at least have voiced her preference for a specific trial date, but she failed to clearly and loudly demand a quick trial. And rather than immediately asserting her speedy trial rights once the violation occurred, she consented to one additional lengthy continuance after the 70-day period had already run its course. Defendant never raised the speedy trial claim until the last possible moment--when a trial was simply unavoidable. Although Barnes was under no obligation to monitor the clock, we nevertheless find that her willingness to abide the unexcused delay of some 5 months and participate in further delay should be counted against her. Cf. Santiago-Becerril, 130 F.3d at 22 (weighing defendant's failure to demand speedy trial until eve of trial against him in assessing Sixth Amendment speedy trial claim); McAfee, 780 F.2d at 146 (dismissing indictment without prejudice where defense counsel bore some blame for delay). We have already determined that the indictment must be dismissed. She should not be doubly rewarded for sitting silently as the delay mounted.
3. Effect of Reprosecution on Administration of Justice and
Similarly, enforcement of the Speedy Trial Act would not be unduly hampered by allowing Barnes to be retried. There is little doubt that the harsh remedy of dismissal with prejudice has greater deterrence value than its counterpart. But considerations of general deterrence are not dispositive or else dismissal with prejudice would impermissibly become the preferred tool. See United States v. Taylor, 487 U.S. 326, 334, 108 S.Ct. 2413, 101 L.Ed.2d 297 (1988) ("Congress did not intend any particular type of dismissal to serve as the presumptive remedy for a Speedy Trial Act violation."). Moreover, the fact that a retrial might be necessary at all is often deterrence enough. We find that to be true here. As the Supreme Court has observed,
Id. at 342, 108 S.Ct. 2413. Conversely, little would be gained in the case at bar by foreclosing the possibility of another trial.
4. Miscellaneous Factors: Length of Delay and Actual Prejudice
Two final closely related considerations merit discussion: the length of delay and actual prejudice. On its face, the length of delay in this case--more than twice the extent statutorily permissible--is troubling. At first blush the sheer length of unexcused delay might suggest actual prejudice, but Barnes has never once claimed that the delay adversely affected her ability to prepare for trial, much less articulated any facts suggesting how she was actually prejudiced by the tardy trial date. The absence of any consequential prejudice to defendant points toward permitting a new trial. See Taylor, 487 U.S. at 341, 108 S.Ct. 2413.
The decision of the district court denying defendant's motion to dismiss is reversed, her conviction and sentence are hereby vacated, and the indictment is dismissed as to her without prejudice.
Reynaldo Barnes's appeal is not before us. For the sake of clarity, we will hereinafter refer to Marla Barnes as "Barnes" and Reynaldo Barnes by his full name
At oral argument, defense counsel stated that he may have received a phone call from the district court's chambers informing him that the trial had been postponed, but did not recall for sure if the call was made or when it occurred
Time may also be properly excluded to account for the filing of additional submissions necessary for the disposition of a motion or where the motion presents especially complicated issues. See Henderson, 476 U.S. at 331, 106 S.Ct. 1871
There is another, though remote, possibility based on the trial court's comment about the health of Reynaldo Barnes's trial counsel after denying Barnes's motion to dismiss. Perhaps Mr. Homans, who was sick from pneumonia during this period and eventually died, informally moved for a continuance at some point. Yet this scenario is unlikely. The trial court's ambiguous allusion to his illness may have simply been to his earlier request for an adjournment on March 18, 1996. In addition, the government itself later acknowledged to the trial court that Mr. Homans's health "didn't create any problem" and that his associate skillfully replaced him as early as August of 1996. Finally, the government has not once argued on appeal that Mr. Homans's battle with pneumonia caused the October 8 trial to be adjourned. Even if this explains why the court adjourned the trial, however, the reason should have been made explicit in the record
While open-ended continuances are not per se impermissible in this Circuit, we have often stated that "it is generally preferable to limit a continuance to a definite period for the sake of clarity and certainty." Rush, 738 F.2d at 508
The government argues, implausibly, that "the court could have scheduled the trial for a much later date, and still been within the terms of defendant's waiver;" that "[i]n light of this waiver, the defendant should not be allowed to use the period of delay prior to the setting of the new trial date in support of her request for dismissal."