Opinion ID: 2978260
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Competency Evaluations

Text: The district court excluded from the Speedy Trial clock all of the days from November 2, 2005 to March 23, 2006, and from March 29, 2006 to June 9, 2006, because Tinklenberg’s two competency determinations were pending during those periods. On appeal, Tinklenberg argues that 18 U.S.C. § 4247(b), which generally sets the rules by which courts may commit defendants for psychiatric evaluations and limits the period a defendant may be committed for evaluation to thirty days, should be applied to limit the time excludable under the Speedy Trial Act to thirty days for Tinklenberg’s competency evaluations. Pursuant to § 4247(b), “[f]or the purposes of an examination pursuant to [a court] order, . . . the court may commit the person to be examined for a reasonable period, but not to exceed thirty days[.]” However, this Court and “[e]very court that has decided this issue ha[ve] concluded that § 4247(b) does not limit the time period for a competency examination with respect to calculations under the Speedy Trial Act.” United States v. Murphy, 241 F.3d 447, 456 (6th Cir. 2001). Accordingly, Tinklenberg’s argument fails. 1 Tinklenberg’s motion for a new counsel and his counsel’s motion to withdraw did not have any impact on the Speedy Trial clock because both were filed after Tinklenberg moved for an independent competency evaluation on March 29, 2006, and were resolved on June 9, 2006, the same day as the court ruled on the competency motion. The only other pretrial motions at issue are the three pretrial motions filed in August 2006, during the two weeks prior to trial, but those motions do not create excludable time for the reasons discussed in Section I.D below. Nos. 06-2646; 08-1765 United States v. Tinklenberg Page 9 Of more substance is Tinklenberg’s argument that the Speedy Trial Act limits to ten days the time excludable for the transportation of a defendant to and from the location of his competency evaluation. Although 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(A) appears to exclude all time during which a defendant’s competency evaluation and determination is pending, § 3161(h)(1)(F) provides that any delay caused by the transportation of a defendant “to and from places of examination or hospitalization” that is longer than ten days is “presumed to be unreasonable.” Whether the ten day limit in § 3161(h)(1)(F) applies to the time in which a defendant is transported to a place of examination pursuant to a court’s competency evaluation order appears to be a matter of first impression for this Court.2 The few other appellate courts to have ruled on the issue are split: the First and Fifth Circuits have held that an unreasonable delay in the transportation of the defendant for a competency determination is not excludable, see United States v. Noone, 913 F.2d 20, 25-26 (1st Cir. 1990) and United States v. Castle, 906 F.2d 134, 137 (5th Cir. 1990), while the Second Circuit has held that any delay associated with a competency evaluation from the date of the order directing the evaluation until completion of the competency hearing, including delay from transporting a defendant for the evaluation, is excludable under § 3161(h)(1)(A), see United States v. Vasquez, 918 F.2d 329, 333 (2d Cir. 1990). We hold that a delay in transporting a defendant to a mental competency examination beyond the ten day limit imposed by § 3161(h)(1)(F) is presumptively unreasonable, and in the absence of rebutting evidence to explain the additional delay, this extra time is not excludable. Reading § 3161(h)(1)(A) to allow unlimited time for transporting a defendant to a place of examination, as the Second Circuit did in Vasquez, would create an internal conflict in the statute, since § 3161(h)(1)(F) expressly limits 2 The government and the concurring opinion both cite Murphy, arguing that this Court has already held that any delay in transporting a defendant for a mental competency examination is excludable, notwithstanding the ten day limit imposed by § 3161(h)(1)(F). However, the Court in Murphy did not address the interplay between § 3161(h)(1)(A) and § 3161(h)(1)(F), because the defendant’s failure to submit any evidence of the duration of his transportation in support of his argument for a ten day limitation allowed this Court to reject the defendant’s argument before reaching its merits. 241 F.3d at 455. After rejecting the claim for lack of evidence, we stated, “[w]e also conclude that Defendant’s contention is without merit.” Id. However, that statement was not necessary to the outcome, was not accompanied by any interpretation of the statute, and was followed by a citation to Noone, whose interpretation of the statutes we follow today. Id. at 455-56. Nos. 06-2646; 08-1765 United States v. Tinklenberg Page 10 the reasonableness of the transportation period to ten days. See Noone, 913 F.2d at 25 n.5 (finding that allowing unlimited excluded time for transporting defendants to competency evaluation “would render mere surplusage the specific reference in [§ 3161(h)(1)(F)] to transportation ‘to and from places of examination or hospitalization’”). The only way to avoid conflict between § 3161(h)(1)(A) and § 3161(h)(1)(F) is to read § 3161(h)(1)(F) as a specific exception to the general rule announced in § 3161(h)(1)(A): i.e., all delays caused by proceedings to determine a defendant’s competency are excluded, except for the time during which the defendant is supposed to be in transit, which is presumptively unreasonable if longer than ten days. See United Steelworkers of America, Local 2116 v. Cyclops Corp., 860 F.2d 189, 202 (6th Cir. 1988) (“[W]e are bound to construe statutes in such a way as to avoid internal conflicts whenever possible[.]”).3 On November 10, 2005, Tinklenberg was designated to the MCC in Chicago, but did not arrive there until November 30, 2005. Under this Court’s precedent, weekends and federal holidays are not included when calculating the ten day time period in which the transportation delays are excluded. United States v. Bond, 956 F.2d 628, 632 (6th Cir. 1992) (citing Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 45(a)). Thus, although twenty calendar days passed until Tinklenberg arrived at the MCC on November 30, 2005, only two non-excludable days lapsed during that time: ten days were excludable under § 3161(h)(1)(F), six days were Saturdays or Sundays, and two days were federal holidays. Accordingly, by the time Tinklenberg arrived at MCC in Chicago, two more non-excludable days had lapsed, for a total of three non-excludable days to date. The period from November 30, 2005 until March 23, 2006, the day the magistrate judge found Tinklenberg competent, was continuously excludable time, pursuant to § 3161(h)(1)(A). See Murphy, 241 F.3d at 456. The next five days were not excludable, bringing the total number of non-excludable days to eight. On March 29, 2006, 3 The concurring opinion states that the phrase “to or from places of examination” in § 3161(h)(1)(F) “addresses more generally those situations in which a defendant may need to be transported to the hospital for testing,” Concurring Op. at 19, but it is surely a leap to read “places of examination” to exclude competency evaluations–the very type of “examination” that a defendant most typically undergoes prior to trial. Nos. 06-2646; 08-1765 United States v. Tinklenberg Page 11 excludable time began again, because Tinklenberg filed a motion for an independent psychiatric evaluation on that day. See § 3161(h)(1)(A). On April 17, 2006, the magistrate judge granted Tinklenberg’s motion and ordered the independent competency evaluation. Time was therefore excludable until June 9, 2006, when the court again found Tinklenberg competent. From June 10, 2006 through July 31, 2006, fifty-two nonexcludable days lapsed, bringing the total number of non-excludable days to sixty.