Opinion ID: 1267157
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: State's Right of Review in Criminal Cases

Text: The defendant resists any effort by the petitioner to obtain review of the respondent judge's decision to dismiss the indictment charging him with malicious assault by contending that the State's only right of review of a trial court's decision is limited to appealing a decision to dismiss an indictment, as being either bad or insufficient, pursuant to W. Va.Code 58-5-30 (1923). [4] The defendant's contention is correct if, indeed, the justification for the dismissal of the indictment is that the indictment is either bad or insufficient. We have recognized that the State has a narrow opportunity to request review of an action of a trial court in a criminal proceeding. The State's right of review is best expressed as being limited to: (1) where the right of appeal is conferred by constitution or statute (Syllabus Point 1, State v. Jones, 178 W.Va. 627, 363 S.E.2d 513 (1987) (Our law is in accord with the general rule that the State has no right of appeal in a criminal case, except as may be conferred by the Constitution or a statute.)); and (2) where the trial court has acted outside its jurisdiction (Syllabus Point 5, State v. Lewis, 188 W.Va. 85, 422 S.E.2d 807 (1992)). The sense of the defendant's argument is that W. Va.Code 58-5-30 confers the right upon the State to appeal [5] a decision holding an indictment bad or insufficient, and because the trial court's decision to dismiss the indictment was not grounded upon the sufficiency of the indictment, there can be no appellate review of that decision. We agree that the trial court's announced decision to dismiss the indictment had nothing to do with whether the indictment was bad or insufficient, therefore if the State was attempting to review that decision as provided by W. Va.Code 58-5-30, any review by direct appeal would fail. There was no challenge by the defendant as to the legal soundness or sufficiency of the indictment that charged the crime of malicious assault. The defendant's quarrel with the indictment is permitting the Prosecuting Attorney of Kanawha County to proceed forward with the prosecution arguing that the prosecutor forfeited that opportunity when he chose not to join the offense of malicious assault with the charges of public intoxication and destruction of property which proceeded to trial in magistrate court on March 13, 1992. An indictment is bad or insufficient for purposes of analysis under W. Va.Code 58-5-30 when within the four corners of the indictment it: (1) fails to contain the elements of the offense to be charged and sufficiently apprise the defendant of what he or she must be prepared to meet; and (2) fails to contain sufficient accurate information to permit a plea of former acquittal or conviction. Russell v. United States, 369 U.S. 749, 763-64, 82 S.Ct. 1038, 1047, 8 L.Ed.2d 240, 250-51 (1962). Accordingly, because there is no contention that the indictment failed to contain all the elements of the offense of malicious assault, or that it did not sufficiently apprise the defendant of what he was prepared to meet, or that it failed to contain sufficient accurate information to permit a plea of former acquittal or conviction, then the potential dismissal of the indictment has nothing to do with its being bad or with its sufficiency. The intention of the respondent judge was to dismiss the indictment based upon the State's failure to comply with the compulsory joinder rule under 8(a) of the West Virginia Rules of Criminal Procedure, and not upon any defect in the indictment. In State v. Adkins, 182 W.Va. 443, 388 S.E.2d 316 (1989), we refused to broaden the definition of bad or insufficient beyond its plain and ordinary meaning. Therefore the State would have no right to appeal the announced decision of the Circuit Court of Kanawha County to dismiss the indictment because the right of appeal was not conferred by either constitution or statute. Although the State does not have the ability to appeal the dismissal of an indictment when it is not bad or insufficient, we recognize that the State is armed with another right of appellate review in the form of prohibition. In State v. Lewis, 188 W.Va. 85, 422 S.E.2d 807 (1992), we exhaustively examined all the circumstances under which appellate review is appropriate in a criminal case upon request by the State. We rejected the notion that the State has a right of appeal in any circumstances other than provided by constitution or statute, and for purposes of appeal, the State is limited to appealing under W. Va.Code 58-5-30. We also clearly stated that certified questions are used exclusively in civil cases, never in criminal cases. Id. at Syllabus Point 4. We then stated that petitions for prohibition and mandamus are permissible tools for the State to use, although we noted that [a]s between mandamus and prohibition, it appears from our cases that prohibition is the preferred and more appropriate remedy to challenge the actions of a court when the allegation is that the trial court was without jurisdiction or was acting beyond its legitimate powers. Lewis, 188 W.Va. at 91, 422 S.E.2d at 813. If a trial court improperly interferes with a State's right to prosecute, the court, in effect, exceeds its jurisdiction. In State v. Lewis , we stated in Syllabus Point 5 as follows: The State may seek a writ of prohibition in this Court in a criminal case where the trial court has exceeded or acted outside of its jurisdiction. Where the State claims that the trial court abused its legitimate powers, the State must demonstrate that the court's action was so flagrant that it was deprived of its right to prosecute the case or deprived of a valid conviction. In any event, the prohibition proceeding must offend neither the Double Jeopardy Clause nor the defendant's right to a speedy trial. Furthermore, the application for a writ of prohibition must be properly presented. Id. at Syllabus Point 5; see also State ex rel. Rusen v. Hill, 193 W.Va. 133, 454 S.E.2d 427 (1994) (reviewing the dismissal of an indictment through a writ of prohibition based on the State's pretrial discovery violations). In this case, the petitioner maintains that the trial court exceeded its jurisdiction by determining that the indictment should be dismissed based on the State's failure to comply with the mandatory provisions of Rule 8(a). We agree that the circuit court will deprive the State of its right to prosecute this case or deprive it of a valid conviction if the indictment was improperly dismissed. Accordingly, the circuit court's decision to dismiss the indictment against the defendant is reviewable through this writ of prohibition. B.