Opinion ID: 889300
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The District Court's Policies on Trial Dates and Plea Agreements

Text: ¶ 6 The Twentieth Judicial District Court has a trial setting procedure which, in conjunction with its plea agreement policy, arguably caused much of the pretrial delay in this case. Under the trial setting procedure, court staff first picks a tentative trial date that is 180 days after the defendant's initial appearance. The trial date does not become firm, though, until the parties proceed through the omnibus hearing. Thus, if omnibus is held within the initial 180-day period, then the trial date falling 180 days after the initial appearance becomes the firm trial date. But if omnibus is not held within this period, then the 180-day trial date is discarded. In this event, the court requires the defendant to file a speedy trial waiver in order to extend the trial date beyond the 180-day period. Likewise, the court requires a waiver if the parties are not ready for the omnibus hearing by the 150th day, since by statute the court must hold the omnibus hearing not less than 30 days before trial. Section 46-13-110(1), MCA. If the defendant refuses to provide a waiver, then the court leaves the trial date set at 180 days from the initial appearance. If a waiver is provided, then staff selects a new trial date. But again, the trial date is tentative and does not become firm until the parties proceed through the omnibus hearing. Consequently, a continuance of the omnibus hearing acts as a de facto continuance of the first trial setting. ¶ 7 The District Court's consideration of plea agreements, in turn, is controlled by the omnibus hearing. If a plea agreement is reached before the omnibus hearing, then the court either will accept the plea agreement and be bound by it, or will allow the defendant to withdraw from the plea agreement if it is not acceptable to the court. But after the omnibus hearing, the court does not treat any subsequently negotiated plea agreement as binding on the court, and the defendant is not allowed to withdraw his guilty plea solely because the court imposes a sentence different from the one recommended in the plea agreement. As a result, there is a built-in incentive for a defendant to exhaust all possibilities of a plea agreement with the State before the omnibus hearing. As Nistler later explained at the speedy trial hearing, once you go through omnibus, you have to advise your client that there are no guarantees anymore, now the plea agreement may not be worth the paper it's written on. Thus, in essence, you've got a deadline at omnibus. Once you cross that threshold, you're going to trial. Nistler noted that he had seen some disastrous consequences when counsel proceeded through omnibus and then attempted to settle the case. For this reason, he stated, the court's policy is something that I bear in mind in handling cases. Many times I may even get crosswise with the judges because I'll continue omnibuses multiple times. But until you rule out a plea agreement as an option, you are not serving your client well to go through omnibus hearing. The court, in turn, is fairly liberal about continuing omnibus hearings at the defendant's request. ¶ 8 The upshot of the District Court's policies on trial dates and plea agreements, therefore, is this: Until plea negotiations are exhausted, the defendant repeatedly seeks continuances of the omnibus hearing, and the court routinely grants them; and each continuance of the omnibus hearing, in turn, acts as a de facto continuance of the trial date. Bottom line: No firm trial date is set until the defendant and the State rule out the possibility of a plea agreement. Of course, that could take monthsor even years since plea negotiations may be ongoing until discovery, investigations, testing, and interviews have all been completed. Hence, the District Court's policies, in tandem, theoretically may result in an indefinite postponement of the setting of the first trial date.