Opinion ID: 2635258
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The State's Preaccusation Delay Was Constitutional

Text: ¶ 42 Hales initially claims that his right to due process was violated because the State declined to prosecute him until fourteen years after Luther was severely injured. We analyze the State's preaccusation delay, for its constitutionality under the Fifth Amendment of the United States Constitution [22] as it applies to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment. [23] The Sixth Amendment right to a speedy trial invoked in postaccusation delay cases does not apply in cases like this where prosecutorial delay occurs before there is a formal indictment, information, or arrest. [24] Until a formal charge or physical restraint is imposed on a citizen, a citizen suffers no restraints on his liberty and is not the subject of public accusation, and thus, his situation does not compare with that of a defendant who has been arrested and held to answer. [25] ¶ 43 In the context of oppressive preaccusation delay, the Due Process Clause has a limited role to play. [26] [S]tatutes of limitations, which provide predictable, legislatively enacted limits on prosecutorial delay, provide the primary guarantee against bringing overly stale criminal charges. [27] Preaccusation delay implicates the United States Constitution only if it violates due process by offending those fundamental conceptions of justice which lie at the base of our civil and political institutions, and which define the community's sense of fair play and decency. [28] ¶ 44 In Lovasco and Marion, the United States Supreme Court indicated that, at minimum, a due process violation would occur if a prosecutor delayed for the purpose of gaining a tactical advantage and the delay actually prejudiced the defendant. [29] But the Court held that due process would not be violated where a prosecutor delays for investigative purposes before bringing charges. [30] Although the United States Supreme Court has not ruled on whether something less than prosecutorial bad faith could ever trigger a violation of due process, [31] the large majority of the federal circuits have held that to succeed in a due process challenge based on preaccusation delay, a defendant must show both (1) actual prejudice and (2) delay for the purpose of gaining a tactical advantage or for other bad faith motives. [32] ¶ 45 We have addressed preaccusation delay due process claims under the federal Constitution in three cases since the United States Supreme Court decided Lovasco: State v. Smith, [33] State v. Bailey, [34] and State v. Wright. [35] In the first two of these cases, we cited as authority United States v. Revada [36] a case from the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals that applied the above test adopted by the majority of federal circuit courts. [37] In the third, we cited as authority our previous two cases. [38] However, while our three cases consistently required a showing of actual prejudice, agreeing with the first prong of the majority test, our statements in these cases are inconsistent regarding whether the other prong of the test focuses on the State's reason for the delay [39] or on the result of the delay. [40] We therefore take the opportunity presented by this case to clarify our intent to apply the majority test, which considers the reason for the delay, requiring the defendant to show both (1) actual prejudice and (2) bad faith. ¶ 46 We agree with the majority of circuits that delay does not violate a defendant's right to due process under the United States Constitution unless the State delayed in bad faith. We come to this conclusion in light of the United States Supreme Court's emphasis on the constitutional significance of a prosecutor's good or bad faith in Arizona v. Youngblood. [41] In Youngblood, the Court held that due process is violated by destruction of potentially exculpatory evidence only when the State destroys the evidence in bad faith. [42] In support of this holding, the Youngblood court cited Lovasco and Marion for the proposition that it had previously stressed the importance for constitutional purposes of good or bad faith on the part of the government when the claim is based on loss of evidence attributable to the Government. [43] ¶ 47 We therefore reaffirm our prior use of the two-pronged test adopted by the majority of federal circuit courts in Bailey [44] and the appropriateness of our inquiry in Wright into whether the prosecution delayed the filing of charges against [the defendant] in order to achieve a tactical advantage, [45] and we disavow the language in Wright and our per curiam decision in Smith suggesting that the federal due process test looks to whether preaccusation delay causes actual prejudice and  result[s] in [a] tactical advantage for the prosecutor. [46] ¶ 48 The result-oriented language that we initially used in Smith and repeated in Wright is not consistent with United States v. Revada , [47] the decision of the Tenth Circuit that we cited as authority. Further, it is not consistent with the United States Supreme Court's focus in Lovasco on the reason for the delay. [48] In Lovasco, the United States Supreme Court stated that proof of prejudice is generally a necessary but not sufficient element of a due process claim, and . . . the due process inquiry must consider the reasons for the delay as well as the prejudice to the accused. [49] The Court then held that delay for an investigative purpose will not violate due process. [50] This is true regardless of whether the investigative delay results in a tactical advantage for the prosecutor. ¶ 49 As a matter of federal law, we therefore apply the two-pronged test adopted by the majority of federal circuits, which requires the defendant to show (1) actual prejudice and (2) delay for the purpose of gaining a tactical advantage or for another bad faith motive. We hold that the preaccusation delay in Hales's case did not violate Hales's right to due process under the United States Constitution because the delay caused no actual prejudice and the State did not delay in bad faith.
¶ 50 Hales argues that he was prejudiced by the fourteen-year delay between December 1985, when Luther suffered brain injuries, and February 2000, when Hales was charged with Luther's murder. But in so arguing, Hales misses the legal distinction between the murder charge that the State ultimately brought against him after Luther died from the brain injuries in 1997 and the lesser charges that the State could have brought against him immediately after Luther was injured in 1985. Because the State could not charge Hales with Luther's murder until Luther died in 1997, the State actually delayed only two years before filing the murder charges. To conclude otherwise would be to interfere with the State's exercise of its prosecutorial discretion to decide which charges it would bring against Hales and would encourage prosecutors to bring lesser charges prematurely where a victim is likely to die of his or her injuries in order to avoid losing their ability to prosecute. To prove prejudicial preaccusation delay, Hales must therefore establish that he suffered prejudice due to the two-year delay after Luther's death. Hales cannot do so. ¶ 51 Mere speculation about the loss of favorable evidence is insufficient to support a claim of prejudice. [51] If a defendant claims prejudice because a certain document or a previously available witness is now missing or unavailable, the defendant must provide the expected content of the document or the witness's testimony and indicate how that document or witness would have aided the defense. [52] The defendant must also show causation by establishing that he could not have obtained the crucial evidence from another source and that the evidence would have been available if it were not for the government's delay in filing the charges. [53] Therefore, we reject Hales's claim that actual prejudice was caused by nonspecific negative effects of delay, including changing versions of events, general prejudice from faded memories, and the impossibil[ity] of assembl[ing] the missing pieces to a defense that would have been available two decades ago. ¶ 52 Hales's citations to Sixth Amendment postaccusation delay cases such as Barker v. Wingo [54] are inapposite. The case law is clear that it is improper to presume prejudice in the context of Fifth Amendment preaccusation delay claims as we do in the context of Sixth Amendment postaccusation delay claims. [55] Nebulous problems such as faded memories are inherent in any lengthy preaccusation delay, and we presume that they were considered by the legislature in deciding that there should be no statute of limitations for murder. [56] ¶ 53 Hales also claims, somewhat more concretely, that he was prejudiced by delay because the delay caused the loss of retinal scans of Luther's eyes showing retinal hemorrhaging and the loss of witnesses who might have cast some suspicion on Westerman. But Hales has not established that he would likely obtain favorable evidence from the retinal scans. And with regard to the witnesses, the most he has established is that one caseworker employed at Primary Children's, Mel Harwood, had sufficient concerns regarding Westerman to call police to ask that she take a polygraph test, but he does not know on what information this is based. He cannot tell us if it was based on a hospital worker's hunch, on mistrust of the mother, or on some evidence that would prove to be more substantial and useful at trial. Similarly, although Hales thinks that social worker Annie Bates's testimony would be useful, he provides no indication of what she would say. Therefore, even if both the retinal scans and the witnesses disappeared in the two-year period from December 1997 to February 2000 rather than during the initial twelve-year period from 1985 to 1997 (which seems unlikely), Hales has not been able to establish that the disappearance of that evidence caused prejudice. ¶ 54 We also reject Hales's claim that he was prejudiced due to the destruction and reconstruction of the evidentiary file. Hales has not shown causation because he has not established that the file was destroyed during the two-year delay after Luther's death rather than during the prior twelve years. In fact, during the hearing on the motion to quash bindover, where Hales raised his due process claims, Hales's attorney told the district court that the file had been destroyed sometime prior to Cope's review of the file in January 1998, which review occurred less than a month after Luther's death. Furthermore, Hales is not able to point to any favorable information known to be missing from the file. The most Hales can say about the file is that it may have contained potentially exculpatory evidence. A claim that potentially exculpatory evidence has been destroyed is better analyzed under the standard provided by Youngblood, as we discuss further in Part I.B. ¶ 55 Similarly, we reject Hales's claim that he was prejudiced by the State's failure to conduct an autopsy after Luther's death in 1997. Regardless of whether Hales could satisfactorily explain how the missing evidence would have aided his defense, Hales cannot allege that the delay in charging Hales after Luther's death actually affected the State's choice not to conduct an autopsy because the State made that choice shortly after Luther's death and before any significant delay occurred. We therefore conclude that Hales has not proven sufficient facts to establish that he was prejudiced by the State's preaccusation delay.
¶ 56 There is likewise no evidence that the State delayed for the purpose of gaining a tactical advantage or otherwise delayed in bad faith. In addressing Hales's motion to dismiss, the district court found that [t]he record contain[ed] no evidence to suggest that the government intentionally withheld its filing of the criminal charge to purposefully gain any specific tactical advantage over [Hales], and that [n]othing here suggests that the State was attempting to destroy exonerating evidence or increase [its] chance to prosecute the defendant. In his briefs before us, Hales does not challenge these findings or otherwise allege that the State acted in bad faith, but claims only that he was prejudiced. We therefore hold that Hales has not established that the preaccusation delay in filing murder charges violated his right to due process under the United States Constitution. Having rejected his due process claim based on preaccusation delay, we now address his claim that the loss and destruction of evidence violate general principles of fundamental fairness.