Opinion ID: 544291
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: jurisdiction

Text: 8 We first pause at a jurisdictional question that neither party brought to the attention of this court. To avoid becoming mired in a swamp of dates, it is sufficient to note that we have appellate jurisdiction over both the government's and the petitioners' appeals only if FED.R.APP.P. 4(a)'s time limits for appeals in civil cases apply. If FED.R.APP.P. 4(b)'s time limits for appeals in criminal cases apply, then both the government's and the petitioners' notices of appeal were untimely, and we have no jurisdiction to hear this case. Thus, the question is which set of time limits should govern coram nobis appeals. Two courts of appeals have applied the time limits for criminal appeals, Yasui v. United States, 772 F.2d 1496, 1498-99 (9th Cir.1985); United States v. Mills, 430 F.2d 526, 528 (8th Cir.1970), cert. denied, 400 U.S. 1023, 91 S.Ct. 589, 27 L.Ed.2d 636 (1971), 1 and two have applied the time limits for civil appeals, United States v. Cooper, 876 F.2d 1192, 1193-94 (5th Cir.1989) (per curiam); United States v. Keogh, 391 F.2d 138, 140 (2d Cir.1968). We will break the tie and apply the time limits for civil appeals. 9 It is tempting to resolve this issue as a matter of semantics. In United States v. Morgan, 346 U.S. 502, 505 n. 4, 74 S.Ct. 247, 249 n. 4, 98 L.Ed. 248 (1954), the Supreme Court made a passing reference that a motion for a writ of error coram nobis is a step in the criminal case. From this remark, two courts have deemed that an appeal from such a motion falls under rule 4(b)'s heading of Appeals in Criminal Cases and is therefore governed by a ten-day time limit. See Yasui, 772 F.2d at 1499; Mills, 430 F.2d at 528. It is similarly unsatisfying to classify a coram nobis proceeding as civil and conclude that appeals from a motion for a writ of error coram nobis fall under rule 4(a)'s heading of Appeals in Civil Cases. See 9 J. MOORE, B. WARD & J.D. LUCAS, MOORE'S FEDERAL PRACTICE p 204.15, at 4-132 to -133 (2d ed. 1990) (applying this approach). Rather than decide which set of rules applies on the basis of labels, it is better to decide the issue in light of the particular rule in question. 10 For example, in United States v. Balistrieri, 606 F.2d 216 (7th Cir.1979), cert. denied, 446 U.S. 917, 100 S.Ct. 1850, 64 L.Ed.2d 271 (1980), we examined the need for evidentiary material in a coram nobis proceeding and determined that it was more appropriate to afford the district judge the broad discretion in monitoring discovery that comes with the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. We observed that a coram nobis proceeding is  'a hybrid action: quasi-civil and quasi-criminal.'  Id. at 221 (quoting United States v. Tyler, 413 F.Supp. 1403, 1404-05 (M.D.Fla.1976)). We will again follow this approach. Instead of broadly classifying a coram nobis action as criminal or civil and reasoning from there, we only decide whether it is more appropriate to apply civil or criminal rules to a coram nobis petition in the context of the timeliness of a notice of appeal. 11 The Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure provide for a thirty-day, sixty days if the government is a party, time limit for appeals in civil cases and a ten-day, thirty days if the government exercises a right to appeal, time limit for appeals in criminal cases. See FED.R.APP.P. 4. The shorter time limit for criminal appeals furthers the public interest in the prompt resolution of criminal proceedings. Neither the interests of society nor of individual criminal defendants are served by a plodding appellate process that could change the results of a trial, often while the defendant has already begun to serve a sentence of incarceration. Indeed, as witnessed by the sixth amendment and the Speedy Trial Act, rule 4(b) is just a small part of a larger scheme to ensure that criminal prosecutions do not plod on indefinitely. See United States v. Hammad, 709 F.Supp. 334, 336 n. 3 (E.D.N.Y.1989), aff'd, 902 F.2d 1062 (2d Cir.1990). 12 A petition for a writ of error coram nobis does not present the same concerns. Coram nobis petitions are brought only after a convicted defendant's release from federal custody. See United States v. Bush, 888 F.2d 1145, 1147 (7th Cir.1989). Thus, there is no societal or individual interest in prompt adjudication of the petition while a prisoner is languishing in jail. Where the government is appealing a district court's grant of a writ of error coram nobis, the policies of rule 4(b) are even more removed. The short time limits in rule 4(b) are harsh, and where the policies behind it do not apply, the more relaxed time limits of rule 4(a) should govern the timing of the notice of appeal. 13 This holding allows a coram nobis petitioner the same time for appeal as a federal prisoner attacking his sentence under section 2255. SECTION 2255 RULE 11 & advisory committee note. The time limits for civil appeals govern a section 2255 motion, even though a section 2255 motion, much like a coram nobis petition, is considered a continuation of a criminal proceeding. See SECTION 2255 RULES 1 & 11 advisory committee notes. In the past, we have even analogized a petition for a writ of error coram nobis to a section 2255 motion. See United States v. Scherer, 673 F.2d 176, 178 (7th Cir.), cert. denied, 457 U.S. 1120, 102 S.Ct. 2935, 73 L.Ed.2d 1334 (1982); United States v. Hedman, 655 F.2d 813, 817 (7th Cir.1981). Because a section 2255 motion closely resembles a petition for a writ of error coram nobis, it is best to treat them consistently for the timing of a notice of appeal. See Cooper, 876 F.2d at 1194. 14 We hold that the time limits for civil appeals in FED.R.APP.P. 4(a) govern an appeal from a district court order denying or granting a petition for a writ of error coram nobis. Because both the government and the petitioners met the time limits for a civil appeal, we have jurisdiction to hear the merits of their cases.
15 One of the petitioners, however, cannot meet the standing requirements to have a case heard in federal court. Accordingly, we do not have jurisdiction to hear that part of the appeal. In United States v. Kerner, 895 F.2d 1159 (7th Cir.1990), we held that a decedent's estate lacked standing to bring a coram nobis petition on behalf of the decedent, and that holding is dispositive of the Walker estate's appeal. 16 In Kerner, the estate of a late governor of Illinois brought a coram nobis petition to expunge his convictions for mail fraud, perjury, false statements, and tax fraud. Although we determined that the estate met the article III standing requirements, we found that the estate failed to satisfy the court-imposed prudential limitations on the exercise of jurisdiction. See Valley Forge Christian College v. Americans United for Separation of Church and State, 454 U.S. 464, 102 S.Ct. 752, 70 L.Ed.2d 700 (1982). First, we believed that the estate's interests fell outside of the zone of interests protected by the writ of error coram nobis. 895 F.2d at 1162-63. Second, we held that the estate was impermissibly trying to assert the rights of a third party, namely the rights of the decedent to seek a writ of error coram nobis. Id. at 1163. 17 Predictably, the Walker estate attempts to distinguish its situation from that of the Kerner estate. The Walker estate argues that unlike Kerner, Walker's widow is still alive and would be entitled to pension benefits if Walker's conviction is expunged. This argument misses the point. By refusing to hear an estate's petition for a writ of error coram nobis, Kerner implicitly holds that the right to seek the writ belongs to the wrongfully convicted individual and dies with that individual. Only one entity could have sought a writ of error coram nobis for Jack Walker, and that entity was Jack Walker himself, before his death. 18 Furthermore, the Walker estate's petition for a writ of error coram nobis presents standing problems that even go beyond those considered in Kerner. The Kerner estate was at least trying to remedy a cognizable injury to itself: it claimed $90,000 worth of injury in the form of fines, penalties, back taxes, and pension forfeiture it lost as a result of the felony conviction. 895 F.2d at 1161-62. The Walker estate is not even trying to remedy an injury to itself; it wants to expunge Walker's felony conviction so that Walker's widow can receive pension benefits. Not only is the Walker estate trying to assert legal rights that belonged to Jack Walker the individual, but it is also trying to assert the rights of Walker's widow. If Mrs. Walker has been wrongfully deprived of her own vested pension benefits, her right to recover those benefits is in a forum different than a petition for a writ of coram nobis by her late husband's estate.