Opinion ID: 1119833
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 15

Heading: legislative abolition of the insanity defense and pretrial ruling on availability of insanity defense

Text: In 1982 the Idaho Legislature abolished the insanity defense in criminal cases by repealing I.C. § 18-209 and enacting I.C. § 18-207(a), which provides that [m]ental condition shall not be a defense to any charge of criminal conduct. In this case, prior to trial, defense counsel filed a Request for Declaration that the Enactment of § 18-207, I.C., the Repeal of §§ 18-208, 18-209, I.C. and the Repeal of Rule 12(g), I.C.R. are Unconstitutional. It was urged that the abolition of the defense deprives criminal defendants of due process rights under the state and federal constitutions. The state filed a motion to quash this request, because, an insanity defense has not been raised by the defendant and until such time as that issue is raised in good faith by the defendant such a request is an academic exercise as there is no issue in controversy. Both parties extensively briefed and argued the issue of justiciability; that is, whether there was any factual showing on the record that would grant the court the authority to render a ruling in the nature of a declaratory judgment on the issue. Rhoades had been examined by a psychiatrist pursuant to defense counsel's request. However, the defense did not introduce evidence indicating the psychiatrist's conclusions as to whether there was any basis on which to raise the issue of mental defect. The defense contended that no showing was required under the unique circumstances of a capital case. The defense asserted that the court did have jurisdiction to render a declaratory judgment, in that the nature of a declaratory judgment is to clarify legal uncertainty, and having no legal definition of insanity made it impossible for a psychiatrist to render an opinion on whether Rhoades was legally insane. The defense further argued that even if some showing was required, the prosecution and the court had waived the necessity of presenting preliminary evidence on Rhoades's mental condition when a defense request for psychiatric assistance at state expense was granted without the preliminary showing required by statute. The defense argues that this constituted a waiver of any showing that might be required in the later request for a ruling on the existence of the insanity defense. Finally, the defense urged that there was a sufficient factual showing on the record to bring Rhoades's sanity into issue. Noting that where the insanity defense is permitted it may be established by lay testimony, the defense cited the preliminary hearing testimony of one of the arresting officers to the effect that on the night Rhoades was arrested he was unstable and incoherent. The trial court held a hearing on the defense request for a declaration, which consisted of the court inquiring of defense counsel if he was asserting the defense of insanity, if he had an offer of proof that the sanity of the defendant was in question, or an opinion from the psychiatrist that examined the defendant. Defense counsel replied to each inquiry that he could offer no proof until he had a legal standard by which to define insanity. THE COURT: Do you have an insanity defense that you are raising, or is this an academic exercise we're going through? ... If you have a defense, and you have an expert who is going to testify that this is an issue in this case, then I want to know that. ATTORNEY: Your Honor, I'm sure the Court is thinking of Ake v. Oklahoma where the U.S. Supreme Court spoke on an indigent's right to have a psychiatrist appointed at public expense. The problem we have here, Your Honor, is there's little authority out of the Supreme Court in this area, that's one of the few cases that come even close to our situation. THE COURT: My question is, though, do you have, after having Mr. Rhoades examined by a psychiatrist of your choosing, an opinion that the insanity issue is present in this case? ATTORNEY: Your honor, may I have just a minute, I want to address the precise question the Court is posing to me. In light of Ake, we've been afforded the psychiatrist, ... and if you read the Ake decision, the Court explicitly states that the purpose of providing that psychiatrist at an early point is to allow the defense an opportunity to determine whether a defense is viable ... my point here today ... is that the psychiatrist does me no good unless we know what the law and legal standard is. THE COURT: You're evading my question. My question, and I want an answer to it, is direct, do you have an opinion from your expert that the sanity of this defendant is in question? ATTORNEY: Your Honor, I have no opinions from my expert at this time for the simple reason it was to be my next point, that until we know what the legal standard is for a possible sanity defense, defense of mental conditions excluding responsibility of the law, until we know what that is... . THE COURT: I'm going to go back, the question I'm concerned with is whether or not your expert who examined Mr. Rhoades months ago has rendered an opinion at any time indicating that there is a viable issue as to sanity or the ability of this man to understand what he did and to formulate an intent? I need an answer to that question, and we've danced around it, but we haven't had that directly presented to the Court. Has your expert given you any type of an opinion as to the mental condition of this defendant? ATTORNEY: Your Honor, again I'm not sure I understand the question... . The trial court issued a Memorandum Decision refusing to rule on defendant's motion to find I.C. § 18-207 unconstitutional, finding that in the absence of expert testimony or evidence, there was no legitimate issue before the court. Defendant moved to appeal this decision, and another hearing was held. Again, the court asked defense counsel for an offer of proof, and again, none was given. THE COURT: Let me ask you again as I did in August, do you have,  do you represent to this Court that you have expert testimony available to establish the viability of insanity defense in this case? ATTORNEY: Well, I'll answer it the way I answered it. First of all, I don't know whether I do or not because a psychiatrist, forensic psychiatrist without a legal standard defining what insanity is could not possibly give me an opinion. That's where that sits. Defendant's motion to appeal was denied. We perceive the difficulty of the defense in obtaining an expert opinion on such a complex issue without the guiding framework of a legal standard. We also recognize that a psychiatric opinion on the mental condition of a defendant in a criminal case is forged by a long process of interaction between the expert and the defense, and that the result of that process will not generally be available during the pretrial stage of a criminal case. However, the trial court did not require that the defense present an expert opinion as to the ultimate issue of Rhoades's sanity. The court requested any expression of opinion by the expert as to whether insanity might be an issue in the case, or an assertion by counsel that he was raising the defense of insanity. The court did not require polished testimony concerning exact mental processes or precise cognitive abilities of the defendant. It would have sufficed for the expert to provide a summary affidavit stating that in his opinion, there was a viable issue of insanity involved in the case. Alternatively, the expert might have submitted an affidavit to the effect that it would be impossible for him to render an opinion without a guiding legal standard. Yet another option might be to offer an opinion based on the definition of insanity that Idaho had in place prior to the legislative repeal of the defense, restricting the affidavit to an in camera review in order to protect the defense from the consequences of prematurely offering an opinion from an improperly prepared defense expert. The trial court found that the record did not create a justiciable controversy to support a ruling on the issue of the repeal of the insanity defense. We agree. The authority to render a declaratory judgment is bestowed by statute. The Declaratory Judgment Act, contained in Idaho Code Title 10, chapter 12, confers jurisdiction upon the courts with the option to declare rights, status, and other legal relations, whether or not further relief is or could be claimed. I.C. § 10-1201. An important limitation upon this jurisdiction is that, a declaratory judgment can only be rendered in a case where an actual or justiciable controversy exists. Harris v. Cassia County, 106 Idaho 513, 516, 681 P.2d 988, 991 (1984). This concept precludes courts from deciding cases which are purely hypothetical or advisory in nature. Declaratory judgments by their very nature ride a fine line between purely hypothetical or academic questions and actually justiciable cases. Many courts have noted that the test of justiciability is not susceptible of any mechanistic formulation, but must be grappled with according to the specific facts of each case. Id.; 22 Am.Jur.2d Declaratory Judgments § 33, at 697. This Court, in Harris, adopted the following language from the United States Supreme Court's definition of justiciability as a guiding standard in the context of declaratory judgment actions: [A] controversy in this sense must be one that is appropriate for judicial determination. A justiciable controversy is thus distinguished from a difference or dispute of a hypothetical or abstract character; from one that is academic or moot. The controversy must be definite and concrete, touching the legal relations of parties having adverse legal interests. It must be a real and substantial controversy admitting of specific relief through a decree of a conclusive character, as distinguished from an opinion advising what the law would be upon a hypothetical state of facts. Where there is such a concrete case admitting of an immediate and definitive determination of the legal rights of the parties in an adversary proceeding upon the facts alleged, the judicial function may be appropriately exercised although the adjudication of the rights of the litigants may not require the award of process or the payment of damages. Aetna Life Ins. Co. v. Haworth, 300 U.S. 227, 241-42, 57 S.Ct. 461, 464, 81 L.Ed. 617 (1937) (citations omitted). The same principle as pronounced by this Court provides: The Declaratory Judgment Act ... contemplates some specific adversary question or contention based on an existing state of facts, out of which the alleged rights, status and other legal relations arise, upon which the court may predicate a judgment either affirmative or negative in form and effect.       The questioned right or status may invoke either remedial or preventative relief; it may relate to a right that has either been breached or is only yet in dispute or a status undisturbed but threatened or endangered; but in either or any event, it must involve actual and existing facts. State v. State Board of Education, 56 Idaho 210, 217, 52 P.2d 141, 144 (1935). In the present case, there are no actual and existing facts on the record. The record before the trial court, and before this Court, contains nothing more than the statement of counsel that he desired to inquire into the viability of the defense, and that although Rhoades had been examined by a psychiatrist, no opinion in any form as to Rhoades's mental state could be forthcoming unless the court provided an operative legal definition of insanity. As to the impossibility of offering an opinion without a legal standard to work with, the court had only the unsubstantiated statement of counsel to rely upon, there being no evidence from the expert. This unsworn statement does not provide a factual showing sufficient to create a justiciable issue before the court. The testimony of Officer Rodriguez concerning Rhoades's manner on the night of his arrest likewise does not suffice to create a justiciable controversy on the issue of insanity. The officer stated during the preliminary hearing that on the night of the arrest: Paul Rhoades was either acting as if he was high on some kind of narcotic, or he was high on some kind of narcotics... . [H]e really didn't have much stability ... he had to be helped to walk. He swayed back and forth when he sat down, almost in a drunken stupor. Didn't say too much, and when he did, he mumbled, as if, I would take it, he was not in control of his senses, ... Other testimony confirms Officer Rodriguez's impressions of Rhoades's conduct on the night of the arrest, but there is no evidence in the record as to abnormal conduct at any other time. This testimony establishes that Rhoades was having physical difficulty on the night of his arrest, which was assumed by the officers to be the result of drugs or intoxication. The trial court appropriately concluded that such evidence alone does not rise to the level of a showing of the mental condition of the defendant. The defense argues that any showing that might be required was waived by the prosecution at the time of the hearing on the defense request for appointment of a psychiatric expert at state expense. The United States Supreme Court, in Ake v. Oklahoma, 470 U.S. 68, 105 S.Ct. 1087, 84 L.Ed.2d 53 (1985), held that the defendant is constitutionally entitled to psychiatric assistance at state expense once a preliminary showing has been made that the mental condition of the defendant is likely to be an issue in the case. At the hearing, the prosecution represented that it had no objection to the appointment of a psychiatric expert, and further stated that: From the state's point of view from what we understand the evidence to be we would understand why they seek these two particular appointments, so we would urge the Court to go ahead and adopt that without requiring any further showing. Defense counsel urges that this statement by the prosecution, and the court's acquiescence in the motion for a court appointed expert without requiring any preliminary showing on the defendant's mental condition, amounts to a waiver of the required showing on the issue. We disagree. Justiciability is a question of the jurisdiction of the court over the matter at issue. Baird v. State, 574 P.2d 713, 716 (Utah 1978); Mountain West Farm Bureau Mut. Ins. v. Hallmark Ins., 561 P.2d 706 (Wyo. 1977). It is axiomatic that a lack of jurisdiction may not be cured by means of stipulation or waiver by the parties. Bowlden v. Bowlden, 118 Idaho 84, 794 P.2d 1140 (1990); White v. Marty, 97 Idaho 85, 540 P.2d 270 (1975), overruled on other grounds (1985). Therefore, this defense argument must be rejected. We uphold the trial court's determination that the record does not create a justiciable controversy to support a ruling on the issue of the repeal of the insanity defense. Having done so, we do not reach the constitutional issue regarding the legislative repeal of the insanity defense.