Opinion ID: 2058036
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: The Rationales

Text: Two principal rationales have been offered to support the view that, when a defendant dies during the pendency of an appeal of right, the entire criminal proceeding should be abated ab initio. The first and predominant one rests on the notion that, when a conviction is appealed, it loses finality until the appeal is resolved and should not be permitted to stand when the defendant's death prevents the appellate court from adjudicating the validity of the conviction. Courts have expressed this rationale in different ways, but all to the same effect. [2] The second rationale, as articulated in United States v. Estate of Parsons, 367 F.3d 409, 414 (5th Cir.2004), focuses on the precept that the criminal justice system exists primarily to punish and cannot effectively punish one who has died. Many of the courts adopting the full abatement approach note that justification as well. See Carver v. State, 217 Tenn. 482, 398 S.W.2d 719, 720 (1966): One of the cardinal principles and reasons for the existence of criminal law is to punish the guilty for acts contrary to the laws adopted by society. The defendant in this case having died is relieved of all punishment by human hands and the determination of his guilt or innocence is now assumed by the ultimate arbiter of all human affairs. See also People v. Valdez, 911 P.2d 703, 704 (Colo.App.1996); State v. Holland, 288 Mont. 164, 955 P.2d 1360, 1361 (1998). A slight majorityand an increasingly smaller majorityof the courts that have considered the matter adopt this full abatement approach. Some of the courts allude to one or both of these rationales for their decision; others give no reason other than to follow what other courts have done. Two rationales have also been offered for the opposite view, of dismissing the appeal but leaving either the entire judgment or at least non-punitive aspects of it, such as compensatory restitution orders, intact (Options 2, 3, and 5). The first responds to the view of the courts favoring the full abatement approach that a conviction is not final until the appeal is resolved. It stresses that (1) a conviction erases the presumption of innocence, and (2) trial court judgments are presumed to be regular and valid. After conviction, a defendant is no longer presumed innocent but, indeed, is presumed guilty. See McCoy v. Court of Appeals of Wisconsin, 486 U.S. 429, 436, 108 S.Ct. 1895, 1900, 100 L.Ed.2d 440, 451 (1988) (After a judgment of conviction has been entered, however, the defendant is no longer protected by the presumption of innocence.); Herrera v. Collins, 506 U.S. 390, 399, 113 S.Ct. 853, 859, 122 L.Ed.2d 203, 216 (1993). Convictions therefore do have significance and should not be treated as inconsequential simply because the defendant has died. As noted in Whitehouse v. State, 266 Ind. 527, 364 N.E.2d 1015, 1016 (1977): The presumption of innocence falls with a guilty verdict. At that point in time, although preserving all of the rights of the defendant to appellate review, for good and sufficient reasons we presume the judgment to be valid, until the contrary is shown. To wipe out such a judgment, for any reason other than a showing of error, would benefit neither party to the litigation and appears to us likely to produce undesirable results in the area of survivor's rights in more instances tha[n] it would avert an injustice. See also Wheat v. State, 907 So.2d 461, 462 (Ala.2005) (A conviction in the circuit court removes the presumption of innocence, and the pendency of an appeal does not restore that presumption); People v. Peters, 449 Mich. 515, 537 N.W.2d 160, 163 (1995) (The conviction of a criminal defendant destroys the presumption of innocence regardless of the existence of an appeal of right. We therefore find it inappropriate to abate a criminal conviction); State v. Clements, 668 So.2d 980, 981-82 (Fla.1996) ([A] judgment of conviction comes for review with a presumption in favor of its regularity or correctness . . . We therefore conclude . . . that the death of the defendant does not extinguish a presumably correct conviction and restore the presumption of innocence which the conviction overcame). Although rarely articulated, that view tacitly takes into account and gives credence to two underlying precepts: first, that to obtain the conviction under review, the State was obliged to prove, and presumptively did prove, each element of the offense, including criminal agency, beyond a reasonable doubt, either to an impartial jury selected in accordance with the legal requirements or to a judge who is presumed to know the law; and second, that, at least where the defendant was represented by presumably competent counsel, every challengeable aspect of the State's case was subjected to scrutiny and challenge. A second concern expressed by courts in this camp arises from the collateral consequences of abating the judgment in its entiretyprincipally the eradication of restitution orders entered to compensate victims but also, in some instances, court costs, fines, and limitations on inheritance. That rationale was explicated in State v. Korsen, 141 Idaho 445, 111 P.3d 130 (2005), where the court observed that, in light of recent legislation requiring that criminals bear the economic burden of their criminal activity, including restitution to compensate their victims, a criminal conviction and any attendant order requiring payment of court costs and fees, restitution or other sums to the victim, or other similar charges, are not abated, but remain intact); United States v. Dudley, 739 F.2d 175 (4th Cir.1984); Matter of Estate of Vigliotto, 178 Ariz. 67, 870 P.2d 1163, 1165 (App.1993). The courts impressed with this second rationale, of giving effect to legislative efforts mandating compensation to victims through restitution orders, may differ as to whether the entire judgment should be left intact or only essentially non-punitive compensatory aspects of the judgment, but they are united in opposing the automatic full abatement approach. When joined by those courts that permit the appeal to proceed, which, at least to some extent, is also antithetical to an automatic abatement approach, they may, indeed, represent an equally well-established view disfavoring automatic full abatement. At least seven States have concluded that the only fair and practical way to resolve the competing concerns or policies is to permit the appeal to proceed, despite the defendant's death, and allow the fate of the judgment to hinge on the result. The courts adopting that approach accept the view of the abatement courts that an appeal of right is an integral part of a defendant's right to a final determination of the merits of the case but also observe that, because of collateral effects of the conviction, including restitution orders, society too has an interest in having a complete review of the merits, once an appeal is noted. This was well explained in Gollott v. State, 646 So.2d 1297, 1304 (Miss.1994), where, after reviewing the competing points of view and its own prior decisions, the Mississippi court observed: Full review is the only way to preserve the presumption that the conviction is valid until overturned on appeal, while simultaneously preserving the vested right of the criminal defendant to his appeal. This rule also protects society, third parties, and the decedent's estate from being subjected to the force of a hollow convictionone that remains a presumption for having not been fully adjudicated. See also State v. Makaila, 79 Hawai'i 40, 897 P.2d 967 (1995); State v. Jones, 220 Kan. 136, 551 P.2d 801 (1976); State v. Salazar, 123 N.M. 778, 945 P.2d 996 (1997); State v. McGettrick, 31 Ohio St.3d 138, 509 N.E.2d 378, 381 (1987) (It is in the interest of the defendant, the defendant's estate and society that any challenge initiated by a defendant to the regularity of a criminal proceeding be fully reviewed and decided by the appellate process); Commonwealth v. Walker, 447 Pa. 146, 288 A.2d 741, 742, n. 1 (1972); Commonwealth v. Bizzaro, 370 Pa.Super. 21, 535 A.2d 1130 (1987); State v. McDonald, 144 Wis.2d 531, 424 N.W.2d 411, 414 (1988). Obviously, those courts do not accept the assumed but unexplained, blanket notion that the appeal automatically becomes moot upon the defendant's death and must, for that reason, be dismissed. There are at least two possible reasons to consider the appeal as moot when the defendant-appellant dies. One is that there is no one to pursue it. That is more obviously the case, of course, in the extremely rare circumstance, at least in Maryland, where the appellant is appearing pro se. Even, as is almost always the case in the Maryland appellate courts, the defendant is represented by counsel, the defendant's death, as a matter of agency law, would ordinarily terminate the lawyerclient relationship and, with that termination, the authority of the erstwhile agent to continue to act for the defendant. See Brantley v. Fallston Hospital, 333 Md. 507, 511, 636 A.2d 444, 446 (1994); Switkes v. John McShain, 202 Md. 340, 348, 96 A.2d 617, 621 (1953). In Brantley, quoting, in part from Switkes, we observed: Ordinarily, under well-established principles of agency law, an agent's authority terminates upon the death of the principal . . . The lawyer-client relationship is not excepted from this rule . . . Thus, we have specifically held that an attorney has no authority to note an appeal on behalf of a client who has died. If, because of the termination of the agency relationship, the lawyer has no authority to note an appeal on behalf of a client who has died, that termination would presumably abrogate as well any authority, which exists solely by virtue of the agency relationship, to continue an appeal already noted. That conclusion, which ordinarily would follow from the straightforward application of principles of agency law, does not fit so well in this context, however, for, if we were faithfully to apply that notion, counsel in these cases would have had no authority to move for dismissal of the appeal (and certainly no authority, in Bell's case, to file a petition for certiorari ) or to present written or oral argument on behalf of their dead clients. Although we have never applied the Rule in this context, we do note Maryland Rule 1-331: Unless otherwise expressly provided and when permitted by law, a party's attorney may perform any act required or permitted by these rules to be performed by that party. When any notice is to be given by or to a party, the notice may be given by or to the attorney for that party. We shall not address here whether, if counsel's authority to file motions and petitions and appear and present argument on behalf of a dead client rests on Rule 1-331, that Rule may also provide authority as well to pursue on the client's behalf an appeal previously noted by the client. [3] In civil cases, if a party dies during the pendency of an appeal, the Rules provide for the appointment or naming of a substitute party, usually a personal representative, to carry on the appeal. See Maryland Rules 8-401 and 2-241. Rule 1-203(d) complements that right by automatically suspending all time requirements applicable to the deceased party from the date of death to the earlier of sixty days after death or fifteen days after the appointment of a personal representative by a court of competent jurisdiction. Although there are some distinctions in this regard between civil and criminal appeals, Rule 1-203(d) applies to civil and criminal proceedings, in both the trial and appellate courts, and most of the courts that have opted to allow a criminal appeal to continue have invoked their analogues to Rules 8-401 and 2-241 and permitted a personal representative or other proper person to stand in the shoes of the appellant. See State v. McGettrick, supra, 31 Ohio St.3d 138, 509 N.E.2d 378; Gollott v. State, supra, 646 So.2d 1297; State v. Makaila supra, 79 Hawai'i 40, 897 P.2d 967. In State v. Salazar, supra, 123 N.M. 778, 945 P.2d 996, the court appointed defense counsel as the substituted party for purposes of pursuing the appeal. The McGettrick and Gollott courts (Ohio and Mississippi) did not opt for an automatic continuance of the appeal but instead allowed some time to determine whether either the defendant's estate or the State desired to have the appeal continue and, if so, to designate a personal representative as a substituted party. Under their approach, if a substituted party is not named within the time allowed, the appeal is dismissed and all proceedings are abated ab initio. Abatement is regarded as a default. A second reason why the appellate proceeding may be regarded as moot when the appellant dies is because there is often, though not always, no effective relief that the appellate court can provide. If there is no collectible fine, judgment for court costs, or restitution order and no inheritance rights are affected by the conviction, neither affirmance nor reversal (nor modification) of the judgment will have any practical effect. If affirmed, the judgment cannot be executed; a dead defendant obviously cannot be imprisoned or made to satisfy conditions of probation. If reversed, there can be no retrial and no practical benefit to the defendant. Only where the appellate decision may affect the prospect of collecting from the defendant's estate or property a fine, costs, or restitution or nullify some impediment to inheritance can there be said to be possible effective relief that the court could provide. If, in a given case, the appellate decision could affect the continuing vitality of that aspect of the judgment, the appellate proceeding may not be moot for want of an ability to provide effective relief.