Opinion ID: 2381515
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: the trial judge tolerates a forfeiture

Text: The trial judge, in my view, correctly declined to partition the property or to award an undivided half share to Gallimore. She went further, however, and held that Gallimore no longer had any interest in the jointly held premises. I cannot agree with that disposition, for it effects a forfeiture of Gallimore's interest during his own lifetime. In Pannone v. McLaughlin, 37 Md.App. 395, 377 A.2d 597 (1977), a case in which a husband killed his wife and committed suicide shortly thereafter, the court enunciated the principle that a murderer cannot enrich his estate by his act of wrongdoing, but neither can he be deprived of an interest in property which he possessed at the time he committed his wrongful act. An unconstitutional forfeiture would result in the latter instance. Id. 377 A.2d at 600. The trial judge was aware of the Pannone decision, but distinguished it upon the ground that  Pannone turned upon the application of Maryland's Constitution and Declaration of Rights prohibiting forfeiture of property based on a conviction. [6] Washington, supra, 122 Daily Wash.L.Rptr. at 1133. She pointed out that the District has no such constitutional provision, nor does it have a statute proscribing such forfeitures. Id.; cf. Johansen v. Pelton, 8 Cal.App.3d 625, 87 Cal.Rptr. 784, 790 (1970). The lack of any such constitutional or statutory provision does not mean, however, that a forfeiture is a presumptively acceptable remedy in the District of Columbia. Maxim II makes it plain that, on the contrary, forfeitures are disfavored. This court has put it this way: Equity abhors forfeitures. Berg v. Slaff, 125 A.2d 844, 846 (D.C.1956). Statutes or regulations which impose forfeitures ... are penal in nature and must be strictly construed. See generally 3 N. SINGER, SUTHERLAND STATUTORY CONSTRUCTION § 59.02, at 7-8 (4th ed. 1986). Beard, supra, 587 A.2d at 203. Section 19-320(a) is broadly phrased, but I can find in it no provision clearly authorizing, or indeed authorizing at all, the forfeiture of an interest in property which the murderer owned prior to the homicide. The statute precludes a murderer from profiting from his own wrong, but it does not confiscate property which was previously his. Given the rule of strict construction articulated in Beard, I do not think that this aspect of the trial judge's disposition can be sustained.