Court Opinion

ID: 9667150
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 01:36:45.822481+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:35.385507
License: Public Domain

DRAUGHN, Justice,
concurring.
Although agreeing with the result reached by the court, I would opt for a somewhat narrower holding. Where a defendant enters a plea of guilty or nolo contendere without an agreed punishment recommendation and announces to the court his intent to appeal, so that it is obvious he is operating under the mistaken belief he has a right to an appeal on the merits, I would hold that the trial court has a duty to warn the defendant he has no such right. The right to appeal or not to appeal should not be a secret and the procedure should not be a guessing game where the defendant is in a sort of “gotcha” position if the guess is wrong. In the instant case, the court should have let the “secret” out rather than by his responses let the defendant think he could appeal. The plea is therefore properly held to be involuntary. The plurality opinion apparently holds a plea is involuntarily entered whenever a defendant mistakenly believes he has a right to an appeal on the merits regardless of whether he vocally expresses that mistake and is encouraged in his error by the judge’s response. Believing that such a holding goes a bit too far, I concur in the result only.