Court Opinion

ID: 9446259
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 21:50:13.704051+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:30:35.122107
License: Public Domain

BAZELON, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
Appellant’s motion under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 alleged that his District Court appointed counsel had been ineffective in that the lawyer had met with him only once, had advised him to plead guilty because there was nothing he could do for him, and had neglected to move for suppression of certain evidence obtained by the police through an allegedly illegal search and seizure. The motion did not charge that the lawyer failed to seek suppression of the oral and written confessions.
Indeed, the record, as it reached us, contained no reference to those confessions.1 In fact, the date of the arrest shown by the record was five days after the confessions. The record of proceedings before the United States Commissioner gives December 16, 1955, as the date of arrest. So does appellant’s motion. So also do the briefs of both parties.
*711After the argument, however, the attorney we appointed for appellant reported to us that he had found evidence in the files of the United States Commissioner that (1) the arrest had been made on December 11, 1955; (2) appellant had been placed in the District of Columbia General Hospital for five days for treatment of narcotic withdrawal symptoms, before being taken to the United States Commissioner; and (3) the police had questioned him before sending him to the hospital, obtaining from him first an oral confession and then a written one.
If it is true that the police obtained confessions from appellant by questioning him while he was suffering so severely from narcotic withdrawal symptoms as to require five days of hospital treatment before he could be brought before a committing magistrate, it would seem clear that such confessions would not be admissible in evidence.
With the confessions inadmissible, it could well be that the Government had no case against appellant. I am thus brought to ask: Did the lawyer appointed for appellant below advise him to plead guilty on the assumption that the Government had a strong case, without conducting the investigation which was conducted by our appointee? Or did he advise a guilty plea, despite knowledge of the circumstances of the confession? If he did either, his client was deprived of effective assistance of counsel. It thus seems plain to me that appellant is entitled to have his conviction set aside if the facts are as they are now reported to be. I would therefore vacate the order denying appellant’s motion and remand the case to the District Court for a hearing.
To say that a hearing is unnecessary because the record shows appellant not to be entitled to relief, when we have reason to believe that the record does not reflect the true facts, raises form above substance and administrative convenience above justice.

. The Government’s brief states: “The record fails to reflect that any confessions or admissions as to culpability in the crimes were obtained from appellant when questioned by the police.”