Court Opinion

ID: 9446241
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 21:49:55.952005+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:30:34.782781
License: Public Domain

RIVES, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
I agree that the Federal Youth Corrections Act is constitutional on its face, and I feel sure that it can be constitutionally administered, but, under the facts and circumstances of this case, the application of the Act so as to deprive the appellant of his liberty for more than one year is, in my opinion, an unconstitutional application.
At the time that appellant waived counsel and pleaded guilty [See the proceedings of October 16, 1956 in footnote 2 to the majority opinion.] nothing was said about the Youth Corrections Act. Eight days later, the judge had him confirm his waiver of counsel and plea of guilty, and thereafter announced: “ * * * All things considered, and having received notice only yesterday that young men of your age can be handled now for the first time under the Federal Youth Corrections Act, the Court is going to declare you to be a youthful offender * * (Emphasis supplied.) [See the proceedings of October 24, 1956 in footnote 2 to the majority opinion.]
I cannot find in the record that the appellant assented tacitly or otherwise. He had no alternative but to submit to the Court’s sentence. Indeed, he was not even then informed that he might be deprived of his liberty for more than one year, and he still had the right to assume that such was the maximum limit of his confinement.
A defendant charged with a misdemeanor might be willing to waive counsel and plead guilty if he thought that he could be imprisoned for not more than one year, while, if he realized that he might be imprisoned for as much as six years, he would cry to High Heaven for a lawyer. To be valid, waiver of counsel must be made “with an apprehension of the nature of the charges, * * * the range of allowable punishments thereunder, * * Von Moltke v. Gillies, 1948, 332 U.S. 708, 724, 68 S.Ct. 316, 323, 92 L.Ed. 309.
The appellant did not know and was not advised at or before the time he waived counsel and pleaded guilty that he might be deprived of his liberty for more than one year. That was a necessary prerequisite, I think, to his detention for a longer period. I would hold that he has been deprived of his liberty for the maximum time that he *474could have apprehended at the time' of his waiver of counsel and plea of guilty, and that he is therefore entitled to be discharged.
A further unconstitutional application of the Act is evidenced by the hearing before this Court on a record to a ma- ' terial portion of which the appellant is denied access. In my book that is not procedural due process. On both grounds, I respectfully dissent.
Rehearing denied: RIVES, Circuit Judge, dissenting.