Court Opinion

ID: 9711084
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 04:24:10.601624+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:02.123139
License: Public Domain

HARRIS, Associate Judge:
I concur fully in the result, and in Parts I and III of my colleague’s opinion. I also concur in Part II of the opinion, with the exception of the following paragraph thereof:
Well-established general guidelines are that delay of a year or more between arrest or indictment and trial gives prima facie merit to an accused’s claim that his right to a speedy trial has been denied. The burden then shifts to the government to justify the delay, and the more complex and serious the charge, the easier it will be for the government to meet this burden. Barker v. Wingo, supra at 531, 92 S.Ct. 2182; United States v. Holt, 145 U.S.App.D.C. 185, 448 F.2d 1108, cert. denied, 404 U.S. 942, 92 S.Ct. 292, 30 L.Ed.2d 257 (1971). Failure to meet this burden requires dismissal of the indictment. Strunk v. United States, 412 U.S. 434, 93 S.Ct. 2260, 37 L.Ed.2d 56 (1973); Barker v. Wingo, supra, 407 U.S. at 522, 92 S.Ct. 2182. [Ante, at 1329 (footnotes omitted).]
My inability to agree with that paragraph does not, however, make the views I now express a dissent. Rather, as we are but a two-judge division due to the unfortunate death of Judge Fickling, my disagreement precludes the above-quoted paragraph from having precedential significance. Thus, that paragraph constitutes but an expression of opinion by my Sister KELLY with respect to which I not only disagree but feel obliged to comment.
In footnote 7 to the subject paragraph, Judge KELLY cites her decision for the court in Branch v. United States, D.C.App., 372 A.2d 998 (1977). I recognize that in Branch, this court stated: “A delay of a year or more between arrest and trial gives prima facie merit to a claim that an accused has been denied the right to a speedy trial.” Id., at 1000. The court in Branch went on to state that: “A heavy burden then shifts to the government to justify the delay.” Ibid. I also recognize that Branch is existing precedent, notwithstanding what I respectfully consider to be its shortcomings.1 I express these views because of my concern that bar and bench may permit Branch to obscure the relevant Supreme Court precedents which must control the resolution by both the trial court and this court of *1334a claim of a denial of the right to a speedy trial.
A brief recitation will place the problem in context. In 1966, the United States Court of Appeals resolved a speedy trial issue in Hedgepeth v. United States, 124 U.S.App.D.C. 291, 364 F.2d 684 (1966). In that case, the court made a relatively innocuous comment as it set forth the facts. It stated:
Since the claim has prima facie merit, in view of the lapse of more than a year between appellant’s arrest and his trial . we undertake a review of the intervening events. [Id., at 293, 364 F.2d at 686.]
The Hedgepeth court went on, however, to recognize:
Whether a delay in bringing a defendant to trial results in a denial of his right to a speedy trial requires an analysis of the particular circumstances of each case. There is no touchstone of time which sets a fixed maximum period that automatically requires application of the Sixth Amendment and dismissal of the indictment. [Id., at 294, 364 F.2d at 687 (footnote omitted).]
Nearly six years later, the circuit court decided United States v. Bishton, 150 U.S. App.D.C. 51, 463 F.2d 887 (1972). Without citing the Hedgepeth decision to which I have referred, the Bishton court stated:
We have intimated that when the delay in prosecution exceeds twelve months, prejudice to the defendant is presumed and need not be affirmatively shown. But even the prejudice which is presumed to inhere in all cases where the delay is particularly long must be weighed against the other considerations we have mentioned. [Id., at 55, 463 F.2d at 891 (citations omitted).]
The Supreme Court’s decision in Barker v. Wingo, 407 U.S. 514, 92 S.Ct. 2182, 33 L.Ed.2d 101 (1972), was issued two months after the circuit court’s opinion in Bishton. In Barker, the Court specifically rejected a fixed-time approach to the resolution of speedy-trial claims. It stated:
We, therefore, reject both of the inflexible approaches — the fixed-time period because it goes further than the Constitution requires; the demand-waiver rule because it is insensitive to a right which we have deemed fundamental. The approach we accept is a balancing test, in which the conduct of both the prosecution and the defendant are weighed.
A balancing test necessarily compels courts to approach speedy trial cases on an ad hoc basis. We can do little more than identify some of the factors which courts should assess in determining whether a particular defendant has been deprived of his- right. Though some might express them in different ways, we identify four such factors: Length of delay, the reason for the delay, the defendant’s assertion of his right, and prejudice to the defendant.2 [Id., at 529-30, 92 S.Ct. at 2191-92.]
One may search through Barker v. Wingo in vain for any concept of a presumption of prejudice arising from the passage of a particular time period prior to trial, or for the placing of any specific burden (much less a heavy one) upon the government to justify a particular period of delay. The Supreme Court did not even intimate the existence of such factors, and affirmatively stated: “We find no constitutional basis for holding that the speedy trial right can be quantified into a specified number of days or months.” Id., at 523, 92 S.Ct. at 2188.
Sight must hot be lost of the basic holding of Barker v. Wingo. There the Court considered a delay of more than five years between arrest and trial. While the Court labelled such a delay as “extraordinary” *1335(id., at 534, 92 S.Ct. 2182), no constitutional deprivation of the defendant’s right to a speedy trial was found to have existed — in part because the Court concluded that the “record . . strongly indicates . that the defendant did not want a speedy trial.”3 Id., at 536, 92 S.Ct. at 2195.
Why, then, did the division of this court which decided Branch v. United States utilize dictum which both presumed prejudice after 12 months and placed a “heavy burden” on the government to counteract that presumption? I do not know, for such comments are alien to the balancing test prescribed in Barker v. Wingo.4
In the final sentence of the paragraph of Judge KELLY’s opinion with which I cannot agree, she states (and I quote again):
Failure to meet this burden [of justifying the delay] requires dismissal of the indictment. Strunk v. United States, 412 U.S. 434, 93 S.Ct. 2260, 37 L.Ed.2d 56 (1973); Barker v. Wingo, supra, 407 U.S. at 522, 92 S.Ct. 2182.
In fact, neither Strunk nor Barker suggests that the government even has such a burden, much less that a failure to meet it— under what could only be characterized as a single-pronged analysis — calls for a dismissal of the indictment.
Strunk presented a novel issue. The Seventh Circuit had concluded that the defendant in that case had been denied his right to a speedy trial, but it also had held anomalously that “the ‘extreme’ remedy of dismissal of the charges was not warranted.” Id., 412 U.S. at 435, 93 S.Ct. at 2261. The delay in Strunk was only ten months, and the Supreme Court reflected its implicit disagreement with the conclusion that there had been a speedy trial deprivation as follows:
However, in the absence of a cross-petition for certiorari, questioning the holding that petitioner was denied a speedy trial, the only question properly before us for review is the propriety of the remedy fashioned by the Court of Appeals. [Id., at 437, 93 S.Ct. at 2262.]
The Supreme Court concluded in Strunk that when it has been determined that there has been a denial of the right to a speedy trial, the only appropriate remedy is a dismissal of the charges.5 In reaching that result, the Court reaffirmed “that Barker prescribes ‘flexible’ standards based on practical considerations.” Strunk v. United States, supra, at 438, 93 S.Ct. at 2263.
Thus, notwithstanding the Branch dictum which is the subject of these comments, I *1336remain convinced that the ultimate disposition of any speedy trial contention properly must begin and end with an application of the principles set forth in Barker v. Wingo. See also United States v. McDonald, 435 U.S. 850, 98 S.Ct. 1547, 56 L.Ed.2d 18 (1978) (absent unusual circumstances, trial court should resolve speedy trial contentions after trial has been conducted). As I respectfully consider the position expressed by Judge KELLY in the subject paragraph of her otherwise excellent opinion to be inconsistent with the Barker guidelines, I am unable to agree therewith.

. I do not disagree with Branch’s holding, but rather with its dictum as to the automatic ef-feet of the passage of more than one year between arrest and trial.

. Typically, other courts (including ours) have referred to Barker v. Wingo as having established a four-pronged test for weighing speedy trial issues. As the above-quoted portion of the Court’s opinion makes clear, however, the four enumerated “prongs” vere stated to be “some of the factors which courts should assess.”

. Few people are so naive as to believe that a large percentage of defendants do not consider delay to be an ally, rather than an enemy. In Hedgepeth v. United States, supra, the circuit court referred to “a defendant who has reason to believe that prompt trial will result in conviction, and that defense chances may be improved by delay and later unavailability of witnesses against him.” 124 U.S.App.D.C. at 295 n.5, 364 F.2d at 688 n.5.

. In Branch, the division did not seek to exercise supervisory power to establish “a fixed time period within which cases normally must be brought.” Cf. Barker v. Wingo, supra, 407 U.S. at 531 n.29, 92 S.Ct. at 2192 n.29.
It should be noted that when Congress was considering the Speedy Trial Act of 1974, thought was given to including the Superior Court of the District of Columbia within its purview. As those controversial provisions were enacted, however, the Superior Court was excluded. See 18 U.S.C.A. § 3161 (1978 Supp.). Such a legislative decision was eminently sound. In Bowman v. United States, D.C.App., 385 A.2d 28 (1978), we made reference to the Superior Court’s overwhelming criminal (and juvenile delinquency) caseload, and noted that “the passage of more than 365 days from arrest to trial (a period which certainly has no talismanic constitutional significance) may become the rule rather than the exception.” Id., at 30 n.3. As did the circuit court in United States v. Ransom, 151 U.S.App. D.C. 87, 465 F.2d 672 (1972), we must recognize that:
[Gjiven the state of existing facilities, a measure of even unwelcome delay must be tolerated to combine the speedy trial guarantee with the other elements of justice . . . [Id., at 89, 465 F.2d at 674.]

.The division’s opinion in Branch correctly stated: “The remedy for the denial of the right to a speedy trial is dismissal of the indictment." 372 A.2d at 1000.