Court Opinion

ID: 9549211
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:14:52.636772+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:20:00.066919
License: Public Domain

QUINN, Justice,
dissenting:
I dissent from Part III of the majority opinion which holds that the trial court lacked jurisdiction “to issue further orders in the case relative to the order or judgment appealed from.” I would hold that the trial court, under the facts of this case, did have jurisdiction to consider the defendant’s request to file a motion for a new trial out of time on the ground of excusable neglect. Because the trial court failed to determine whether the defendant’s failure to file a timely new trial motion was due to excusable neglect, I would remand the case for this determination.
*847A brief examination of the facts is helpful to an understanding of the jurisdictional aspect of this case. The defendant was represented by a court appointed private attorney throughout the trial due to a conflict of interest on the part of the public defender’s office. The jury verdict was returned on August 11, 1978. The record does not indicate whether the defendant was informed on this date of his right to appeal and of the necessity of filing a motion for a new trial within fifteen days in order to preserve his grounds for appeal. Nor does the record reveal whether an extension of time for filing the new trial motion was requested or granted. Rather, the next occurrence reflected in the record is the September 8, 1978, sentencing hearing, at which the defendant was advised by the judge as follows:
“I want to tell you you have a right to appeal and seek review of the sentence if you so desire. If you cannot afford an attorney, an attorney will be appointed for you. Because you have gone through with the court appointed attorney ... I assume and will make the assumption that you do want an attorney and one will be appointed.. . . I’ll then appoint the Public Defender to represent you for purposes of appeal in this case, allow [appointed counsel] to withdraw....
“I want you to keep in mind that you have the same right to appeal that I have talked to you about and explained to you in this case as in the next case which I’ll now call.”
The court then appointed a public defender to represent the defendant on appeal. Nevertheless, it was the defendant’s original court-appointed attorney who on October 6,1978, filed the notice of appeal, which stated that the defendant “hereby gives notice of his intent to appeal this case on the grounds set forth in his Motion for New Trial.”
On November 15, 1978, the district court entered an order extending to January 14, 1979, the time within which to transmit the record on appeal. On January 12, 1979, the defendant’s new attorney filed a written request for leave to file out of time a new trial motion. This written request stated that an earlier new trial motion was not filed because the defendant was not fully advised of the appealable issues in the case and also because the defendant’s original attorney had told him that he and the prosecuting attorney believed the defendant would most likely receive a concurrent sentence. The request for leave to file an untimely motion for a new trial was accompanied by the motion for a new trial.
On January 15, 1979, a hearing was held on the defendant’s written request to file out of time. The court denied the request, noting:
“At this time, the Court is ready to rule. There are two things that are important to the Court here. First is the fact that the Defendant was told of his right to appeal, and an attorney was appointed for that purpose. Under those circumstances the Court does not feel it has any right to supervise or work out a contract or relationship between a Defendant and his attorney. That is not the province of the Court.
“Secondly, this is not timely filed. If we don’t have some procedural rule, we never have anything properly and finally determined.
“I’m satisfied from presiding at the trial and the notes of the case that this man did have a fair trial, and I’m not going to allow the motion to be filed. I’ll deny the motion for an extension of time in which to file a motion for new trial.”
The court of appeals received the record on appeal on January 16, 1979.
Crim.P. 33 provides that, unless the ground asserted is that of newly discovered evidence, a motion for a new trial “shall be filed within fifteen days after verdict or finding of guilt or within such additional time as the court may affix during the fifteen-day period.” Crim.P. 45(b) authorizes the trial court to permit a motion for a new trial to be filed after the fifteen day period has elapsed, “if the failure to act on time was the result of excusable neglect.” The majority holds that the trial court had *848no jurisdiction to act under Crim.P. 45(b) in this case because the appeal had been “perfected.” This reasoning assumes that the mere filing of a notice of appeal somehow constitutes “the perfection of an appeal.” The real issue, as I see it, is not whether an appeal may or may not have been “perfected,” but whether the mere filing of a notice of appeal in the trial court rendered that court powerless to consider the defendant’s Rule 45(b) motion. I would hold that the trial court did have jurisdiction to act on the defendant’s motion under the circumstances present here.
There can be no doubt that even where a notice of appeal has been filed the trial court retains jurisdiction over a case for limited purposes. The trial court, for example, is charged with supervising the compilation of the record on appeal and certifying the reporter’s transcript, if any, to the appellate court. C.A.R. 10, 11 and 12. Where the appellant is not required to prepay a docket fee, as here, the case normally is not even docketed in the court of appeals until the record is filed. C.A.R. 12(a). Indeed, this case was not docketed until January 16, 1979, the day after the hearing on the defendant’s request to file a belated motion for a new trial. In these circum-
stances, if the trial court had granted the defendant’s motion and proceeded to consider the new trial motion which had already been filed, it would not have interrupted any proceedings in the court of appeals.
Although the majority recognizes that the trial court retained the power to act during this period “in aid of the appeal,” it apparently attributes no significance to this concept except for purely mechanical actions.1 Yet the whole purpose of requiring a new trial motion is “in aid of the appeal.” Because a motion for a new trial forestalls the necessity of an appeal where the trial court agrees that error has been committed, the requirement for filing such a motion has been imposed as “a procedural prerequisite intended to assure that the matters appealed have been considered by the trial court.” People v. Moore, 193 Colo. 81, 83, 562 P.2d 749, 751 (1977). Thus, while the filing of a motion for a new trial is a procedural prerequisite for appellate review, we have expressly held that the time limitation for a new trial motion “is not jurisdictional in the sense that without it the court would lack authority to adjudicate the subject matter.”2 Id. at 83, 562 P.2d at *849751. Where, as here, the trial court’s action would not only occur before the case is docketed with the court of appeals but might also render the appeal unnecessary, I see no reason for denying the trial court the power to consider, and in its discretion to grant, both the request for leave to file out of time and the motion for a new trial itself.
The record here clearly demonstrates that the trial court did not attempt to determine whether the defendant’s failure to file a timely new trial motion was due to excusable neglect. Rather, the court based its ruling on two unrelated considerations. First, it found that “the Defendant was told of his right to appeal.” Even though such an advisement might be relevant in making a determination of whether excusable neglect has been shown, the only such advisement contained in the record not only failed to advise the defendant of the necessity for filing a new trial motion and of the time limits involved, but occurred after the time for filing the new trial motion had already expired. The second basis for the court's decision was the defendant’s failure to file the motion within the fifteen day time period, the court noting that “[i]f we don’t have some procedural rule, we never have anything properly and finally determined.” We do have the procedural rule contained in Crim.P. 45(b), however, and that rule allowed the court to consider the untimely motion if it determined that “the failure to act on time was the result of excusable neglect.”
I would remand to the trial court for just such a determination. If the court should find that the defendant’s failure to file a timely new trial motion was not due to excusable neglect, the court could then certify the case to this court for a determination of the errors asserted under the plain error rule employed by the majority in its opinion. If, however, the trial court should determine that excusable neglect was shown, it should then proceed to consider the motion for a new trial. If it should deny this motion, it could then certify the case to this court for a determination of the errors asserted under the normal standard employed when issues are properly preserved for appeal. If the trial court, on the other hand, should grant the motion for a new trial, the issues raised here would be moot. This procedure, in my view, is consistent with the overriding purpose of our rules of criminal procedure: “to provide for the just determination of criminal proceedings.” Crim.P. 2. A remand affords the defendant an opportunity to seek a judicial inquiry into the substantive merits of his claims rather than, as here, limiting him to the extremely rigid standard of plain error. Of equal importance, such a resolution avoids the grafting onto our rules of procedure a notion of jurisdictional exclusivity which I believe tends to elevate form over substance and to make procedure an end in itself.
I am authorized to say that Justice DU-BOFSKY joins me in this dissent.

. I disagree with the majority’s “exclusive jurisdiction” concept under which the power to act in relation to a case can only be exercised by an appellate court once the case has been docketed in that court. Our statutes and rules of criminal procedure recognize that even when an appeal is pending the trial court may properly rule on the case for limited purposes. Thus, motions for an appeal bond are directed to the trial court, Crim.P. 46(b); Crim.P. 46.-1(a)(2); C.A.R. 9(b). Similarly, section 18-1-410(1), C.R.S.1973 (1978 Repl.Vol. 8), and Crim.P. 35(c)(1) authorize the filing of some post-conviction motions even if an appeal is pending but judgment “has not yet then been affirmed on appeal.” Nor does a trial court, by virtue of a pending appeal, lose jurisdiction to grant probation or modify sentence upon the receipt of a diagnostic center’s recommended rehabilitation report pursuant to section 17-40-103, C.R.S.1973 (1978 Repl.Vol. 8). It would appear that a trial court also should be able to grant a timely motion to reconsider sentence under Crim.P. 35(b) in spite of a pending appeal. See People v. District Court, 638 P.2d 65 (Colo.1981) (Dubofsky, J., dissenting); People v. Francis, 630 P.2d 82, 84, n. 13 (Colo.1981). Finally, where a motion for a new trial is based upon newly discovered evidence, the trial court has jurisdiction under Crim.P. 33 to consider the motion even though an appeal is pending. See generally United States v. Fuentes-Lozano, 580 F.2d 724 (5th Cir.1978); United States v. Ellison, 557 F.2d 128 (7th Cir.1977), cert. denied, 434 U.S. 965, 98 S.Ct. 504, 54 L.Ed.2d 450 (1977); United States v. Frame, 454 F.2d 1136 (9th Cir.1972), cert. denied, 406 U.S. 925, 92 S.Ct. 1794, 32 L.Ed.2d 126 (1972).

. The reason for the distinction between civil and criminal cases, with respect to time limitation, was expressed in People v. Moore, 193 Colo. 81, 83, 562 P.2d 749, 751 (1977), as follows:
“While in both situations there is a strong judicial preference for deciding cases on the merits rather than on the basis of time limitations, this consideration is more cogent in criminal cases. In a civil case, where a party’s money or property is at risk, his attorney’s failure to file a timely motion for a new trial may constitute professional negligence for which the client has a remedy in damages. In a criminal case, however, where the *849client’s life or liberty is at stake, there is no comparable, practical remedy.”