Court Opinion

ID: 9790878
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 02:00:46.233502+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:32.344386
License: Public Domain

URBIGKIT, Justice,
dissenting.
I remain convinced a trial court should not take either a guilty plea or a nolo contendere plea when the charged defendant asserts his factual innocence to any *140criminal offense and only justifies plea on some external “coercion” by failure to be provided a speedy trial and a pending civil lawsuit as is demonstrated in this appeal. See Martin v. State, 780 P.2d 1354 (Wyo.1989), Urbigkit, J., dissenting. It is not the nature of a speedy trial right as either jurisdictional or non-jurisdictional in Wyoming, see Phillips v. State, 774 P.2d 118 (Wyo.1989); Harvey v. State, 774 P.2d 87 (Wyo.1989); Despain v. State, 774 P.2d 77 (Wyo.1989); and United States v. LoFranco, 818 F.2d 276 (2nd Cir.1987), to be here considered, but rather the corrosive effect of delayed disposition which creates a non-voluntary coerced result. 1 C. Wright, Federal Practice and Procedure: Criminal 2d § 172 at 567-85 (1982). See also Menna v. New York, 423 U.S. 61, 62 n. 2, 96 S.Ct. 241, 244 n. 2, 46 L.Ed.2d 195 (1975).
Criminal processes should not be applied to incarcerate the innocent and nolo conten-dere should not alter this sound principle of societal responsibility. State v. Valencia, 776 P.2d 1332 (Utah App.1989). If we apply all the detrimental effects of a guilty plea but use nolo contendere to avoid collateral estoppel for other purposes, I would require at least an absence of denial of guilt to justify acceptance of the plea. I recognize the opportunity for exercised discretion in absence of adoption of the proposed amendment to the federal rules of criminal procedure, but I continue to believe the pleas of nolo contendere should not be accepted if the charged defendant continues to actively maintain his innocence of any crime. United States v. Dorman, 496 F.2d 438 (4th Cir.), cert. denied 419 U.S. 945, 95 S.Ct. 214, 42 L.Ed.2d 168 (1974). See United States v. Wagner, 256 F.Supp. 574 (D.Conn.1965). I would find a significant difference between standing mute and active assertion of total innocence. I would also agree with English courts which have discontinued use of the nolo contendere plea since 1702. See Lenvin and Meyers, Nolo Contendere: Its Nature and Implications, 51 Yale L.J. 1254 (1942). See also State v. Godek, 182 Conn. 353, 438 A.2d 114 (1980), cert. denied 450 U.S. 1031, 101 S.Ct. 1741, 68 L.Ed.2d 226 (1981); State ex rel. Clark v. Adams, 144 W.Va. 771, 111 S.E.2d 336 (1959), cert. denied 363 U.S. 807, 80 S.Ct. 1242, 4 L.Ed.2d 1149 (1960); Annotation, Plea of Nolo Contendere or Non Vult Contendere, 89 A.L.R.2d 540 (1963); and 1 C. Wright, supra, § 177 at 661. The requirement established in State v. Rhodes, 233 Neb. 373, 445 N.W.2d 622 (1989) should now be adopted for Wyoming plea practice when the nolo contendere is offered by the charged defendant.
The confining power of a denied speedy trial is an obvious example of corrosive pressure which may improperly corrupt the voluntariness of a criminal plea.1 Obviously, no effort was made in this case to obtain compliance with the time limitations adopted by the district court bench in Uniform Rules for the District Courts 204(b), which provides a time limitation of 120 days from arraignment to trial. This maximum time provided by the district court rule of that 120 days compares with the chronology here demonstrated of a complaint filed October 16, 1986, district court arraignment on March 11, 1987, and prosecution then completed with entry of a plea on June 14, 1988. See Phillips, 774 P.2d 118, Urbigkit, J., specially concurring and Despain, 774 P.2d 77.2
I would reverse to permit a new plea for the appellant to either stand trial or admit for the purpose of even the nolo contendere plea that he was not innocent of any criminal conduct.

. Affidavits on file in this appeal portray a disturbing connotation of desired money recovery as the complainant’s purpose in criminal prosecution. The suggestion of payment as the price for nonprosecution is a supposition which is devilishly disturbing. This is an unpleasant case from start to finish — from charged offenses to presently denied guilt.

. Certainly, present counsel for appellant has no real responsibility for the prosecutorial delay and I will not attribute explanation totally to the lack of activity by one disbarred defense attorney. From the standpoint of society, under Wyoming law, this criminal prosecution took too long to conclude. From the standpoint of the appellant, I would also say the same thing.