Court Opinion

ID: 9452609
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 17:46:22.764532+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:33:17.365794
License: Public Domain

*968WINTER, Circuit Judge
(dissenting):
I agree that the Youth Corrections Act, 18 U.S.C.A. § 5005 et seq., does not violate due process. The conclusion of the majority that the requirements of the Pilkington case were met is supported by Hale v. United States, 347 F.2d 367 (10 Cir. 1965), but as one who participated in deciding Pilkington I am constrained to state how the decision of the majority departs from Pilkington and my unwillingness to join in the departure.
Pilkington decided that when an accused was told only that he could be sentenced to a term of five years if his plea of guilty to a violation of 18 U.S.C.A. § 661, which authorized imprisonment for not more than five years, were accepted, he could not be sentenced under the Youth Corrections Act, absent a showing that he knew the maximum penalties to which he was exposed under the latter. This was so, as we stated in Pilkington, footnote 2, 315 F.2d 208, because the Youth Corrections Act:
“ * * * requires a conditional release after not more than four years; but the defendant is then under supervision for two more years, and if he violates any condition of his conditional release, he may be returned to serve wp to six years from the date of his conviction. Revocation of a release order does not require the same type of proof as is necessary to convict for a crime. The summary procedure is made possible because of the original sentence, which may run six years. * * * ” (emphasis supplied)
Thus, we held that for his disposition under the Act on his plea of guilty to be valid, the offender must know that he may be confined up to four years, and then on conditional release up to two years, and that if he violates his conditional release, he may be confined again for the balance of six years from the date of original sentence.
Pilkington, as the authorities cited therein, and as our subsequent decisions demonstrate (see, for example, Townes v. United States, 4 Cir., 371 F.2d 930 (1966)), was but an aspect of our continued insistence that a defendant shall not be permitted to plead guilty unless the plea is made freely and voluntarily. For a guilty plea to be made freely and voluntarily, a defendant must know, inter alia, the full potential consequences of his plea. In departing from Pilkington, the majority departs also from the rule so carefully established in our prior opinions. There is no justification for this aberration. The holding of Pilkington has been expressly adopted in Freeman v. United States, 350 F.2d 940 (9 Cir. 1965); Chapin v. United States, 341 F.2d 900 (10 Cir. 1965); impliedly adopted in Kotz v. United States, 353 F.2d 312 (8 Cir. 1965); rejected in Rawls v. United States, 330 F.2d 777 (5 Cir. 1964); and adverted to in United States ex rel. McGrath v. LaVallee, 348 F.2d 373 (2 Cir. 1965); Butler v. Burke, 360 F.2d 118 (7 Cir. 1966); and Workman v. United States, 337 F.2d 226 (1 Cir. 1964).
In the case at bar, Johnson was told that if treated as an adult offender he might be sentenced to five years or, if treated as a youth offender, he might receive an indeterminate sentence “ * * which might mean that you might spend as much as four years in prison and have two years probation or parole thereafter.” Johnson was not told that, while on probation or parole, if he violated the terms of his conditional release he could be reincarcerated for the balance of the six-year period.
The majority find that in the explanation given to Johnson there was implicit “the possibility of confinement for as long as six years.” The majority strongly suggests, but stops short of so finding, that Johnson understood that two years probation or parole thereafter might be revoked. Support for this conclusion is found in a standard dictionary definition of “parole.” I feel impelled to comment that courtrooms are not ordinarily equipped with Webster’s Third New Int’l. Dictionary (1961), nor are defendants, in colloquy with the presiding judge, *969ordinarily afforded an opportunity to consult any dictionary.
I can conclude only that from what was told him by the district judge, Johnson did not know his possible maximum exposure to penalty under the Youth Corrections Act. I would remand the case to the district judge for an evidentiary hearing to determine if Johnson knew that fact from his general knowledge, from some other court official, from his attorney, or from any other source. Absent a determination that the omission of the district judge was thus rendered harmless, Johnson’s motion should be granted and his plea stricken.