Court Opinion

ID: 9758941
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 23:56:46.028719+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:57.372329
License: Public Domain

Morse, J.,
concurring. Although I concur in the Court’s holding affirming the judgment of contempt, my analysis of the issues differs substantially from that of the Court.
I agree that defendant was not unconstitutionally deprived of the right to counsel, but the reason, in my view, is because he was not entitled to a court-appointed lawyer. The United States Supreme Court has never held that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment requires the appointment of counsel in a civil contempt proceeding for nonpayment of child support. Nevertheless, this Court so holds today, relying on the recent decision in Choiniere v. Brooks, 163 Vt. 625, 660 A.2d 289 (1995) (mem.). Choiniere was a summary entry order, which merely noted that a majority of jurisdictions have found in favor of the right to appointed counsel in these circumstances; indeed, the right-to-counsel issue was raised sua sponte by the Court and was neither briefed nor argued by the parties. Not surprisingly, the entry order contains no meaningful discussion or analysis of the issue. Significantly, it omits any mention whatsoever of the contrary view held by a minority of jurisdictions, a view that, as explained below, is both pragmatic and constitutionally sound.
I also agree with the Court’s decision upholding the appointment of the public defender. Contrary to the Court’s judgment, however, I believe that the public defender act authorizes such appointments. Accordingly, I do not perceive the necessity, nor do I join in the Court’s call, for comprehensive legislative reform in this area.
I. Right to Counsel
The United States Supreme Court has held that the right to appointed counsel arises “only where the litigant may lose his physical liberty if he loses the litigation,” Lassiter v. Department of Social Servs., 452 U.S. 18, 25 (1981), and has qualified the right by observing that as a litigant’s interest in “personal liberty diminishes, so does his right to appointed counsel.” Id. at 26. Thus, in Gagnon v. Scarpelli, 411 U.S. 778 (1973), the Court declined to hold that indigent *406probationers have a right, per se, to a lawyer at probation revocation hearings, notwithstanding the fact that they face possible incarceration if found to have violated probation. The Court noted that the defendant in such cases has already been sentenced; that in most cases the factual inquiry is simplified by the defendant’s conviction of another crime or admission of the probation violation; that while the defendant may offer evidence to explain or mitigate the offense “evidence of this kind is often not susceptible of proof or is so simple as not to require either investigation or exposition by counsel,” id. at 787; and that the introduction of counsel would “alter significantly the nature of the proceeding” by turning it into a full-blown adversarial hearing, prolonging the decisionmaking process and incurring substantial financial costs to the state. Id. at 787-88. Although the presence of counsel was thus “undesirable and constitutionally unnecessary in most revocation hearings,” id. at 790, the Court acknowledged that there may be some cases where the nature or complexity of the evidence or the issues required the presence of a state-appointed attorney for the defendant to be fairly represented. Id. at 786-88. Therefore, the Court concluded that “the need for counsel must be made on a case-by-case basis in the exercise of a sound discretion by the state authority.” Id. at 790. Counsel should be presumptively provided, the Court explained, in those cases where the probationer requests such assistance based on a “colorable claim” that the probationer did not commit the alleged violation, or where, even if uncontested, “there are substantial reasons which justified or mitigated the violation and make revocation inappropriate, and that the reasons are complex or otherwise difficult to develop or present.” Id.
It is against this decisional backdrop that the Supreme Court has more recently described the right to counsel as a “presumption” where physical liberty is at issue, which must be balanced in each procedural setting against the private and governmental interests at stake, and the risk that the procedures used will lead to erroneous results. Lassiter, 452 U.S. at 27-28. In Lassiter itself, the issue was not personal freedom, but parental rights. Nevertheless, in view of the important parental and state interests at stake, and the parties’ joint interest in a correct decision, the Court adopted the standard found appropriate in Gagnon, leaving the decision “whether due process calls for the appointment of counsel for indigent parents in termination proceedings to be answered in the first instance by the trial court, subject, of course, to appellate review.” Id. at 32.
*407II. Civil Contempt
Here, we are concerned with a civil contempt proceeding stemming from the violation of certain court-imposed conditions in connection with a child support order. The trial court found defendant in contempt for violating the court’s directives, further found that defendant had failed to satisfy the stated conditions necessary to purge himself of the contempt, and ordered him incarcerated. To evaluate defendant’s right to a court-appointed attorney in these circumstances requires some attention to the nature of a civil contempt, and the specific procedural setting in which it arises.
Originally a common-law mechanism to enforce court orders and decrees, Andrew v. Andrew, 62 Vt. 495, 501, 20 A. 817, 819 (1890), contempt proceedings are currently authorized by statute “[w]hen a party violates an order made against him in a cause brought to or pending before a superior judge or a county court or the district court after service of the order upon that party.” 12 V.S.A. § 122. There are two classes of contempt, civil and criminal, either of which may be punished by imprisonment. See 12 V.S.A. § 123. The two categories are distinguishable principally by the purpose of the punishment imposed. “In a criminal contempt the purpose of the commitment is punitive and in a civil contempt the purpose is coercive.” In re Sage, 115 Vt. 516, 517, 66 A.2d 13, 14 (1949). The goal of criminal contempt is simply to punish the defendant “to vindicate the ‘authority and dignity’ of the trial court.” Bonser v. Courtney, 481 A.2d 524, 531 (N.H. 1984) (quoting Scarborough v. R.T.P. Enters., 422 A.2d 1304, 1308 (N.H. 1980)). The prison sentence, accordingly, must be definite, Sage, 115 Vt. at 517, 66 A.2d at 14, and “no amount of repentance will remit it.” Town of Nottingham v. Cedar Waters, Inc., 385 A.2d 851, 854 (N.H. 1978).
In a civil contempt, the purpose of imprisonment is something quite different. There, “the imprisonment is inflicted as a means to compel the party to do some act ordered by the court for the benefit or advantage of the opposite party,” Sage, 115 Vt. at 517, 66 A.2d at 14, and thus the sentence may be indeterminate until the contemnor complies with the court order. Id. “[OJnly compensatory fines or coercive sanctions may be imposed on a civil contemnor,” State v. Pownal Tanning Co., 142 Vt. 601, 603, 459 A.2d 989, 990 (1983), and these must be “purgeable,” id. at 604, 459 A.2d at 991, i.e., they must be “capable of being avoided by defendants through adherence to the court’s order.” Vermont Women’s Health Ctr. v. Operation Rescue, 159 Vt. 141, 151, 617 A.2d 411, 417 (1992). Thus, it is commonly said *408that the contemnor holds the ‘“keys to the jail’” and stands committed only until the act required by the court is performed. Bonser, 481 A.2d at 531 (quoting Town of Nottingham, 385 A.2d at 854). The requirement that a defendant must be presently able to perform implies the opposite, as well; the “inability, without fault, to render obedience to an order or decree of a court is a good defense to a charge of contempt.” Socony Mobil Oil Co. v. Northern Oil Co., 126 Vt. 160, 164, 225 A.2d 60, 63 (1966).
It is thus readily apparent that the liberty interest at stake in a civil contempt proceeding is qualitatively unique. Unlike the normal criminal prosecution or criminal contempt proceeding, imprisonment in a civil contempt may not be ordered unless it is shown that the defendant has the present ability to comply with the court’s directive, and the defendant may further secure immediate release from incarceration simply by acceding to the order. As distinct from the criminal setting, where the defendant has no control over continued incarceration, the defendant’s liberty and property interests in the civil context are far less vulnerable; the defendant holds the “key to the cell,” and, by definition, may gain release at any time. “[A]s a litigant’s interest in personal liberty diminishes, so does his right to appointed counsel.” Lassiter, 452 U.S. at 26. Because the liberty interest at stake in the civil contempt context is thus limited, the historical “presumption” in favor of the appointment of counsel is substantially weakened.
III. Other Lassiter Factors
Another important factor in determining an indigent’s right to an appointed lawyer is the risk of an erroneous decision. Lassiter, 452 U.S. at 27-28. Generally, the legal and factual issues in a civil contempt hearing are not complex. Issues relating to the merits of the court’s order have already been adjudicated; the only questions before the court are thus whether the defendant has violated the order and has the present ability to comply. In a support enforcement proceeding, the issues are singularly uncomplicated and straightforward; arrearages are simple accounting matters and rarely are subject to substantial dispute. The plaintiff, be it the custodial spouse or the Office of Child Support (OCS), will rarely have the occasion to call expert witnesses or to take advantage of OCS counsel’s superior advocacy skills. The violation is often uncontested, and the defendant seeks merely to explain or mitigate his conduct. As the Supreme Court has observed, “evidence of this kind is often not susceptible of *409proof or is so simple as not to require either investigation or exposition by counsel.” Gagnon, 411 U.S. at 787. Thus, the presence of a court-appointed attorney for the defendant will not, in reality, enhance the accuracy of the court’s findings or reduce the risk of erroneous results. See Lassiter, 452 U.S. at 27-28.
Finally, the “financial cost to the State” of assigning counsel in every civil contempt proceeding where incarceration is a possibility must be weighed against the potential benefit of a more reliable adjudication. Gagnon, 411 U.S. at 788. As I have elsewhere observed, “due process cannot be made perfect at any price. If added burden is placed on one part of the criminal justice system, a price is exacted from another.” State v. Porter, 164 Vt. 515, 522, 671 A.2d 1280, 1285 (1996) (Morse, J., concurring). In view of the fact that most civil contempt proceedings for nonpayment of support pose relatively simple fact questions of compliance and arrears, the requirement that counsel be afforded to all indigent defendants “is simply too big a price to pay for the relatively small marginal gain in ‘reliability.’” Id.
On balance, therefore, the critical considerations identified by the Supreme Court in Lassiter and Gagnon weigh against the appointment of counsel in every case in which an indigent may be incarcerated for failure to comply with an order of support. Rather, the flexible standards adopted by the high court in Gagnon and Lassiter seem most appropriate to this setting. The trial court should have the discretion to evaluate the need for counsel on a case-by-case basis, and decide, based on articulated reasons, whether fundamental fairness requires the appointment of a lawyer to assist an indigent defendant in a civil contempt proceeding for nonpayment of support.
Although, as the Court notes, a majority of jurisdictions have concluded otherwise, it is noteworthy that the states are not unanimous. A number of courts analyzing the Supreme Court precedents have concluded that due process does not require the appointment of counsel in every case where an indigent defendant faces the possibility of incarceration if found in civil contempt for failure to comply with an order of support. These states include Illinois, In re Marriage of Betts, 558 N.E.2d 404 (Ill. App. Ct. 1990), appeal denied, 567 N.E.2d 328 (1991)*; Maine, Meyer v. Meyer, 414 A.2d 236 (Me. 1980), and *410Colson v. State, 498 A.2d 585, 587 n.4 (Me. 1985); New Hampshire, Sheedy v. Merrimack County Superior Court, 509 A.2d 144 (N.H. 1986); New Mexico, State ex rel. Dep’t of Human Servs. v. Rael, 642 P.2d 1099 (N.M. 1982); and Ohio, In re Calhoun, 350 N.E.2d 665 (Ohio 1976), and Courtney v. Courtney, 475 N.E.2d 1284 (Ohio Ct. App. 1984); see also Andrews v. Walton, 428 So. 2d 663 (Fla. 1983) (parent not entitled to court-appointed counsel in civil contempt proceeding because indigent cannot be imprisoned for failure to pay support).
The Supreme Court of New Mexico has succinctly summarized the position of these courts as follows:
[T]he defendant’s liberty and property interests are not as vulnerable in the context of the civil contempt hearing as in the criminal setting. The provision of court-appointed counsel would do little to reduce erroneous decisions here, where the legal and factual issues are not complex. These factors, when added to the state’s interests, militate against a rule requiring appointment of counsel in all cases ....
Rael, 642 P.2d at 1103.
The views expressed in Rael are sound. Civil contempt does, in fact, carry built-in safeguards that are sufficient to protect most defendants in most routine enforcement proceedings: the issues are simple; the trial court must find a present ability to comply; the defendant virtually controls the duration of the incarceration. Furthermore, the trial court retains broad discretion to appoint counsel in any case where it appears necessary for a fair presentation of the issues. Thus, the Court need not choose between the extremes of requiring court-appointed counsel in every case, or in none. The flexible standards adopted by the high court in Gagnon and Lassiter provide the appropriate model for decision here.
IV. Appointment Standard Applied
Defendant was held in contempt not strictly for failing to make payment under the support order in effect, but rather for failing, as ordered, to take certain specific steps to secure employment, and to prosecute a workers’ compensation claim for a back injury which *411would have enabled him to pay substantial child-support arrearages. At the initial contempt hearing, defendant admitted that he had not taken the required steps and offered various excuses for his lack of diligence. The court was unpersuaded and held defendant in contempt. It also set forth four specific conditions to purge the contempt. At the next scheduled hearing, the court, after listening to defendant’s explanation, observed that “not a lot has changed.” The court then expressed an inclination to order defendant’s immediate incarceration, but noted that it was constrained under Choiniere to appoint counsel if defendant met the financial criteria. Defendant’s financial application reported negligible income and no assets. A public defender was duly appointed, who argued, briefly, that defendant had experienced some difficulties in gaining access to transportation and a telephone. The court set a new hearing one month later to provide counsel an additional opportunity to investigate and gather any pertinent evidence. At the new hearing, counsel represented that defendant had taken some minimal steps to purge himself of the contempt, but otherwise offered no evidence that defendant was unable to comply with the remaining provisions. The court ordered defendant to be incarcerated forthwith, but stated that it would order his release upon his demonstrating a willingness to comply with the order. Counsel promptly filed a notice of appeal, and this Court granted a stay of sentence to consider issues relating to defendant’s right to appointed counsel.
The facts of this case provide a perfect illustration of the futility of appointed counsel in the typical support enforcement proceeding. The issues were simple and straightforward. The trial court had ordered defendant to diligently pursue his workers’ compensation claim. Defendant violated the order, was held in contempt, and failed to satisfy the specific conditions necessary to purge himself of the contempt. Counsel, appointed under compulsion of Choiniere, offered no evidence of defendant’s inability to comply with the order, and made only perfunctory arguments to excuse defendant’s behavior, arguments that were no more effective than those defendant himself had earlier advanced. All that appointed counsel accomplished here was to needlessly prolong the proceeding, consume additional state resources, and blunt the only effective weapon left in the court’s arsenal to obtain support payments for defendant’s two minor children. The trial court should have been allowed to assess the circumstances and determine whether the appointment of counsel was necessary for defendant’s position to be fairly represented. Had *412the court been so empowered, I have no doubt it would have concluded, correctly, that counsel was unnecessary to safeguard defendant’s right to a fair hearing.
V. Appointment of Public Defender
Also before the Court is the question of who shall represent indigent defendants in civil contempt proceedings for nonpayment of support. The issue is undoubtedly important to the bar, but otherwise of no great practical significance. Under the approach outlined above, the need for assigned counsel in these circumstances should be quite limited, given the general lack of complexity that characterizes such proceedings. It should also be apparent that in most circumstances a finding that the defendant is sufficiently needy to qualify for the services of appointed counsel would effectively preclude incarceration, since a present financial ability to comply with the support order is a prerequisite to imprisonment. See Spabile v. Hunt, 134 Vt. 332, 334-35, 360 A.2d 51, 52 (1976) (“[T]he inability without fault to obey an order of court is a valid defense to a charge of contempt since ‘contempt by its very nature is inapplicable to one who is powerless to comply with the court order.’”) (quoting Yoder v. County of Cumberland, 278 A.2d 379, 390 (Me. 1971)). Absent a threat of incarceration, there is, of course, no constitutional requirement to appoint counsel. Conversely, if the parent has the present ability to pay, the parent may not qualify as a needy person entitled to the services of appointed counsel. Thus, I would expect the number of cases actually requiring court-appointed counsel in this context to be quite small.
Where it does become necessary, I would hold, contrary to the Court, that assignment of the public defender is authorized by the public defender act. 13 V.S.A. §§ 5201-5277. It is true that one provision of the act refers to needy persons charged with “a serious crime.” Id. § 5231. It does not necessarily follow, however, that the act is limited to criminal proceedings. On the contrary, the broader purpose of the act is plainly to provide counsel to indigent persons faced with a potential loss of liberty, regardless of the precise nature of the proceeding. This is apparent from the provision expressly requiring assignment of counsel in extradition proceedings, habeas corpus and other proceedings where a person is confined in a penal or mental institution and seeks release, and juvenile court matters. See id. § 5232. Such proceedings may, but need not necessarily, involve serious criminal charges. As we observed in In re A.C., 134 Vt. 284, *413287, 357 A.2d 536, 538 (1976), “so far as the right to assistance of counsel is concerned, juvenile proceedings generally have been placed by the Legislature in the same category with criminal offenses, without distinction as to whether the juvenile proceedings do, or do not, involve an act otherwise criminal.” Furthermore, the act provides unrestricted access to assigned counsel in habeas corpus proceedings, which may involve petitioners confined for reasons completely unrelated to “serious crimes.” See, e.g., Allen v. Smith, 126 Vt. 546, 237 A.2d 354 (1967) (petitioner found in civil contempt and incarcerated for failure to make child support payments, without opportunity to purge contempt, may seek release by writ of habeas corpus); 12 V.S.A. § 3979 (person who disobeys order, decree, judgment, or process of court, and imprisoned for contempt, is entitled to file petition for writ of habeas corpus).
The Legislature, moreover, has expressly charged this Court with the duty to “make such rules as shall further the intent and purposes of” the public defender act. 13 V.S.A. § 5204. To this end, the Court has promulgated Administrative Order 4, governing the “Assignment of Counsel and Payment Therefor by the Defender General.” That order states, in part, as follows: “The purpose of these rules is to assure the availability of counsel to all persons adjudged in need thereof, confronted by proceedings which may involve potential loss of personal liberty, irrespective of their ability to pay for such representation . . . .” A.O. 4, § 1 (emphasis added). Thus, in implementing the “intent and purposes” of the public defender statute, the Court itself has drawn no distinction between criminal and civil matters, but rather has provided broadly for the right to appointed counsel in all “proceedings which may involve potential loss of personal liberty.” I cannot imagine better proof of the act’s applicability to civil contempt proceedings where incarceration is a possibility and counsel is constitutionally necessary for a fair hearing.
Constitutional rights are not static, but reflect changing perceptions over time of what is fundamentally fair in a civilized society. The scope of the constitutional right to counsel under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments has been broadened substantially over the last several decades. The public defender act is, and must be, sufficiently supple to respond to these changing needs. Accordingly, the same administrative order referred to above further provides as follows: “The circumstance that statutory authority of the right to representation by counsel does not appear to reach the matter involved is not to bar the exercise of the inherent power to provide *414counsel where it may be constitutionally required.” Id. This is not, in my view, merely a restatement of the Court’s inherent “power to require attorneys to serve and protect the vital interests of uncounselled litigants where circumstances demand it.” Caron v. Betit, 131 Vt. 53, 55, 300 A.2d 618, 619 (1972). Rather, it is a recognition that merely because a category of cases requiring counsel is not specifically mentioned in the public defender act, does not mean that the Legislature intended to prohibit their assignment when necessary to protect the liberty interests of indigent defendants. That is, after all, the fundamental purpose of the act, and it does no violence to the letter or spirit of the law to extend the services of public defenders to defendants threatened with incarceration in civil contempt proceedings, where necessary to protect their constitutional right to a fair hearing.
In sum, I would accord trial courts broad discretion, under the standards outlined above, to determine whether the appointment of counsel in a civil contempt proceeding for nonpayment of support is necessary to provide a fair representation of the defendant’s position. Because an assigned counsel was not, in my view, constitutionally compelled in this case, I concur in the decision affirming the judgment of contempt. In other cases where the assignment of an attorney becomes necessary, the office of the public defender, or appointed counsel as prescribed by 13 V.S.A. § 5272, should normally be assigned to handle the case.

 There is a split of authority among the Illinois District Courts of Appeal. Compare Sanders v. Shepard, 541 N.E.2d 1150, 1156-57 (Ill. App. Ct. 1989) (indigent facing incarceration in a civil contempt proceeding for nonsupport is entitled to appointed counsel per se), with In re Marriage of Betts, 558 N.E.2d 404, 422 (Ill. App. Ct. 1990) (“Contrary to the recent decision [in Sanders [¶]... we conclude that a respondent in an *410indirect civil contempt proceeding is not entitled to appointed counsel if he or she is indigent, even though the contempt proceeding may result in imprisonment.”), appeal denied, 567 N.E.2d 328 (1991). Having denied review in Betts, which followed Sanders, the Supreme Court of Illinois may incline toward the later decision holding that counsel should be appointed only when necessary to a fair hearing.