Court Opinion

ID: 9469099
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 02:32:01.127366+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:41:13.148855
License: Public Domain

CUDAHY, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
Unfortunately, this case cannot be satisfactorily dispatched through analysis only of the petitioner’s claimed failure to receive required warnings when pleading guilty. Among other things, the majority mentions but fails adequately to resolve the petitioner’s allegations that his plea was involuntary in that he was unaware of his right to pursue an insanity defense, and in that he was coerced by the state’s threat to file more serious charges against him. With respect to insanity, the Supreme Court has squarely held that a plea is involuntary unless a defendant understands the nature of the offense charged, including its essential elements. Henderson v. Morgan, 426 U.S. 637, 96 S.Ct. 2253, 49 L.Ed.2d 108 (1976). Moreover, with respect to coercion, Illinois Supreme Court Rule 402(b) clearly recognizes that the existence of a plea agreement, as well as any threats or coercion surrounding that agreement, is relevant to the voluntariness of a guilty plea. Ill.Rev.Stat. ch. 110A, § 402(b). Neither insanity nor coercion were adequately addressed in the state court hearing on petitioner’s motion to withdraw his guilty plea. At that hearing the state presented no witnesses and offered no argument. Nor was there any testimony presented to corroborate Judge Nielson’s statement from the bench that it was his habit to inform defendants of their rights before accepting a plea of guilty. Cf. Clayton v. Blackburn, 578 F.2d 117, 118 (5th Cir. 1978) (per curiam). There has thus been no “full and fair hearing” under Townsend v. Sain, 372 U.S. 293, 294, 83 S.Ct. 745, 746, 9 L.Ed.2d 770 (1962), on petitioner’s constitutional claim.
As the majority points out, it is the duty of the district court, on a petition for habeas when the record of the guilty plea proceeding is inadequate, to examine the record of state proceedings and to determine “whether the state tribunal provided a ‘full and fair hearing’ on the voluntariness of the plea.” Ante at 877-878. I agree with the majority that Judge Roszkowski’s grant of summary judgment was improper, but I believe it is equally improper for this court, in effect, to sweep under the rug issues of fact which no one has yet adequately addressed.
I therefore, while approving reversal, respectfully dissent from the majority’s holding that no evidentiary hearing is necessary in this case.