Court Opinion

ID: 9703389
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 23:53:55.470354+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:21:48.275542
License: Public Domain

SHIRLEY S. ABRAHAMSON, CHIEF JUSTICE
¶ 35. (concurring). It is difficult to conclude that the defendant here was not provided with sufficient notice of the predicate convictions on which his repeater status was based when the complaint misstated the date of one of the convictions by a single day. Thus I feel compelled to join the mandate.
¶ 36. I write separately because I believe the majority here misses the forest for a single tree to the detriment of the citizens of Wisconsin.
*350¶ 37. First, this court should adopt for future cases a bright-line rule that Wis. Stat. § 973.12(1) requires any charging document containing a repeater allegation to accurately and precisely recite all predicate convictions, including the offense of conviction, whether the offense was a felony or misdemeanor, and the date of the conviction. Failure to do so defeats the State's ability to convict someone as a repeater under Wis. Stat. § 939.62. Such a rule would cut down on useless litigation and ensure that enhanced repeater sentences are based only on qualifying convictions.
¶ 38. For nearly a decade Wisconsin courts have made it clear that pleading and proving the repeater allegation is neither onerous nor complicated and have urged the State to adopt practices that will result in the accurate recitation of predicate convictions.1 For more than a decade, however, cases have arisen in which the facts of predicate convictions are not accurately recited.2 Merely urging the State to do better is futile without a sanction for failure.
¶ 39. Instead of holding the State accountable by adopting a bright-line rule, the majority opinion concludes that Wis. Stat. § 973.12(1) and due process are satisfied if the State comes close enough. The majority opinion does not define close enough, leaving future *351courts to grapple with the question of how close is close enough under the "relative clarity and precision" standard.3
¶ 40. Under the majority opinion's standard, a defendant is encouraged to bring a post-conviction challenge every time the State fails to recite accurately a predicate offense, to determine whether the State's recitation of a predicate offense was close enough. The circuit court's determination will likely then be appealed at least once as the only parameters set by this court are that one calendar day is close enough while 10 months and three weeks is not close enough.4 The majority opinion's failure to adopt a bright-line rule is thus expensive, for defense counsel, for district attorneys' offices, for the department of justice, and for the courts. The costs to the legal system of hearing and deciding these appeals clearly exceeds the cost to the State to adopt procedures ensuring that it correctly pleads a prior conviction for purposes of obtaining an enhanced sentence. Why not staple a certified copy (or even a non-certified copy) of all prior judgments of conviction to the criminal complaint or at least proofread criminal complaints?
¶ 41. Second, the majority opinion's failure to adopt a bright-line rule is yet another example of the lower burden this court places on the State when depriving a person of his or her liberty than it places on private litigants in civil actions.5 A plaintiffs error in serving a summons and complaint on the wrong city agency office after apparently being misdirected by the *352correct city agency, and despite the fact that the correct city agency subsequently received the summons and complaint, terminates his cause of action.6 The State's repeated inability to accurately inform a defendant of the convictions on which his repeater status was based, however, is forgiven as close enough for government work.
¶ 42. According to this court, Wis. Stat. § 801.11(4), governing service of process in civil actions against bodies politic, demands strict adherence but Wis. Stat. § 973.12(1), governing the requisite notice for criminal defendants being charged as repeat offenders, permits leniency. This court's jurisprudence thus upsets a bedrock principle in our Constitution that because "the accused during a criminal prosecution has at stake an interest of immense importance" the burden on the State in a criminal prosecution is the highest burden required of any litigant and the margin of error allowed is the lowest.7
¶ 43. Finally, I cannot let pass what appears to me an additional waste of resources: charging the defendant in this case as a repeater so that his sentence for four misdemeanors is increased from two years to 12 years.
¶ 44. I do not condone the defendant's actions here or in any of his prior convictions. All citizens must abide by the law and the failure to do so must result in punishment. The four misdemeanors identified in the complaint here, however, as well as the prior misdemeanors, are "minor" when compared to the broad spectrum of criminal offenses. The complaint alleged *353two counts of disorderly conduct and two counts of resisting a police officer and included a repeater allegation based on damage to property and bail jumping convictions; the present charges collectively carry a maximum total penalty of 24 months — well short of the 12-year maximum sentence the defendant received as a repeater.
¶ 45. What is apparent in the present case is that the defendant's behavior is directly linked to drug and alcohol abuse. It appears to me that the State is using an extended prison term to mask the symptoms of substance abuse instead of facing up to the role that alcohol and drug abuse plays in the defendant's criminal conduct. Not all people are amenable to treatment and not all treatment programs prove successful. Prison, however, is expensive, costing the State approximately $25,000 per year per inmate. Is it wise public policy to impose an extra 10-year prison sentence at a cost to the taxpayers of about $250,000 as a substitute to providing him treatment in the community he so desperately needs?8
¶ 46. For the foregoing reasons, I write separately.

 See State v. Goldstein, 182 Wis. 2d 251, 261, 513 N.W.2d 631 (Ct. App. 1994).

 See, e.g., State v. Gerard, 189 Wis. 2d 505, 525 N.W.2d 718 (1995); State v. Martin/Robles, 162 Wis. 2d 883, 470 N.W.2d 900 (1991); State v. Wilks, 165 Wis. 2d 102, 477 N.W.2d 632 (Ct. App. 1991).

 Majority op., ¶ 25 (emphasis added).

 Wilks, 165 Wis. 2d at 111.

 See State v. Jennings, 2003 WI 10, ¶ 38, 259 Wis. 2d 523, 657 N.W.2d 393 (Abrahamson, C.J., dissenting).

 Hagen v. City of Milwaukee Employee's Ret. Sys. Annuity Pension Bd., 2003 WI 56, 262 Wis. 2d 113, 663 N.W.2d 268.

 In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 363-64 (1970).

 The nationwide average cost of imprisoning an addict is $25,900 per year, while treatment costs only $4,400-$6,800 per year. Physician Leadership on Nat'l Drug Policy, Addiction & Addiction Treatment (March 1998), at http://center.butler .brown.edu/plndp/Resources/Research_Reports/Mar_98_Report/ mar_98_report.html.