Court Opinion

ID: 9475456
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 05:27:53.346043+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:44:43.732019
License: Public Domain

COFFIN, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I have considerable sympathy for the majority’s approach, recognizing the initial logic of its conclusion. Since subsection (J) allows the district court 30 additional days beyond November 16 to determine the non-suppression motions, and only five additional days were needed in this case to comply with the Speedy Trial Act, it seems at first blush reasonable to conclude that the trial was timely.
The problem with this conclusion, however, arises from the language of subsection (J). The statute very specifically provides an exclusion for the period during which “any proceeding concerning the defendant is actually under advisement by the court” (emphasis added). This “under advisement” period is limited to 30 days. The majority assumes that because 30 days are available, it is proper to allocate five of them to deciding the non-suppression motions, regardless of the time actually devoted to those motions. But I do not see how we can say any time, up to 30 days, is excludible when subsection (J) allows an exception only for days actually used to decide the remaining motions. Although there is an argument for allowing some “play in the joints,” it must be remembered that the Speedy Trial Act starts with the presumption that if a trial is not held within 70 days of indictment, the Act is violated. That time may be lengthened only if one of the enumerated exceptions applies. The subsection that applies here, (J), does not make a 100-day trial delay lawful; it merely allows an extension during the time motions actually were under advisement.
Moreover, my brethren’s approach suffers from the same problem they sought to avoid by adopting it, namely the improper extension of the 30-day period allowed under (J) for the suppression motions. The majority approach would allow a district court up to 60 days for the suppression motions, so long as there is one non-suppression motion decided at the same time. (The sixty days would be reduced only by whatever time it took to decide the non-suppression motion, which, in some cases, probably would be less than one day.) Thus, there would be no sanction for violating the 30-day period under (J) for the suppression motions. In addition, there would be an invitation to manipulate; the government could help insure against speedy trial violations by filing other evidentiary motions after a motion to sup*24press is filed. And defendants will likely be chilled; they will think twice before filing any additional motions.
The “common sense” result reached by the panel might have more to commend it if there were not available perfectly adequate means, consistent with the statute, for a district court to obtain as much time as it reasonably needs to decide pretrial motions. It may take all the time it wants before having a hearing on a motion to suppress; it can wait after the hearing until all the filings are in; it can then take 30 days and, on the 30th day, it can announce that exceptional circumstances justify a further delay, 18 U.S.C. 3161(h)(8). If, at the end of all this time, there is pending a non-suppression motion, the court has 30 days to decide it — but it can announce a needed extension on or before the 30th day.
I therefore conclude that only time actually spent on the non-suppression motions in this case is excludable. This is not to say that I believe a court must make a showing that it was actually considering the motions on every one of the days it had them under advisement. See original panel opinion at 6-10. I merely believe that only the days actually under advisement are ex-cludable.
On the record before us in this case, it is impossible to determine how much time was devoted to the non-suppression motions. The district court stated that it waited until it had decided the suppression motions before taking the non-suppression motions under advisement. The decision on the suppression motions was issued on December 23, however, two days after the order on the non-suppression motions. As does the majority, I assume that the court first decided the suppression motions, and then turned to the non-suppression motions while it put finishing touches on the lengthy opinion disposing of the suppression motions. But we do not know when the court completed deliberations on the suppression motions, or whether the court then took one hour or one day or five days to decide the non-suppression motions. I would therefore remand the case to that court asking it to specify how much time it spent on the non-suppression motions. If the non-suppression motions were under advisement for less than five days, the Act was violated.