Court Opinion

ID: 9629944
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 09:54:00.180824+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:07:27.660499
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Kelleher,
dissenting. I cannot subscribe to the thoughts expressed by my brother Doris and those of the Chief Justice.
I would first note that I am not convinced as to the extent of the sentencing justice’s participation in the actual hammering out of the bargain reached in the case at bar. While the prosecutor at the February 26, 1973 hearing did state that the guilty pleas had been negotiated between defense counsel and “myself and the Court,” it *541is by no means clear from the record before us as to just what part the sentencing judge played in formulating a proposal which called for a reduction of one charge and a prison sentence on the reduced charge of not less than 2 nor more than 3 years, the deferring of sentences on the rape and kidnapping indictments, and the suspension of the execution of sentence in ,the sodomy case. It may be that all the sentencing justice did was to signify his approval of the “package” that had been worked out by counsel. Again, it may be that he was an active third party in the negotiations just described, but the colloquy that took place between the court and counsel does not make this supposition that clear.1 However, my uncertainty as to the role played by the sentencing justice is in no way the basis for this dissent.
In this case, the communications media performed a valuable public service. Once it began to publicize the bargain reached between the prosecution and defense counsel with its apparent disparity in the penalties given defendants here when compared with those meted out in other recent convictions involving kidnapping and rape charges, the then Attorney General informed the sen*542tencing justice that there had been a communication gap in his department. The sentencing justice’s statement which was published in the press and read into the record at the March 23, 1973 hearing makes it crystal clear that at the time he indicated that he would approve the agreement, he had assumed that the negotiations had been approved by the then Attorney General. A controversy began to develop, and the sentencing justice sent for and reviewed the prosecutor’s files. It was then that the court decided that he could no longer endorse the February 1973 agreement. When defendants returned for sentencing, the sentencing justice emphasized that the sole reason for his not abiding by his earlier promise was his concept “of the proper administration of justice in criminal matters.” Having had his say, he denied defendants’ request for specific performance and ordered the withdrawal of the previous pleas and the entry of not guilty pleas.
The position taken by the sentencing justice in March 1973 is completely in line with the rationale and holding of Santobello v. New York, 404 U. S. 257, 92 S.Ct. 495, 30 L.Ed.2d 427 (1971). There the prosecutor had breached its bargain. The Chief Justice, joined by Mr. Justice White and Mr. Justice Blackmun, were of the opinion that the ultimate relief .to be afforded was a matter to be determined at the state level. Mr. Justice Douglas concurred with the admonition that in choosing the remedy, the great weight, if not preference, should be accorded to the defendant’s choice. Mr. Justice Marshall, joined by Mr. Justice Brennan and Mr. Justice Stewart, took the view that the defendant had an absolute right to withdraw his guilty plea if he so desired.
Santobello is a plurality opinion. It suggests that when a governmental agency fails or is unable to effectuate its part of a plea bargain, the judge before whom the guilty plea was entered may either vacate the plea or direct that *543the bargain be kept. However, Santobello gives no indication that one remedy is preferred over the other. In most of the cases that have preceded or followed Santobello, the remedy employed has been a vacating of the plea. Miller v. State, 272 Md. 249, 322 A.2d 527 (1974), and the cases cited therein.
In People v. Selikoff, 35 N.Y.2d 227, 318 N.E.2d 784, 360 N.Y.S.2d 623 (1974), the New York Court of Appeals pointed out the incongruity of attempting to apply contract law to plea bargaining. There the court pointed to a possibility that there could never be any binding agreement either because of fraud in the inducement or a unilateral mistake suffered by the defendant. I, too, wonder about the availability of the doctrine of mutuality of remedy and ask what would happen if the state sought specific performance of a prior promise to plead guilty by a defendant who has since changed his mind. The Court of Appeals2 in rejecting the “contract” approach to plea bargaining aptly observed that the strong public interest in the rehabilitation of defendants, the protection of society, and the deterring of other potential offenders were considerations which far outweigh the supposed benefits which actually are beyond the contractual power of the individuals concerned.
Again in Davis v. State, 308 So.2d 27 (Fla. 1975), the *544court ruled that, even where a judge who has participated in or tentatively approved a plea bargain decides not to include the contemplated concessions in his final disposition of the case, the defendant may not refuse to withdraw his plea on the grounds that the plea bargain is a specifically enforceable contract. In taking this position, the Florida court alluded to the principle that a judge is charged by law with meting out just punishment and just punishment is that which fits the circumstances of the crime and the particular criminal. The court, while acknowledging the role plea bargaining can play in the expeditious termination of criminal litigation, remarked that making such agreements binding would be exacting too high a price for administrative efficiency.
While there is a tendency to point to instances where the prosecution had been ordered to abide by the terms of its original agreement as a tacit acceptance of the doctrine of specific performance, an analysis of those cases shows that the ultimate holding is based not on contract principles but on the fact that the defendant has been so prejudiced by the repudiation of the agreement that a vacating of the guilty or nolo plea amounts to an exercise in futility. For example, in State v. Thomas, 61 N. J. 314, 294 A.2d 75 (1972), the defendant as a result of a plea bargain pleaded guilty to a charge of assault and battery and two other related charges were dismissed. The victim died some time after the defendant pleaded to the assault charge but before the dismissal of the other two charges. The defendant was serving an indeterminate sentence at the time of the victim’s death. Some time following the death, the defendant was indicted for murder. The New Jersey Supreme Court rejected his plea of double jeopardy but held that the bringing of the murder indictment did violence to the plea agreement. The defendant had already served 18 months of the indefinite *545term and was on parole. The court ruled that a vacating of the plea in such circumstances would be unjust because the defendant had been punished for the crime to which he had confessed and his status quo could not be restored. Since there had been full performance of the original bargain by both sides, the court dismissed the murder indictment.
The imposition of a criminal penalty is a demanding duty which obligates the court to analyze all the relevant circumstances and impose a sentence which will best protect society, deter others, and punish or perhaps rehabilitate the offender. The State Trial Judge’s Book (2d ed. 1969) at 388. The public interest demands that in those instances where plea bargaining goes awry, any search for a remedy should be conducted without any notion of finding fault or seeking retribution. The remedy should no more be a retaliation against the state than it should be a reward for the defendant. Wynn v. State, 22 Md. App. 165, 322 A.2d 564 (1974). The key concern should be whether the defendant can be returned to the status quo he enjoyed prior to the time he changed his plea. An order calling for fulfillment of the prosecutorial promise should be given only if the defendant has made an affirmative showing that irremediable prejudice has arisen because of the state’s default. No such prejudice has been shown by either defendant. The not guilty verdicts returned on the larceny and sodomy charges are concrete evidence that the jury did indeed render fair and impartial verdicts on the four charges that were considered by them.
Since the choice of vacating the plea or directing performance rested in the sentencing justice’s sound discretion, I can find no abuse of that discretion. Once he heard of the prosecutorial “goof,” and read the relevant files, the duty he owed to society made itself felt. In my opinion *546his subsequent actions were not only very responsible but they were in keeping with the highest tradition of the bench.
As there is a divergence of opinion between my brother Doris and me as to defendants’ right to insist upon the implementation of the original plea negotiations, so, too, I must with all deference and respect disagree with the Chief Justice’s conclusion as to the applicability of the doctrine of double jeopardy and the thrust of our holding in State v. Welch, 112 R. I. 321, 309 A.2d 128 (1973). Admittedly, in Nardone v. Mullen, 113 R. I. 415, 322 A.2d 27 (1973), we said that jeopardy attaches upon the acceptance of a nolo plea because “* * * the entry of defendant’s plea of nolo was as much a conviction as would have been a jury’s verdict of guilty against him * * Id. at 418, 322 A.2d at 29. Later, in State v. Nardone, 114 R. I. 363, 334 A.2d 208 (1975), we noted that the rule enunciated in the first Nardone case did not preclude the vacating of a deferred sentence3 and the imposition of a more severe sentence where the original sentence had been procured by fraud, because a plea of double jeopardy could not be based upon a “void judgment.”
Last spring, the Supreme Court in United States v. Wilson, 420 U. S. 332, 95 S.Ct. 1013, 43 L.Ed.2d 232 (1975), once again recognized the threefold protection afforded by the fifth amendment safeguard against double *547jeopardy. This particular constitutional' mandate bars a second prosecution for the same offense after conviction, prohibits a second prosecution for the same offense after acquittal, and forbids multiple punishments for the same offense. The Court then went on to hold that where there is no threat of either multiple punishments or successive prosecutions, there is no violation of one’s right to be protected from double jeopardy. The Court has also recognized that the double jeopardy provision represents a “constitutional policy of finality” for the defendant’s benefit in criminal proceedings. United States v. Jorn, 400 U. S. 470, 91 S.Ct. 547, 27 L.Ed.2d 543 (1971).
Today most legal scholars take the view that double jeopardy acts as a bar to a completely new prosecution only if a final judgment has been entered in the original proceeding, State v. Sims, 65 N. J. 359, 322 A.2d 809 (1974), and we have expressed similar sentiments. State v. Beaulieu, 112 R. I. 724, 315 A.2d 434 (1974).
The rationale for the Nardone rule is that ordinarily once a guilty or nolo plea has been accepted, nothing remains but the imposition of punishment. Nardone v. Mullen, supra; 1 Wharton, Criminal Law & Procedure (Anderson ed. 1957) §138, Cum. Sup. (1975 ed.) at 73.
The rule adopted in Nardone presupposes that punishment will follow as a matter of course. However, no punishment was ever imposed by the sentencing judge during any time these cases were before him in February and March of 1973. We have in the past ruled that the imposition of sentences is in a manner of speaking the final and conclusive judgment of a court. State v. Garnetto, 75 R. I. 86, 63 A.2d 777 (1949); see also State v. Taylor, 108 R. I. 114, 272 A.2d 680 (1971). In State v. Nardone, supra, we said that a plea of double jeopardy could not rest on a judgment that was void because it was based on fraud. Consequently, in order to trigger the bar of *548double jeopardy, there must be some finality to the initial adjudication whereby an accused can properly maintain that the state is seeking to try or punish him again for a crime which has been the subject of a previous final disposition. Neither defendant can make such a claim.
Finally, I shall attempt to put Welch in what I believe is its true perspective. As I read Welch, it does not stand for the proposition that a judge is estopped from imposing a stiffer sentence once he vacates a sentence that he had previously imposed on a defendant such as Welch. Welch had entered his nolo plea because in good faith he had believed that the sentencing justice would abide by the prosecutor’s recommendation that Welch be given an 18-month sentence that would run concurrently with the one he was presently serving. The sentencing justice declined to accept the prosecutor’s recommendation and refused Welch’s request that the nolo plea be withdrawn and went on to impose a suspended sentence of 18 months. We ruled that in these circumstances Welch’s plea could not be considered as having been given voluntarily. We quashed the denial of the motion to vacate and remanded the case to the Superior Court for a vacating of the nolo plea, but at no point did we rule that if and when Welch was ever sentenced on that particular charge that the maximum sentence he could receive would be 18 months.
Santobello lays the groundwork for the procedures to be followed whenever the agreement has been dissolved. A defendant, if he wishes, can stand on his guilty plea and be sentenced by another judge or if the plea is vacated, he will plead anew to all of the original charges, including those the state had nol pressed. Santobello v. New York, supra, 404 U. S. at 263 n. 2, 92 S.Ct. at 499 n. 2, 40 L.Ed.2d at 433 n. 2. The Superior Court justice after vacating the original pleas did not reinstate the original robbery charge because he felt that since under Rhode *549Island law an indictment can only be amended with the consent of the accused, the larceny charge would have to remain.
In summary, then, I can perceive no constitutional basis for invalidating the jury verdicts entered against the defendants.

The Superior Court has not promulgated any rule that delineates a procedural pattern which would standardize plea bargaining in that court. The American Bar Association in its Minimum Standards for Criminal Justice Relating to Guilty Pleas §3.3 (1968) has concluded that the trial justice should not participate in such negotiations until a tentative agreement has been reached by counsel for both parties. At that time' the ABA standards would permit the trial justice to indicate if he will concur in the proposed disposition provided the presentence report is consistent with the representations made to him. In New Jersey, according to rules promulgated by the Supreme Court, the trial judge takes no part in the negotiations. The agreement is placed on the record in open court. If the proposed plea is accepted, the acceptance is tentative and conditional. If the trial judge feels that the proposed plea presented to him wiE not serve the ends of justice, the defendant may then and there withdraw his plea. 94 N.J.L.J. Index 1 (1971).

The New York court emphasized that any sentence promised at the time of the plea as a matter of law must be conditioned upon its being lawful and appropriate in the light of information contained in the presentence report. We, like New York, have a statute which requires that, in any case where there is a potential punishment of more than a year’s imprisonment, the sentencing judge be supplied with a presentence report before the sentence is imposed. General Laws 1956 (1969 Reenactment) §12-19-6. The report is to include such information' as may assist the court in fashioning an appropriate sentence. It is obvious from the record that once the sentencing judge had doubts as to the bargain that had been presented to him, any effort to prepare a presentence report went by the boards.

Nardone’s habeas corpus petition was based upon his contention that the imposition of the prison sentence violated the constitutional ban against double jeopardy. In both Nardone opinions we spoke of the trial justice’s right to vacate the deferred sentence and impose a second and more severe sentence. We were not as precise as we should have been. A deferred sentence cannot be vacated for the simple reason that, strictly spealdng, a deferred sentence is one that is not imposed unless and until the defendant has violated the terms of his probation agreement. State v. Robalewski, 96 R. I. 296, 191 A.2d 148 (1963). It might have been better if we had spoken in terms of the Superior Court’s ability to set aside the deferred sentence agreement.