Court Opinion

ID: 9734620
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 17:39:44.452769+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:49.524394
License: Public Domain

Ryan, J.
(concurring in part, dissenting in part). I agree with by brother Williams that in Kille-brew the defendant’s conviction must be reversed because of the inappropriate involvement of the trial court in the plea-bargaining process. I share my brother’s concerns about judicial involvement in the business of sentence bargaining and subscribe fully to his disapproval of the practice.
I dissent in Briggs, however, from my brother’s new policy conferring upon defendants the right to *214withdraw a guilty plea when the mere recommendation of the prosecutor concerning a sentence is not adopted by the trial court.
I do not agree that we ought to adopt a policy which affords a defendant the right to withdraw an otherwise valid guilty plea simply because his hope that the court would accept the prosecutor’s sentence recommendation is not realized.
This new policy introduces into our jurisprudence for the first time, and insofar as I can determine the first time anywhere, the proposition that a valid guilty plea may be withdrawn as of right despite the fact that no promise has been made to the defendant as to the sentence which will be imposed, and the only promise made — that a recommendation will be made — is kept.
The essence of the Court’s reasoning seems to be that the trial court’s advice to the accused, that the court is not bound by the prosecuting attorney’s sentence recommendation, is essentially meaningless. The Court claims that such advice is often viewed as mere "ceremonial incantation”. If that is true, then it is likewise true of all of the advice to an accused required to be given under GCR 1963, 785.7, and we are duty-bound to scrap the rule.
Instead, however, by virtue of today’s holding, we are requiring that GCR 1963, 785.7 be once again amended and necessarily lengthened. It will now become necessary for the trial judge to explain to an accused the difference between a "sentence bargain” and a "sentence recommendation” and then ascertain that the accused understands the difference. It will be further necessary to determine whether, understanding the difference, the accused wishes to waive his "right” to withdraw his otherwise valid guilty plea. It takes little pres*215cience to foresee the imaginative new grounds for appeals of guilty pleas which this aspect of today’s decision will generate for presentation to our appellate courts. First among them, I suspect, will be the claim that other statements of caution, and warning, and advice by the court to the accused, made pursuant to GCR 1963, 785.7, are mere "ceremonial incantations” which are not taken seriously by anyone, including the Supreme Court.
I would continue to treat a prosecutor’s sentence recommendation as what it is: a recommendation, and forbear writing into our jurisprudence confirmation of the belief widely held by defendants in criminal cases that, in the sentence bargaining scenario, the trial judge and the prosecutor are essentially on the same "team” and that the warnings and assurances of the trial judge are to be regarded as no more credible or binding than those of the prosecutor.
I would therefore reverse in both Killebrew and Briggs. In view of the majority decision to the contrary, I would apply the rules announced in these cases to these defendants and to cases in which pleas of guilty are accepted after the release of this opinion.
Fitzgerald, C.J., concurred with Ryan, J.
Riley, J., took no part in the decision of this case.
Order
On order of the Court, the motion for clarification of this Court’s opinion in this matter and the petition by the Michigan Judges Association for leave to intervene as a party plaintiff for the *216purpose of seeking rehearing or for leave to file a brief amicus curiae are considered. On further consideration we have determined that the rules announced in People v Killebrew and People v Briggs are to be applied only to those two cases and to cases in which guilty pleas have been accepted after the January 11, 1983 release of the opinion in People v Killebrew and People v Briggs. In all other respects the motions are denied.
Ryan, J., states as follows:
I continue to adhere to my dissent in this matter with the exception of my statement that the rules announced in these cases should be applied to these two defendants and to cases in which pleas of guilty are accepted after the release of this opinion because the Court now subscribes to that view.
Cavanagh, J., not participating in People v Killebrew.