Court Opinion

ID: 9646431
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 12:59:58.737397+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:38.083336
License: Public Domain

FERREN, Associate Judge,
dissenting;
In Durham v. United States, 401 U.S. 481, 91 S.Ct. 858, 28 L.Ed.2d 200 (1971), the *38Supreme Court held that petitioner’s death while his request for certiorari was pending required abatement of “all proceedings had in the prosecution from its inception.” Id. at 488, 91 S.Ct. at 860. Durham adopted the virtually unanimous view of the lower federal courts. See, e. g., Crooker v. United States, 325 F.2d 318 (9th Cir. 1963), and the cases cited therein. However, in Dove v. United States, 423 U.S. 325, 96 S.Ct. 579, 46 L.Ed.2d 531 (1976), which also concerns a petitioner’s death while the question of cer-tiorari was pending, the Court dismissed the petition and held, without further discussion: “To the extent that Durham v. United States, 401 U.S. 481, 91 S.Ct. 858, 28 L.Ed.2d 200 (1971), may be inconsistent with this ruling, Durham is overruled.”
In Dove, supra, at the time the Supreme Court dismissed the petition for certiorari, the appellant had exhausted all appeals of right. Thus, it is understandable why the Court decided no longer to follow, Durham, supra. In the present case, however, as in United States v. Bechtel, 547 F.2d 1379 (9th Cir. 1977), we are asked, on account of appellant’s death, to reverse the conviction and dismiss the indictment before a direct appeal, timely filed, has been resolved. I consider it basically unfair not to grant counsel’s motion. There may be collateral consequences that will be visited upon appellant’s family from his criminal conviction — we do not know. Accordingly, our refusal to grant the motion in circumstances when an appellant, now deceased, has not had an opportunity to exercise his right of appeal may work a serious injustice. This may be all the more true in future cases when the majority view here is applied.*
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in-Bechtel, supra, does not read Dove in a way that would require denial of the motion here. Nor do I. Although, as the majority opinion in the present case points out, the Supreme Court did decline “to distinguish direct appeals from certiorari petitions for the purpose of determining mootness in Durham,” it declined to do so for the purpose of extending the lower court dismissal-of-iridictment practice from direct appeals to certiorari petitions. It does not necessarily follow that the Supreme Court in its cryptic disposition of Dove has overruled Durham not only as applied to death during pendency of a certiorari petition but also with respect to direct appeals — a question not presented. Until the Supreme Court does so, I join the Bechtel court in believing that under the circumstances presented here the appeal should be dismissed and the case remanded to the Superior Court with directions to dismiss the indictment.

 The many questions about collateral consequences raised by the majority opinion reinforce my view that it is not appropriate to move beyond clear Supreme Court authority on this issue.