Court Opinion

ID: 9637297
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 15:02:37.089262+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:09:55.211235
License: Public Domain

Henderson, J.,
filed the following dissenting opinion.
Under Rule 723, it is provided that if, at the time of arraignment, a defendant appears without counsel “the court shall advise him of his right to obtain counsel”, and that the record shall affirmatively show compliance. This Court now holds that the non-compliance in the instant case was reversible error, without consideration of the question whether the error was harmful or prejudicial, and without any showing that it was. The rule as to harmless error is well settled, and the cases illustrating it are legion, but see Weeks v. State, 126 Md. 223, 228; Smith v. State, 169 Md. 474, 477; *128La Guardia v. State, 190 Md. 450, 456; Lenoir v. State, 197 Md. 495, 503. Cf. Bruce v. State, 218 Md. 87.
The record seems to show affirmatively that the defendant had no meritorious defense to the charge of possession and control of heroin on November 8, 1957. The transcript contains the appellant’s application to this Court for leave to appeal in forma pauperis, in which he sets out at length the alleged errors relied on. In this document, he admits that he was arrested and searched by City police while driving his automobile; that the three police officers, whose names appeared on the back of the indictment of which he received a copy, testified against him before the trial magistrate on preliminary hearing; and that heroin was found in his automobile at the time of his arrest. His objections were to the legality of the arrest, and the lack of “proof that appellant had knowledge of the narcotic drugs being in his automobile.” He also complained that the maximum sentence of ten years was “grievous”. These objections are obviously without merit.
In the light of his admissions, it can hardly be maintained that counsel could have aided him in establishing his innocence. Perhaps in a complicated case, counsel might be of assistance in explaining the legal effect of an indictment. But in the instant case the clerk correctly summarized it by stating that he was charged with having in his possession, or under his control, a narcotic drug, heroin, on November 8, 1957; and that he was charged as a second offender, having been convicted of a violation of the narcotics laws in the District of Columbia and sentenced to from 20 months to 5 years. The date of the prior offense was correctly shown in the indictment as October 16, 1953, and the accused actually corrected the clerk’s mistake in reading the wrong date.
There is no reason to suppose that the accused was not fully aware of the nature of the charge, the possible consequences to him, or the character of the evidence that the State was prepared to produce. It seems clear to me that the guilty plea was voluntary and that the accused understood its effect. It may be inferred that he did not request or desire counsel, because he had no hope of successfully con*129testing the issue. At least there is no showing to the contrary. It has been held that a failure to advise an accused of his right to counsel, or to appoint counsel, is waived by a plea of guilty, at least in the absence of any circumstances tending to show that the plea was not entered intelligently and understandingly. In re Burson, 89 N. E. 2d 651 (Ohio), certiorari denied, 339 U. S. 969. See also the cases collected in notes, 146 A. L. R. 369, and 3 A. L. R. 2d 1003, 1061, 1073. In the instant case I think the plea of guilty, under the circumstances, was a sufficient election to proceed without counsel.
The provision of Rule 723 as to the “right to obtain counsel” seems to me to be rather ambiguous, if not misleading. To tell an accused that lawyers are allowed to represent persons charged with crime, in this day and age, would seem to be the statement of a mere truism, unless it were coupled with the further statement that, if he desired to employ counsel, the court would continue the case in order to afford further time in which to do so. If that is its purpose, the Rule does not spell it out. In the instant case it would seem that a continuance would have been useless, for in his application to this Court he states that he was “too poor to obtain a lawyer”, although he did not so inform the trial court. The statement seems to imply that he was well aware of his right to obtain counsel, lacking only the funds to do so.
If the Rule means no more than that the accused has a right to be heard by counsel employed by him, the fact that he had been prevented from obtaining counsel, through poverty or otherwise, would make superfluous any advice as to what his right might be if counsel were present, unless he had a further right to demand that counsel be appointed. But the next sentence of the Rule shows clearly that appointment is not required, even if he requests it, except in “capital cases or other serious cases”. Under the canon of construction, known as ejusdem generis, the word “other” would seem to connote a crime that might fairly be equated to a capital one. In a broad sense, of course, any crime carrying a penalty of incarceration might be described as serious to the accused.
I think the word “serious” must be construed in the light *130of its historical genesis. In Coates v. State, 180 Md. 502, the accused was young, ignorant and unfamiliar with court proceedings, and the sentences imposed totalled ninety years. The court pointed out that the accused “faced a possible total imprisonment for life”, and equated it to a capital offense. In Smith v. State, 180 Md. 529, decided the same day, a sentence of fifty years, imposed after a refusal to appoint counsel, was sustained as not a denial of due process, where there was no unfairness shown. These cases were followed by Betts v. Brady, 316 U. S. 455, decided by a divided court but not since overruled. Cf. Crooker v. California, 357 U. S. 433. It was there held that a refusal to appoint counsel in a trial for robbery, where the sentence was eight years and the possible maximum sentence ten years, was not a violation of due process in the absence of a showing that the defendant was “at a serious disadvantage through lack of counsel.” In Jewett v. State, 190 Md. 289, the real ground of reversal was that no transcript of the record was obtainable nor any adequate substitute therefor. The court’s observation that it is “wise practice” to appoint counsel “in any serious case”, throws no light upon the question as to what cases would be serious enough to require appointment, nor does it suggest that the mere failure to appoint counsel, or to ask whether the accused desired counsel, would be a denial of due process, apart from other circumstances. In Raymond v. State ex rel. Szydlouski, 192 Md. 602, the reversal was placed squarely upon a finding that the accused was incapable of representing himself without counsel, although the sentence was for only two years and six months. Ironically enough, on retrial the accused positively refused to be represented by counsel whom the trial court appointed. I gather from these cases that the potential length of sentence is not the controlling factor in determining whether due process is accorded. The question turns on the fairness' of the trial under the particular circumstances.
I cannot believe that this Court, in adopting Rule 723, or the Rules Committee in recommending it, had any intention of extending the privilege of appointment of counsel beyond what is required by due process. To extend the privilege to *131every case would intolerably impede the administration of justice, to no useful purpose. We cannot assume that the trial judges, who hear without juries over 90% of the criminal cases in Baltimore City, for example, are not deeply concerned with what is fair to the defendants, and the protection of their essential rights. They are also in the best position to decide when appointment of counsel is necessary or desirable to meet the ends of justice. If the criterion is to be “the nature of the offense and the possible penalty”, as stated in the opinion in the instant case, without regard to other circumstances, it may be observed that even a charge of common assault carries a potential penalty without limit either at common law or by statute. Heath v. State, 198 Md. 455, 467; Yantz v. Warden, 210 Md. 343, 351.
Nor do I believe that this Court, or the Rules Committee, intended that any violation of the letter of Rule 723, without any showing of prejudice, should call for automatic reversal. The Rule does not so state, and I think the gloss now put upon it should be reconsidered by the Committee, and the Rule revised and clarified. Indeed, the holding imports that failure to comply is not merely a procedural defect, but jurisdictional.
If that be so, then it would seem to follow, despite the Court’s disavowal, that the defect might be attacked not only on direct appeal, but on application for a writ of habeas corpus. To construe the Rule in terms of the absolute seems to me, in Justice Cardozo’s phrase, to “stick in the bark of a harsh and narrow verbalism”.