Court Opinion

ID: 9465738
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 00:54:18.660019+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:39:20.548436
License: Public Domain

ALVIN B. RUBIN, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
If I thought our efforts to decide this case were appropriate, I would adhere to Judge Godbold’s splendid opinion. However, with all deference for the views of my twelve brethren who array themselves for or against the majority opinion, I would instead vacate the order granting rehearing en banc on the basis that the issues in the case do not warrant review by the entire court. See Judge Godbold’s opinion, footnote 23. Compare the statement in the majority opinion at page 518, (“the outcome of Nash’s habeas petition turns on a factual analysis of his interview with Files”).
F.R.A.P. 35(a) permits en banc review for cases of “exceptional importance.” Our manual, Internal Operating Procedures, Part V.C.5.a. states, “A petition for rehearing en banc is an extraordinary procedure which is intended to bring to the attention of the entire court a precedent-setting error of exceptional public importance or an opinion which directly conflicts with prior Supreme Court or Fifth Circuit precedent. Alleged errors in the determination of state law, or in the facts of the case (including sufficiency of the evidence), or error asserted in the misapplication of correct precedent to the facts of the case, are matters for panel rehearing but not for rehearing en banc.” (Emphasis in original). The eleven typewritten pages of the majority opinion and the thirty pages of partial dissent do not deal with such issues. Whether or not we were in error in voting to hear the case en banc, we should not persist in this exercise, but should merely vacate the en banc order as improvidently entered.
All of us agree on application of the per se rule; we differ only on whether it was triggered here, and, even if not, whether Nash’s waiver of counsel was “voluntary” as required by Miranda. The two opinions consist largely of variant interpretations placed on a conversation the words of which are recorded for all to read.
We can review en banc only about 1% of the 2200 decisions this court makes a year. Even to do this, we must devote to it an inordinate proportion of the total time we have for court sittings. Soon, with eleven more circuit judges, we will be rendering 3500 opinions annually. We ought to mobilize our en banc forces only to meet urgent legal necessity, not to belabor facts or to correct putatively errant panels. The light we shed here is not worth the thirteen-judge candle.