Court Opinion

ID: 9627194
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 08:38:13.861359+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:06:42.670245
License: Public Domain

WINTERSHEIMER, Justice,
dissenting.
I must respectfully dissent from the majority opinion because there were no reasonable grounds for the trial judge to conduct a competency hearing. Neither KRS 504.100 nor RCr 8.06 requires a competency hearing when no reasonable grounds exist to conduct one. See Conley v. Commonwealth, Ky.,App., 569 S.W.2d 682 (1978).
Mills v. Commonwealth, Ky., 996 S.W.2d 473 (1999), a capital murder case which involved a waiver of a competency hearing, set out a rational standard of review regarding the failure of a trial judge to conduct an evidentiary hearing with respect to competency to stand trial. Mills, supra, stated that the accused failed to establish any factual basis which should have caused the trial judge to experience reasonable doubt as to Mills’ competency to stand trial. Here, Thompson provides no reason why he should be afforded a competency hearing.
In this case, defense counsel advised the trial judge of their concern about competency, but such concerns were alleviated prior to the entry of a guilty plea. The trial judge granted the motion for the allocation of funds for psychiatrists as well as the motion for a competency evaluation. This procedure was conducted by the KCPC. The report of the psychiatrist and her testimony at the sentencing phase stated that her evaluation indicated that Thompson was competent to stand trial. Defense counsel indicated they were satisfied with the results of the report and that they were no longer concerned about com*411petency. Further, they indicated that after repeated contact with Thompson, they were satisfied that he was able to rationally participate in his own defense. Competency to plead guilty and competency to stand trial are subject to the same strict standard and there is no higher standard for competency to plead guilty. Cf. Littlefield v. Commonwealth, Ky.App., 554 S.W.2d 872 (1977).
A trial judge is required to hold a competency hearing only when the presumption of competency has disappeared. Cf. Gabbard v. Commonwealth, Ky., 887 S.W.2d 547 (1994). This issue was unpre-served but there was no due process violation as a result of the failure to hold a competency hearing prior to the entry of a guilty plea.
This is a clear case of appellate counsel desiring to change the actual facts of the trial. The appellate brief indicates that trial counsel agreed that Thompson was competent, but then it states that there were still reasonable grounds to question his competency.
Interpreting KRS 504.040 which was the predecessor to the current statute, Clark v. Commonwealth, Ky., 591 S.W.2d 365 (1979), held that the failure to hold a competency hearing was harmless or nonprejudicial error. There are of course some differences. Clark, supra, was not a death penalty case, and Mills, supra, involved a waiver of a competency hearing. Drope v. Missouri, 420 U.S. 162, 95 S.Ct. 896, 43 L.Ed.2d 103 (1975), holds that federal due process requires an evidentiary hearing whenever there is sufficient doubt of competency as to require further inquiry on the question. The decision about sufficient doubt and reasonable doubt are properly left with the trial judge who has the opportunity to observe the entire situation. Here, in an abundance of caution the trial judge appointed a psychiatrist who made a report indicating that the defendant was competent to stand trial. Clearly, a hearing would have only been a vain act and the admission by counsel that Thompson was competent is tantamount to a formal waiver.- Even in a death penalty case, a vain act is not required.
In addition, it should be noted that Mills, concludes that it was harmless error for the trial judge to allow the defendant to waive the mandatory competency hearing set out in KRS 504.100(3). In that case, the report concluded that the accused was competent to stand trial, but on appeal, Mills relied on his own psychiatric report to show that he was incompetent. There was nothing else in the record that should have caused the trial judge to question his competency. It would appear that the decision rendered today is contradictory to the reasoning of Mills.
The psychiatrist who conducted the competency evaluation testified at the sentencing phase of this trial and was subject to cross-examination. The words “reasonable” in the statute must have some meaning. In this case, there was no reasonable expectation that Thompson was not competent based on the facts and evidence available to the trial court.
Occasionally lawyers and judges become so involved with the words of a statute that they are overwhelmed by them and become entangled in them. Here, the language of the statute should be afforded the clear meaning that it expresses and consequently, undue interpretation is not necessary. KRS 446.080.
A simple diagram will show that reasonable modifies the subject of the paragraph and controls its meaning. The result is that the mandatory hearing required by the statute arises only when the other conditions are satisfied. The initial requirement is that reasonable grounds must *412be first established. There is no reason to abandon the learned language of the statute to reach an artificial result in this case.