Court Opinion

ID: 9584669
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:51:29.706987+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:13:09.092269
License: Public Domain

NEUMAN, Justice
(dissenting).
“There are some cases that in fairness are best resolved by a jury.” With these words, the district court summed up the failed attempt to get Mary Hager to plead guilty to reduced charges at the pretrial conference held on Thursday preceding her Monday trial. Now convicted of terrorism and going armed with intent, Hag-er blames the court and her lawyer for preventing her from tendering a favorable — but belated — guilty plea on the morning of trial. It’s an interesting tactic, but one we should not reward. I therefore respectfully dissent.
My quarrel with the majority’s reasoning is two-fold. First it utterly disregards the State’s principal argument supporting the district court’s decision — that there was, in fact, no plea agreement reached on the morning of trial. Even assuming ar-guendo the court had a fixed and unwavering policy that permitted no accommodation for “good cause,” no reversal based on abuse of discretion would be warranted. It is evident from the record that defense *838counsel was still cajoling Hager — unsuccessfully — on the morning of trial. No agreement was reduced to writing. Although Hager rests her due process argument on the fact that rule 9 requires “the disclosure of the agreement in open court,” the rule’s requirement presupposes that an agreement has been reached. See Iowa R. Crim. P.' 9(2). But beyond a vague reference to “reduced charges,” nothing before us reveals a firm charging concession by the State or, more importantly, a willingness by Hager to tender a guilty plea.
Second, the majority has joined the distinctly minority view concerning modern court administration. Those courts that recognize the value of plea deadlines as part of sound trial management protect against arbitrary rejection of belated pleas by tempering deadlines with exceptions to permit relief from the rule for good cause. Those same courts recognize, however, that good cause implicates “more than a mere change of mind or a renegotiation by the parties.” State v. Jasper, 17 P.3d 807, 814 (Colo. 2001). By rejecting that sound caveat here, the majority permits a defendant’s indecision to trump not only trial court discretion but sound administrative policy as well.
Despite my misgivings about the factual and legal bases for the majority’s decision, I am perhaps most puzzled by the prospect of what will happen on remand. What plea is there for the court to entertain? No doubt Hager, having once been convicted, will now be much more amenable to plea negotiations. But, despite the majority’s protestations to the contrary, that sounds to me more like manipulation than justice.
TERNUS, J., joins this dissent.