Court Opinion

ID: 9522008
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 02:16:47.154015+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:02:12.259088
License: Public Domain

Robinson, J.,
¶ 19. dissenting. I don’t doubt that petitioner faces a steep uphill battle in showing the necessary causal relationship between the convictions he challenges and his hold-without-bail status, but I believe the court’s dismissal of his case on the pleadings, and prior to referral to counsel, was premature. For that reason, I respectfully dissent.
¶ 20. I agree with the majority that the central question in this case will be whether defendant can demonstrate that his detention without bail pending retrial on the aggravated assault charge was “a direct result of the challenged Vermont conviction[s].” In re Stewart, 140 Vt. 351, 359-60, 438 A.2d 1106, 1109 (1981). Ante, ¶ 14.
¶ 21. And I agree that establishing the necessary causal connection in a case like this is especially challenging. This is not a case in which a petitioner was automatically subject to a sentence enhancement or the loss of an important legal right on the basis *602of a statute, rule, or other legal authority; here, the necessary cause-effect relationship between the challenged convictions and the restraint of liberty supporting the post-conviction relief petition is a matter of evidence and judgment.
¶ 22. Moreover, petitioner will likely be limited to the established record in trying to prove the impact of his challenged convictions on his pretrial detention. He cannot, after all, depose the trial court judge who conducted the bail hearing, or the judge who conducted the de novo bail review hearing, to determine the significance of the prior convictions in either judge’s decision-making. Judges cannot be compelled to testify about the mental processes used to formulate judgments. See United States v. Morgan, 313 U.S. 409, 422 (1941) (deposition of judge regarding process by which judge reached order “would be destructive of judicial responsibility”).
¶ 23. Finally, a judge’s decision to hold an accused without bail is generally based on multiple factors, such that establishing the impact of a particular factor may require inappropriate speculation. See, e.g., Sinclair v. Blackburn, 599 F.2d 673, 676 (5th Cir. 1979). Ante, ¶¶ 15, 17.
¶ 24. I nonetheless would hold that dismissal of petitioner’s complaint at the very threshold of litigation was premature. I reach this conclusion for several reasons. First, our general practice is to “regard as true the complaint’s well-pleaded factual allegations when reviewing an order on a motion under V.R.C.P. 12(b)(6).” Wentworth v. Crawford & Co., 174 Vt. 118, 121, 807 A.2d 351, 353 (2002). In this case, petitioner specifically alleged that the violation of probation charges that are the subject of his complaint for post-conviction relief “have been used to hold [him] w/out bail.” We have recognized that “when the complaint relies upon a document[, that] document merges into the pleadings and the court may properly consider it under a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss.” Kaplan v. Morgan Stanley & Co., 2009 VT 78, ¶ 10 n.4, 186 Vt. 605, 987 A.2d 258 (mem.) (quotation and alteration omitted). In reliance on this principle, the majority referenced “the hold-without-bail order.” Ante, ¶ 16 n.4. It is not clear which order the majority relies on — the initial order or the order upon de novo appeal. In either event, the transcripts and written decisions from bail review hearings were not expressly mentioned in nor attached to petitioner’s PCR complaint. Although I understand the majority’s chain of reasoning — petitioner’s causation *603claim has to be supported by the trial court’s ruling on bail, and that ruling is a matter of record — I believe the review of the record undertaken by the majority in the context of this motion to dismiss stretches the principle we affirmed in Kaplan to a new frontier.
¶ 25. Second, the standard applied by the majority affirms that it is reviewing petitioner’s complaint as if the court were reviewing a motion for summary judgment. Rather than considering whether petitioner’s allegations support a claim, the majority concludes that petitioner “has failed to demonstrate that his current incarceration is sufficiently related to the convictions he seeks to attack.” Ante, ¶ 14. The record available for review — consisting of transcripts of two bail hearings and a written decision from a bail review hearing — may well include all of the evidence on the dispositive issue of causation that could properly be considered on a motion for summary judgment. However, I do not feel confident that we can know that. The trial court’s decision focused on a different issue, and petitioner has not been given the opportunity to present evidence in the context of a motion for summary judgment.
¶26. Third, for the purpose of this appeal, the State has conceded that the challenged convictions were a factor in the trial court’s bail determination. Although the Court is not bound by a party’s concession, at this juncture in the litigation it seems odd to disregard a concession in favor of our own read of the evidence — or what we believe to be the evidence.
¶ 27. Fourth, to the extent we do consider the transcripts of prior bail review hearings — an approach that apparently differs from the trial court’s — those transcripts provide some support for petitioner’s claim, albeit weak. After petitioner’s aggravated-assault conviction was vacated, the trial court held a bail review hearing to consider whether petitioner should be held without bail pending retrial on that charge. The trial court treated the hearing as one for review of bail on the ground that petitioner previously had been held without bail in 2002 following the aggravated-assault and other charges but before his convictions.
¶ 28. The trial court concluded that evidence of guilt was great, and turned its attention to the question of whether petitioner’s release pending hearing would pose “a substantial threat of physical violence to any person” that reasonably could be prevented through conditions of release. 13 V.S.A. § 7553a. The court *604noted petitioner’s ongoing obsession with the way that his property was taken from him by the mortgage-holder. Then the court explained:
I am concerned about the failure to abide by the court’s conditions in the past. This incident occurred while there was a specific condition not to have contact nor harass Mr. Mackay and a trespass order had been issued against Mr. Russo for preventing this same thing and this really serious charge, event, incident happened while both of those or all of those orders were in place. There was also an order not to use alcohol and one of the convictions here was a DWI, so clearly when it comes to Mr. Mackay there’s difficulty with abiding by court orders that are meant to protect him.
On appeal, the State presented evidence of petitioner’s convictions for violating various conditions, and the court specifically identified his criminal record — presumably including the convictions at issue here — as a factor supporting its hold-without-bail order.
¶29. I do not mean to suggest that on the basis of the above evidence petitioner could establish the requisite causal connection between the convictions he is challenging and his confinement without bail, or even that his claims' could survive summary judgment. The trial court did not purport to rely on petitioner’s VOP and other convictions in holding him, but, rather, relied in part on the underlying alleged conduct that gave rise to those convictions. On appeal and de novo hearing, the court pointed generally to petitioner’s criminal record, but did not single out the charges at issue in this case — which comprised part only of the overall criminal record. Again, petitioner faces long odds. But this is a motion to dismiss, and petitioner has not had the opportunity to present other evidence to provide context for understanding the court’s ruling.
¶ 30. Finally, I note that the trial court did not refer petitioner’s case for consideration of appointment of counsel before dismissing the case despite petitioner’s request for appointed counsel and his filing of the requisite application for appointment of counsel. Petitioner’s right to counsel in connection with the charges that form the basis for the PCR complaint extends to “any . . . postconviction proceeding which may have more than a minimal effect on the length or conditions of detention where the attorney *605considers the claims, defenses, and other legal contentions to be warranted by existing law or by a nonfrivolous argument for the extension, modification, or reversal of existing law or the establishment of new law.” 13 V.S.A. § 5233(a)(3). In this case, the trial court never referred the case to the Defender General for a determination of whether counsel believed his claims to be frivolous. See In re Morse, 138 Vt. 327, 330, 415 A.2d 232, 233 (1980) (failing to appoint counsel before making any rulings on a PCR motion can be reversible error). Before closing the door to the possibility of post-conviction relief for petitioner, I believe we ought to allow for the possibility that petitioner may qualify for counsel and that counsel may present evidence or may identify and brief the issues more persuasively.
¶ 31. For these reasons, I respectfully dissent. I am authorized to state that Justice Dooley joins this dissent.