Court Opinion

ID: 9677280
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 05:48:15.549885+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:54.948965
License: Public Domain

Concurring Opinion by
Justice SCOTT.
I concur fully with the majority’s determination that indigent defendants are entitled to an independent expert for a competency examination upon a showing of necessity and unavailabihty/impracticality of alternate state services. Here, for want of a record from which to make these determinations, we have accepted the findings of the court’s order that a reasonable necessity has been shown and that no available or practicable facilities existed. However, in most instances this will not be the case as state facilities will be available, or will have already been used. Despite the absence of record from the ex parte hearing in this instance, it is clear that the trial court had significant reservations about Deanna’s competency. Thus, the court appropriately exercised its discretion and permitted an additional independent examination.
I write separately for reasons that I believe, for the benefit of the Commonwealth’s trial courts, some parameters should be established 1) concerning the extent of a trial judge’s discretion in allowing indigent criminal defendants access to public funds in acquiring non-state expert witness competency evaluations; and 2) to define what constitutes a reasonable showing of necessity. It is those circumstances I wish to address further.
As this Court has oft noted, while a criminal defendant is not entitled to state funds merely to conduct merit less fishing expeditions, see, e.g., Bowling v. Commonwealth, 964 S.W.2d 803, 804 (Ky.1998), we should, likewise, not be so tight-fisted in our funding as to permit injustice where it is preventable. Trial courts are empowered by virtue of KRS 504.100(1) to order, at any stage of a trial’s proceedings, a competency examination if “the court has reasonable grounds to believe that the defendant is incompetent to stand trial.” (em*866phasis added). This is not to say, however, that a trial judge’s discretion should be unfettered. Indeed, trial courts are the gatekeepers of evidence and must exercise caution in the determination as to whether an additional or independent evaluation should occur.
In addition to the procedural preconditions of unavailability/impracticality of state facilities, which we have previously noted, the defendant must, upon his request, demonstrate that obtaining an independent expert is reasonably necessary, Crawford v. Commonwealth, 824 S.W.2d 847, 850 (Ky.1992) (citing Young v. Commonwealth, 585 S.W.2d 878 (Ky.1979)). However, I would extend this reasonably necessary requirement further in an attempt to clarify these admittedly murky waters. I believe that in order for a trial judge to invoke his or her authority under KRS 504.100(1) and order an additional or independent competency examination, the defendant’s competency must still be legitimately in question,1 see Ake v. Oklahoma, 470 U.S. 68, 74, 105 S.Ct. 1087, 84 L.Ed.2d 53 (1985), and it appears reasonably likely that only an additional or independent evaluation will lead the court to a firm conclusion as to the defendant’s fitness to stand trial. KRS 504.060(4); see Bishop v. Caudill, 118 S.W.3d 159, 163 (Ky.2003).
In sum, a trial court may allow or order an additional state or independent evaluation for purposes of determining competency if it still has reasonable concerns about a criminal defendant’s competency. KRS 504.100. However, for these reasonable concerns to be justifiable and for a defendant to obtain an independent competency evaluation, he must demonstrate reasonable grounds by showing that state facilities are unavailable or impractical, KRS 31.185(1), and that an independent evaluation is reasonably necessary, KRS 31.110. In order to be reasonably necessary, there must be a reasonable likelihood that the defendant’s competency is still legitimately in question following the state’s report and a reasonable likelihood that the additional independent evaluation would assist the court in reaching a firm conclusion as to the defendant’s competency-
With this framework in place, I believe trial judges would have a more reasonable analytical path upon which to exercise their discretion.
ABRAMSON, J., joins this opinion.

. As was the circumstance here, where the defendant was, at best, marginally competent.