Court Opinion

ID: 9573992
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:01:13.023611+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:43:53.561316
License: Public Domain

ZIMMERMAN, Justice
(concurring in the result):
I join the majority’s analysis of the deficiencies of trial counsel’s representation of appellant on his initial appeal. For that reason, I conclude that this case presents the “unusual circumstances” necessary to permit the raising of the effective-assistance-of-counsel claim by way of collateral attack. Fernandez v. Cook, 783 P.2d 547, 549-50 (Utah 1989); Hurst v. Cook, 777 P.2d 1029, 1085 (Utah 1989) (collecting cases on “unusual circumstances”).
However, just as I did not join in the Hurst opinion, I cannot join the present opinion of Justice Stewart, speaking for himself and Justice Durham. It tracks the dictum in Justice Stewart’s opinion in Hurst, dictum which can be read to suggest that the requirement of unusual circumstances is relatively meaningless and that we readily permit the raising of new issues on collateral attack. There are certainly a number of instances where we have found unusual circumstances to exist, but there are a great number more where we have not. Counsel should not be lulled by the seeming liberality of the language used by the majority into thinking that we casually entertain collateral attacks. We do not.
I likewise cannot agree with the majority’s apparent effort to distinguish Andrews v. Shulsen, 773 P.2d 832 (Utah 1988), an effort that can only reinforce the misim-pression created by the dictum on unusual circumstances. The majority seems to be restricting to cases arising in a very specific procedural context the requirement discussed in Andrews that before a petitioner is entitled to have a court address claims raised on collateral attack that could or should have been raised earlier, the petitioner must show “good cause” why those claims were not raised earlier.
It is true that Andrews arose in a procedural posture different than the present case. However, that is not dispositive for me. The issue in Andrews was the same as the issue in Fernandez and in the present case: Has the petitioner demonstrated that there was a sufficiently good reason why the issues raised had not been presented earlier? In all three cases, an attempt at that showing was made. And in answering that question, it is not important whether it is labeled “good cause” under rule 65B(i)(4) of the Utah Rules of Civil Procedure or “unusual circumstances” under our habeas corpus case law. In my view, the standard is operatively the same, regardless of the rubric used. By attempting to distinguish Andrews as it has and minimize the good cause requirement, the majority can only further delude the bar about the nature of the threshold showing necessary before the merits of a claim will be addressed on collateral attack.
One final point. I heartily join in that portion of the majority opinion applauding the efforts of counsel we appointed to represent appellant. Their pro bono efforts are but one example of a fine tradition in the legal profession that too seldom receives the recognition it deserves.
*880HALL, C.J., concurs in the concurring opinion of ZIMMERMAN, J.
HOWE, Associate Chief Justice, concurs in the result.