Court Opinion

ID: 9746356
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-27 14:13:12.360719+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:25:12.470339
License: Public Domain

RODOWSKY, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent because I am in substantial agreement with the analysis presented by Judge Wilner for the Court of Special Appeals in Anderson v. Department of Health & Mental Hygiene, 64 Md.App. 674, 498 A.2d 679 (1985).
The majority of this Court believes that Anderson’s confinement implicates ex post facto prohibitions based on “the nature of that confinement under Maryland law, and particularly the fact that it represents the disposition portion of an adverse judgment in a criminal case____” For the latter proposition, Langworthy v. State, 284 Md. 588, 399 A.2d 578 (1979) is cited. The majority relies on that portion of Langworthy which discussed whether an appeal would lie to review the verdict of guilty of the crime charged where the trier of fact had also found the accused to have been insane. The concern was whether there was a final judgment. In that context this Court said:
Despite the lack of a “sentence” in the context of punishment inflicted, the determination of the trial court as to the disposition of the defendant is as final a judgment following the conviction as if a sentence inflicting punishment had been imposed. The general rule that pronouncement of sentence or the suspension of its imposition is required to comprise an appealable judgment in a criminal cause does not apply because punishment is legislatively prohibited and supplanted by the statutory alternatives applicable upon the successful interposition of the defense of insanity. In circumstances such as here exist, the defendant may appeal from the judgment, composed of the verdict that he committed the criminal act charged and the disposition of him, as a final judgment in *232the contemplation of the statutory authority for direct appeal. [Id. at 597, 399 A.2d at 583.]
This is simply a nuts-and-bolts, technical discussion of a jurisdictional-procedural issue, and not a characterization of the confinement.
More appropriate, in my view, to the nature of Anderson’s confinement is the characterization found in that portion of Langworthy in which this Court rejects the notion that the verdict of insane meant that Langworthy was attempting, in effect, to appeal from an acquittal. We said:
In short, the clear legislative intent regarding the successful interposition of a plea of insanity is not that an accused is to be found not guilty of the criminal act it was proved he committed, but that he shall not be punished therefor. Rather than be punished, he may go free or, under prescribed circumstances, be provided treatment for his mental disorder. [Id. at 598, 399 A.2d at 584 (emphasis added).]
The difference under the present statute from that involved in Langworthy is that under new § 12-lll(a) “after a verdict of not criminally responsible, the court immediately shall commit the defendant to the Department for institutional, inpatient care or treatment.” An administrative hearing must be held within fifty days after that commitment for the purpose of making recommendations to the court concerning eligibility for release. See Md.Code (1982, 1986 Cum.Supp.), § 12-114(a) of the Health-General Article. Whether we deal with a commitment for evaluation under the old statute or a commitment for a maximum of fifty days before an administrative hearing under the new statute, the disposition of the criminal case is “treatment for [the defendant’s] mental disorder.” Langworthy, supra, 284 Md. at 598, 399 A.2d at 584. In my opinion, the prohibitions against ex post facto laws are not implicated.
MURPHY, C.J., has authorized me to say that he joins in this dissenting opinion.