Court Opinion

ID: 9646142
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 12:50:21.830742+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:05:29.578225
License: Public Domain

Dissenting Opinion by
BARBERA, J.
I respectfully dissent.
In my view, the suppression court correctly rejected appellant’s argument that statements he made as part of a negotiated plea agreement—which the State repudiated only after appellant breached the agreement—were the product of an inducement and, so, inadmissible at his trial. Contrary to the view of the majority, I do not believe that the Court of Appeals’ decision in Allgood v. State, 309 Md. 58, 522 A.2d 917 (1987), dictates a contrary result.
As the majority points out, appellant bargained with the Assistant State’s Attorney that, in return for the State’s nolle pros of all charges against him arising out of the burglary investigation, he would, inter alia, “fully and truthfully disclose to the State any and all knowledge and information he may have concerning the investigation.” Appellant further agreed that, if at any time he knowingly withheld evidence from the State or was not “completely truthful with the State in his testimony before the grand jurors or at trials,” then the State would be free to “use against him in all prosecutions the information and documents that he has disclosed to the State during the course of his cooperation.” Appellant and the Assistant State’s Attorney signed the memorandum of agreement reflecting this quid pro quo.
Appellant reneged on his part of the bargain by giving the police incomplete information about his knowledge of the burglary, causing the State to rescind the agreement. The State duly offered the statements against appellant in its case in chief, and it is of course the correctness of the court’s allowing this evidence that is before us now.1
*480I agree with the majority that the outcome of this case turns on two decisions of the Court of Appeals: Allgood, and an earlier decision upon which Allgood is largely premised, Wright v. State, 307 Md. 552, 515 A.2d 1157 (1986). The Court of Appeals made quite clear in Wright that the inducement cases, Nicholson v. State, 38 Md. 140 (1873); Hillard v. State, 286 Md. 145, 406 A.2d 415 (1979); Stokes v. State, 289 Md. 155, 423 A.2d 552 (1980); and their progeny, had no application to statements properly “induced” as part of a plea agreement:
Under the principle applied in the above cases, if the police or the Assistant State’s Attorney had simply told Coley that a confession and guilty plea to second degree murder would result in his not being prosecuted for first degree murder, and if Coley had confessed because of that inducement, his confession would be deemed involuntary and inadmissible at his trial.
307 Md. at 583, 515 A.2d 1157. The Court emphasized that Coley’s case involved “something quite different” and “significantly distinguishable” from that involved in Nicholson, Hil-lard, and Stokes. Id. The Court said: “Here, the inducement by the State took the form of promises under a negotiated plea bargain agreement, made in exchange for Coley’s promises under that agreement.” Id. Moreover, “[t]he mutual promises were specifically authorized by Rule 4-243.” Id. at 583, 585, 515 A.2d 1157. And, “the agreement specified that if Coley reneged, his inculpatory statements could be used against him at trial.” Id. at 585, 515 A.2d 1157. Finally, the Court noted, “[t]he State neither rescinded nor breached the agreement.” Id.
*481The Court added that it would be “anomalous” “to hold that the State’s actions were ‘improper’ when they are expressly authorized by law (i.e., Rule 4-243) and when the State neither rescinds nor breaches the plea bargain agreement.” Id. The Court went on to say: “Obviously, the rule does not contemplate that the defendant’s promises be deemed per se involuntary, under Hillard and other cases, on the ground that they were induced by the State’s promises.” Id.
The Court rejected Coley’s argument that Hillard should be extended, on “policy” grounds, to the present situation in order to encourage plea bargaining. Id. at 586, 515 A.2d 1157. The Court concluded:
In the situation now before us, we do not believe that it would foster the policy favoring plea bargain agreements to hold Coley’s statements inadmissible. On the contrary, it would likely have the opposite result, encouraging defendants to rescind consummated plea bargain agreements without justification. Consequently, we decline to extend Hillard to the case now before us.
Id. at 587, 515 A.2d 1157.
It was to the rationale and holding of W'right that the Court looked in deciding Allgood the following year. The proposed plea agreement (it was never executed) called for Allgood, a Navy seaman, to testify before the grand jury and at trial and to disclose to the State the truth about the murder with which he was charged. In exchange, the State promised to accept a guilty plea to manslaughter and a suspended sentence and probation. Allgood gave a statement to the prosecutor, but even before Allgood was taken before the grand jury to testify, the prosecutor had doubts that Allgood was being truthful. Eventually, and after Allgood’s grand jury testimony, the prosecutor proposed that Allgood would take a polygraph test to determine whether he was being truthful. All-good agreed to take the polygraph test in return for the State’s securing his transfer from the Baltimore City Jail, where he was being held on “no bail status,” to the custody of the Navy. 309 Md. at 60-64, 522 A.2d 917.
*482Allgood took the polygraph test and failed it. This led the State to repudiate the plea agreement and proceed to trial. The court denied Allgood’s motion to enforce the plea agreement and admitted his grand jury testimony over his objection at trial. Id. at 65, 522 A.2d 917.
The Court of Appeals held that, because Allgood failed the polygraph test and the parties had agreed to abide by its results, the State was entitled to repudiate the agreement. Therefore, the trial court properly denied Allgood’s motion to enforce the agreement. Id. at 71-72, 522 A.2d 917.
Of particular relevance to the present case, the Court further held that the trial court erred in permitting the State to use Allgood’s grand jury testimony against him in its case in chief. The Court reasoned that because the State had repudiated the plea agreement, Allgood’s grand jury testimony was inadmissible per se in the State’s case in chief.
Important to the Court in Allgood was the repeated references in Wright to the fact that the State in that case had not breached, rescinded, or repudiated its plea agreement with Coley. See id. at 77-78, 522 A.2d 917 (referencing the Court’s statements of same in Wright). The Court distinguished Wright, saying:
The decisive difference between Coley’s situation and that of Allgood is that the defendant reneged on the agreement in the former but the State terminated the agreement in the latter. In Coley’s case, “the State neither rescinded nor breached the agreement.” In Allgood’s case the State flatly rescinded the agreement in a letter to defense counsel, and thereafter refused to submit it to the court. It proceeded to try Allgood on the murder and robbery charges despite his desire to plead pursuant to the agreement.
Id. at 77, 522 A.2d 917 (citations omitted).
Of particular relevance to the present case, the Court went on to point out another distinction between Coley’s situation and that of Allgood:
Furthermore, the Coley agreement “specified that if Coley reneged, his inculpatory statements could be used against *483him at trial.” The agreement with Allgood contained no such provision. Allgood answered “Yes” when he appeared before the Grand Jury to the question if he understood that “anything you say here can be used against you in a court of law.” But this is far from an agreement that his statements could be used against him at trial. In fact, the accuracy of the question so broadly phrased is at least questionable.
Id. (citations omitted).
The Court, summarizing the teachings of Wright, laid out the rules governing the admissibility of statements obtained pursuant to plea agreements:
1) When statements are obtained from a defendant upon promises made him by the State by way of a plea bargain agreement, the statements, in the light of Rule 4-243, are not inadmissible per se, under that inducement doctrine, in the State’s case in chief at trial on the merits.
2) When the State rescinds, repudiates, or breaches the plea bargain agreement, for whatever reason, after the statements are so obtained, the statements as a matter of law are inadmissible per se in the State’s case in chief at trial on the merits.
Id. at 78, 522 A.2d 917. The Court went on to say:
Wright fully appreciated that promises to the defendant of the nature usually encompassed in plea bargain agreements, certainly suffice to induce a statement obtained, so that, ordinarily, the inducement most assuredly would be improper. The intervention of a plea bargain agreement, however, expressly authorized by law, serves to make the inducement proper. Thus, the plea agreement, in itself, does not render the statement inadmissible. On the other hand, Wright recognized the chilling effect on plea bargaining were the State permitted to enter into a plea agreement, obtain a statement thereunder, abort the agreement, and then use the statement in its case in chief at trial on the merits. The reason for the State’s repudiation of the agreement is immaterial with respect to the admissibility of the statement. Whether its reason be sound or unsound, tech*484nical or substantial, in good faith or simply because the prosecutor had misgivings or a change of heart, or' was utterly arbitrary, is of no matter. The justification vel non of the rescission, repudiation, or breach of the agreement by the State goes to whether the defendant is entitled to have the agreement enforced; it does not affect the admissibility of the statement obtained under it. This is in accord with the rationale of Wright.
Id. at 78-79, 522 A.2d 917.
Certainly, at first blush, this language would seem to preclude the State’s use of appellant’s statements in this case, since it was the State who repudiated the agreement. Such a mechanistic application of Allgood to the facts of this case, however, overlooks what are fundamental distinctions between that case and this one.2 I do not read Allgood as governing the situation presented here, where the defendant expressly agrees as a term of the agreement that, upon his breach, the State is free to use his statements against him at trial. On this score, the Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. Mezzanatto, 513 U.S. 196, 115 S.Ct. 797, 130 L.Ed.2d 697 (1995), is quite instructive.
Mezzanatto was decided one year after the Court of Appeals’ adoption of the Maryland Rules of Evidence, which includes Rule 5-410.3 That rule addresses the use of statements made by the defendant in plea negotiations, and is *485modeled after the counterpart federal rule, Federal Rule of Evidence 410. Elmer v. State, 353 Md. 1, 10, 724 A.2d 625 (1999). Mezzanatto involves Federal Rule of Evidence 410, and Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(e)(6), which control a criminal defendant’s waiver of these rules’ proscription against the use at trial of statements made by a defendant in plea negotiations.
In that case, Mezzanatto was arrested and charged with drug offenses. He and his attorney later met with the prosecutor to discuss the possibility of his cooperating with the Government. 513 U.S. at 198, 115 S.Ct. 797. At the outset of the meeting, the prosecutor told Mezzanatto that, “[a]s a condition to proceeding with the discussion, the prosecutor indicated that respondent would have to agree that any statements he made during the meeting could be used to impeach any contradictory testimony he might give at trial if the case proceeded that far.” Id. Mezzanatto conferred with counsel and agreed to the prosecutor’s terms. He then gave an inculpatory statement. Other aspects of his statement to the prosecutor, however, suggested that he had minimized his role in the drug transaction. The Government terminated the meeting on the basis of Mezzanatto’s failure to give completely truthful information. Id. at 198-99, 115 S.Ct. 797.
At his trial, and over the objection of defense counsel, the Government used Mezzanatto’s inculpatory statement on cross-examination of him. When he denied making the statement, the Government called one of the agents who had attended the meeting to recount the prior statement. Id. at 199, 115 S.Ct. 797.
Mezzanatto was convicted and, on appeal, a divided panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed. The court held that the admission of the statement violated Federal Rule of Evidence 410 and Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(e)(6), reasoning that the defendant could not waive the protections of those rules. United States v. Mezzanatto, 998 F.2d 1452, 1454-56 (9th Cir.1993).
*486The Supreme Court reversed. The Court held that a federal criminal defendant’s agreement to waive the exclusionary provisions of the plea-statement rules is valid and enforceable, absent some affirmative indication that the defendant’s entry into the agreement was unknowing or involuntary.
The Court reasoned that the plea-statement rules in effect create a privilege on behalf of the defendant which, like other evidentiary privileges, may be waived or varied at the defendant’s request, 513 U.S. at 203-04, 115 S.Ct. 797, and that enforcement of a waiver agreement such as the one at issue “enhances the truth-seeking function of trials and will result in more accurate verdicts,” id. at 204, 115 S.Ct. 797. The Court noted that “[respondent has identified nothing in the structure or history of the plea-statement Rules that suggests that they were aimed at preventing private bargaining; in fact, [the Court’s discussion of the Rules] suggests that the Rules adopt a contrary view.” Id. at 206 n. 4, 115 S.Ct. 797.
The Court also rejected the notion that permitting waiver of the Rules’ prohibitions would interfere with the plea-statement rules’ goal of encouraging plea bargaining:
[T]here is no basis for concluding that waiver will interfere with the Rules’ goal of encouraging plea bargaining. The court below focused entirely on the defendant’s incentives and completely ignored the other essential party to the transaction: the prosecutor. Thus, although the availability of waiver may discourage some defendants from negotiating, it is also true that prosecutors may be unwilling to proceed without it.
Id. at 207, 115 S.Ct. 797.
The Court added that “[i]f prosecutors were precluded from securing such agreements, they might well decline to enter into cooperation discussions in the first place and might never take this potential first step toward a plea bargain.” Id. at 207-08, 115 S.Ct. 797. “A sounder way to encourage settlement is to permit the interested parties to enter into knowing and voluntary negotiations without any arbitrary limits on their bargaining chips.” Id. at 208, 115 S.Ct. 797.
*487Although not directly on point with the present case, Mezza-natto does reflect the Supreme Court’s recognition of the policy that favors holding a defendant “to the bargain that had been negotiated before he made any statement.” Joseph F. Murphy, Jr. Maryland Evidence Handbook § 805(B), at 336 (3d ed.1999).
This view of course echos that held in this State. Wright, 307 Md. at 591-95, 515 A.2d 1157. Mezzanatto is also consistent with the view held in Maryland that plea bargains are to be encouraged, State v. Brockman, 277 Md. 687, 694, 357 A.2d 376 (1976), and that constitutional rights can be knowingly and intelligently waived, see, e.g., State v. Priet, 289 Md. 267, 424 A.2d 349 (1981) (discussing waiver of constitutional rights in the context of a guilty plea).
To be sure, the present case is not precisely like Wright, because here the State repudiated the plea agreement, albeit following the defendant’s breach. But it is also not precisely like Allgood, because the present case involves appellant’s essentially “waiving” the protections addressed by the Allgood rules.
In any event, neither Wright nor Allgood should preclude what happened here. Appellant struck a bargain fully cognizant of the consequences of his failure to honor his part of the bargain. He breached his agreement with the State, and, as bargained, the State used his statement against him at his subsequent trial. The determination of whether appellant’s statement should be used against him should focus on these facts, not on the fact that the State, as it was entitled to do, repudiated the agreement as the direct result of appellant’s breach. In my view, Allgood ought not be read so broadly as to foreclose the State from holding appellant to the bargain he had negotiated, and using his statements against him at his criminal trial.

. Appellant also sought suppression of his statements on the ground that they were obtained in violation of Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. *480436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966). Appellant raised that argument on appeal as a separate basis for reversing the suppression court’s ruling. Having decided that appellant’s statements should have been suppressed as the product of an inducement, the majority had no need to reach the question of the alleged Miranda violation. I have reviewed the record developed at the suppression hearing, the suppression court’s extensive fact findings and ruling on the issue, and the parties’ respective arguments on appeal. There appears to be no merit to appellant’s Miranda contention.

. I agree wholeheartedly with Judge Krauser’s observation in the concurring opinion that application of the rule of Allgood “unnecessarily undermines the integrity of the legal process, by gratuitously suppressing important evidence. And it does so without serving any countervailing public policy.” (Krauser, J., concurring, slip op. at 9).

. Rule 5-410 provides, in pertinent part:
(a) Generally. Except as otherwise provided in this Rule, evidence of the following is not admissible against the defendant who made the plea or was a participant in the plea discussions:
(4) any statement made in the course of plea discussions with an attorney for the prosecuting authority which do not result in a plea of guilty or nolo contendere or which result in a plea of guilty or nolo contendere which was not accepted or was later withdrawn or vacated.