Court Opinion

ID: 9789558
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 01:38:28.630323+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:23.181751
License: Public Domain

GORDON, Justice
(dissenting).
The majority charts a dangerous course by allowing a person to be convicted with an unconstitutional statute. In doing so, the members of this Court recognize that A.R.S. § 13-531 is void on account of vagueness and overbreadth, yet they allow appellant’s conviction to stand because in their eyes he is “a hard core violator”. There may be others, who have already begun the process of appealing their convictions for violations of A.R.S. § 13-531. Since I am unable to discern any rational means of applying such an arbitrary standard to these future appeals, I am compelled to dissent.
The cases relied on by the majority do not constitute authority for the incongruous result which they have reached. Both Linkletter v. Walker, 381 U.S. 618, 85 S.Ct. 1731, 14 L.Ed.2d 601 (1965), and State v. Stenrud, 113 Ariz. 327, 553 P.2d 1201 (1976), concerned the application of court-made rules which changed previous court-made rules. Because Linkletter and Stenrud did not involve the constitutionality of a statute, the process of analysis utilized in those cases simply is not applicable here.
“Linkletter itself announced an exception to the general rule of retroactivity * *. Linkletter * * * dealt with those constitutional interpretations bearing on the use of evidence or on a particular mode of trial. These procedural rights and methods of conducting trials, however, do not encompass all of the rights found in the first eight Amendments. Guarantees that do not relate to these procedural rules cannot, for retroactivity purposes, be lumped conveniently together in terms of analysis.” Robinson v. Neil, 409 U.S. 505, 507-508, 93 S.Ct. 876, 877-878, 35 L.Ed.2d 29 (1973).
Justice Rehnquist, writing for the majority in Robinson, cited Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238, 92 S.Ct. 2726, 33 L.Ed.2d 346 (1972) as one example of a holding being applied retrospectively despite its not meeting the Linkletter criteria. As a result of that retrospective application, Furman’s death penalty was reversed notwithstand*361ing his being a “hard core violator” who was aware of the possible consequences of killing a person.
The remaining cases cited by the majority also fail to support their conclusions. James v. United States, 366 U.S. 213, 81 S.Ct. 1052, 6 L.Ed.2d 246 (1961), altered a Supreme Court interpretation of the Internal Revenue Code. Likewise, Great Northern Ry. Co. v. Sunburst Oil & Refining Co., 287 U.S. 358, 53 S.Ct. 145, 77 L.Ed. 360 (1932), revolved around the effect of a Montana Supreme Court’s opinion which changed its own prior interpretation of a tariff statute. The common thread which runs through all the above cases arises from a party’s reliance on a previous rule or interpretation of a supreme court which was later changed by that court. Because of that reliance, the changes announced by those courts were applied only prospectively. Arizona, on the other hand, has not previously spoken on A.R.S. § 13-531. If we had previously given the statute a permissible limiting interpretation, the result arrived at by the majority would have been correct. See Wainwright v. Stone, 414 U.S. 21, 94 S.Ct. 190, 38 L.Ed.2d 179 (1973); Rose v. Locke, 423 U.S. 48, 96 S.Ct. 243, 46 L.Ed.2d 185 (1975).
By warping the holding of Linkletter and Stenrud to reach the result in this case, the majority ignores a fundamental rule of law which is based on the United States Constitution being the supreme law of the land. United States Const. Art. VI, cl. 2; Ariz. Const. Art. II, § 3. Because of this fact, “An unconstitutional law is void, and is as no law. An offense created by it is not a crime. A conviction under it is not merely erroneous, but it is illegal and void and cannot be a legal cause of imprisonment”. Ex Parte Siebold, 100 U.S. 371, 376-77, 25 L.Ed. 717 (1879). See also Norton v. Shelby County, 118 U.S. 425, 6 S.Ct. 1121, 30 L.Ed. 178 (1886). This basic principle of American jurisprudence cannot be swept aside to incarcerate even the most hard core violat- or.
The majority has granted Gates standing to challenge the constitutionality of A.R.S. § 13-531 as applied to others, and, pursuant to his challenge, they have held the statute void on account of vagueness and over-breadth. Nevertheless, they leave him incarcerated. “Although a statute may be neither vague, overbroad, nor otherwise invalid as applied to the conduct charged against a particular defendant, he is permitted to raise its vagueness or unconstitutional overbreadth as applied to others. And if the law is found deficient in one of these respects, it may not be applied to him either * * Coates v. City of Cincinnati, 402 U.S. 611, 619-620, 91 S.Ct. 1686, 1691, 29 L.Ed.2d 214 (1971) (White, J. dissenting); Accord Dombrowski v. Pfister, 380 U.S. 479, 85 S.Ct. 1116, 14 L.Ed.2d 22 (1965); See also, Winters v. People of State of New York, 333 U.S. 507, 68 S.Ct. 665, 92 L.Ed. 840 (1948); Herndon v. Lowry, 301 U.S. 242, 57 S.Ct. 732, 81 L.Ed. 1066 (1937).
My understanding of this area of the law remains unchanged by the contentions and authorities presented by the majority. Thus, for the reasons set forth above, I respectfully dissent from the unprecedented position adopted by the majority.