Court Opinion

ID: 9853053
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:41:36.949518+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:22:40.275987
License: Public Domain

UDALL, Justice
(specially concurring) :
I concur generally in the conclusions reached by the majority; however, I disagree with the majority’s statement that the trial judge failed to give sufficient consideration to the question of whether the defendant was able to make an intelligent and competent waiver of counsel. By quoting the portions of the record relating the judge’s statements that defendant was not smart enough to defend himself, among other things, the majority implies that the trial judge refused altogether to consider defendant’s request to defend himself. It is my opinion that the trial court did not so act.
The judge on the bench at the trial was also on the bench at defendant’s arraignment. The record indicates that at the arraignment the judge spoke with defendant at some length concerning the defendant’s desire to defend himself, at the conclusion of which defendant requested that a public defender be appointed to defend him — the request was granted. Thus, it is clear that prior to the beginning of the trial the judge was not required to consider the question of whether defendant was able to make an intelligent and competent waiver of counsel, for such was rendered unnecessary by defendant’s own request that counsel be appointed.
It was at the earliest stages of the trial that defendant’s conduct indicated he intended, one way or another, to sabotage and make a mockery of the proceedings. For example:
“THE DEFENDANT: Let’s go! I’m ready! I’m ready for the ‘knock down, drag out!’ You have to convict me in ‘60 days’ or turn me loose, Mr. Wren! You have to convict me in ‘60 days!’
“THE COURT: You can talk through your attorney, Mr. Martin. You will be given an opportunity to testify, but there are legal technicalities * * *.
“THE DEFENDANT: I know what legal technicalities are and I don’t think you got them! You can’t count them! You haven’t got any technicalities; no technicalities!
“THE COURT: Do you want this Court to gag you?
“THE DEFENDANT: I don’t give a damn what you do. I’m going to die anyway. I want justice. I won it once, hands down. I want it now!
“Read that blue book on crime and it says in there you only have ‘60 days’ to do this! I won it at the preliminary hearing. You will make them let me go !
* * * * * *
“THE DEFENDANT: I’m going to win this thing with a knock down, drag out brawl and a hell raising campaign or else I’m going there in that hole and die.
“THE COURT: Mr. Martin!
“THE DEFENDANT: I’m not going back to that hole to die! I’m sticking to this thing right now! You are not going to push me around. This is the third month. I’ve been in that hole three months. Any American and everybody has 60 days for a trial or turn him loose and you know it, Mr Wren!
“THE COURT: Your attorney knows far more about it. He has looked * *
“THE DEFENDANT: * * * technicalities. Mr. Smith’s nothing but a dirty rat, himself, to permit this thing to go on.
“THE COURT: Would you take him out and gag him?
.“THE DEFENDANT: I want to be gagged. I’ll go to the hole.”
At that point in the proceedings the trial judge was justified in concluding that counsel to represent the defendant was a necessity if the trial were to proceed. In fact, *150since the defendant’s outbursts and displays of utter and complete disrespect for the court necessitated his handcuffing and gagging as early in the trial as voir dire examination of the prospective jurors, it would have been impossible to conduct the trial if defendant had not been represented by counsel.
Hence, the majority’s statement that the trial judge failed to give sufficient consideration to defendant’s request implies that the judge was under an obligation in the instant case to do something which was not necessary. For, it is my opinion that under the facts and circumstances of this case as mentioned above, there was absolutely no reason for the judge to even seriously consider such a request.
In reference to the other issues raised in the case by the defendant, I am in full accord with the opinion of the majority.