Court Opinion

ID: 9965231
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-05-01 21:00:34.714007+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:24:48.978400
License: Public Domain

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                                               PUBLISHED

                               UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
                                   FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

                                                No. 23-4089

        UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

                     Plaintiff – Appellee,

        v.

        BOBBY LEE MCCAINE MINTON,

                     Defendant – Appellant.

        Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of North Carolina, at
        Statesville. Kenneth D. Bell, District Judge. (5:19-cr-00084-KDB-DSC-1)

        Argued: March 22, 2024                                           Decided: April 30, 2024

        Before AGEE, QUATTLEBAUM, and HEYTENS, Circuit Judges.

        Affirmed by published opinion. Judge Heytens wrote the opinion, in which Judge Agee
        and Judge Quattlebaum joined.

        ARGUED: Megan Coyle Hoffman, FEDERAL DEFENDERS OF WESTERN NORTH
        CAROLINA, INC., Charlotte, North Carolina, for Appellant. Julia Kay Wood, OFFICE
        OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Charlotte, North Carolina, for Appellee. ON
        BRIEF: John G. Baker, Federal Public Defender, FEDERAL DEFENDERS OF
        WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA, INC., Charlotte, North Carolina, for Appellant. Dena J.
        King, United States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY,
        Charlotte, North Carolina, for Appellee.
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        TOBY HEYTENS, Circuit Judge:

               Bobby Lee Minton has a long history of mental illness and substance abuse. After

        an episode that started with him knocking on a stranger’s door to ask for a drink of water

        and ended with him pulling a gun, Minton was convicted of possessing a firearm after

        being convicted of a felony. Minton argues the district court erred in not dismissing the

        indictment under the Speedy Trial Act. We disagree. Instead, we join the only circuit to

        have considered the issue in a published opinion in holding that 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(4)

        “automatically excludes all time during which a defendant is incompetent” from the Act’s

        ambit “whether or not any other provisions of the Act apply.” United States v. Romero,

        833 F.3d 1151, 1154 (9th Cir. 2016). With that time excluded, Minton’s case went to trial

        within the required period. We thus affirm.

                                                      I.

               The Sixth Amendment’s Speedy Trial Clause and the Speedy Trial Act both protect

        a criminal defendant’s right to be tried promptly. Because Minton makes no constitutional

        claim, we consider only the Act.

               Once a defendant has been charged, the Act imposes a 70-day deadline for

        “commenc[ing]” the trial. 18 U.S.C. § 3161(c)(1). But the Act also identifies various

        “periods of delay” that “shall be excluded . . . in computing” the 70-day period. § 3161(h).

               Here, the Act’s trial clock was triggered on December 16, 2019, when Minton first

        appeared before a judge. See 18 U.S.C. § 3161(c)(1). Then, on June 11, 2020, the district

        court concluded Minton was not competent to stand trial. The parties disagree about how

        much of the pre-June 11 period is excluded, but—even in Minton’s view—46 days

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        remained on the Speedy Trial Act clock when the district court found him incompetent. *

        On September 27, 2021, the district court found Minton’s competency had been restored,

        and Minton does not assert any non-excludable delays occurred after that date. This appeal

        thus comes down to a single question: How much of the 473-day period between June 11,

        2020 (when the district court found Minton incompetent) and September 27, 2021 (when

        the court found his competency had been restored) is included in the Speedy Trial Act

        calculation? That is a pure question of law, which we review de novo. See United States v.

        Velasquez, 52 F.4th 133, 138 (4th Cir. 2022).

                                                     II.

                  Minton argues that 129 days of the incompetency period should be included in the

        Speedy Trial Act calculation. He notes that, after the district court committed him to the

        Attorney General’s custody for competency restoration, 139 days passed before he arrived

        at the facility where those restoration efforts would occur. Minton arrives at the 129-day

        number by looking to 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(F), which says delays of more than 10 days

        in transporting a defendant “to and from places of examination or hospitalization” “shall

        be presumed to be unreasonable.” If he is correct, that 129-day period alone is enough to

        establish a violation of the Speedy Trial Act. See 18 U.S.C. § 3161(c)(1) (trial “shall

        commence” within 70 days).

              *
                 Minton also argues he was not formally declared incompetent until the court
        memorialized its oral ruling in a written order issued 12 days later. We need not resolve
        that issue because Minton agrees those 12 days were properly excluded either way.
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               The government responds that Minton has cited the wrong provision. In numbered

        paragraphs, the Speedy Trial Act lists eight “periods of delay” that “shall be excluded” “in

        computing the time within which the trial of any such offense must commence.” 18 U.S.C.

        § 3161(h)(1)–(8). Minton’s argument is based on language from the first paragraph. In

        contrast, the government says the fourth paragraph controls here. That paragraph reads, in

        its entirety: “Any period of delay resulting from the fact that the defendant is mentally

        incompetent or physically unable to stand trial.” § 3161(h)(4). The government contends

        that, under this provision, the entire 473-day incompetency period is excluded from the

        Speedy Trial Act clock.

               We conclude the government has the better argument. Because we agree with the

        Ninth Circuit’s analysis in United States v. Romero, 833 F.3d 1151 (2016), our discussion

        largely tracks that court’s.

               First, both “[t]he plain meaning of ” Section 3161(h)(4) and its unusually clear

        legislative history favor the government’s position. Romero, 833 F.3d at 1154. The

        statutory text says “[a]ny period of delay resulting from the fact that the defendant is

        mentally incompetent” “shall be excluded.” 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h) (emphasis added). “On

        its face, this provision is absolute; any period during which a trial cannot commence

        because of a defendant’s incompetence must be excluded.” Romero, 833 F.3d at 1154. That

        conclusion is confirmed by the Speedy Trial Act’s other provisions, some of which impose

        the sort of time-based limits that are conspicuously absent from Section 3161(h)(4).

        See, e.g., 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(6) (allowing “[a] reasonable period of delay when the

        defendant is joined for trial with a codefendant as to whom the time for trial has not run”

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        (emphasis added)); § 3161(h)(8) (stating that a different type of excludable period may not

        “exceed one year”). It is also consistent with the House Committee Report’s statement that

        Section 3161(h)(4) provides for the “exclusion” of any “period during which a defendant

        is incompetent to stand trial.” H.R. Rep. No. 93-1508, at 33 (1974).

               Second, “[t]he Supreme Court’s Speedy Trial Act case law further supports this

        result.” Romero, 833 F.3d at 1154. To the extent that Minton makes an argument grounded

        in the text of Section 3161(h)(4), he suggests the 129-day delay he identifies did not

        “result[ ] from” his incompetence to stand trial but was instead “caused by a failure to

        transport [him] to a facility for restoration.” Minton Br. 14. But in United States v.

        Tinklenberg, 563 U.S. 647 (2011), the Supreme Court rejected just that sort of argument

        about a neighboring provision of the same statute. Instead, the Court held that provision

        applied “irrespective of whether” the triggering event (there, the filing of a pretrial motion)

        “actually causes” a “delay in starting a trial.” Id. at 650, 653; accord Bloate v. United States,

        559 U.S. 196, 205 n.9 (2010) (rejecting similar argument about a different provision of the

        Act). Any other result, the Court explained, “would significantly hinder the Speedy Trial

        Act’s efforts to secure fair and efficient criminal trial proceedings” by requiring trial judges

        to figure out what events “actually cause[d]” the trial to be delayed. Tinklenberg, 563 U.S.

        at 650, 657.

               We agree with the Ninth Circuit that “[t]he same reasoning applies to § 3161(h)(4).”

        Romero, 833 F.3d at 1155. “[T]he criminal trial of an incompetent defendant violates due

        process.” Medina v. California, 505 U.S. 437, 453 (1992). For that reason, Minton’s trial

        could not constitutionally commence between the time the district court declared him

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        legally incompetent and when the court later determined his competency had been restored.

        “Given this foundational principle of our criminal justice system, it would make little sense

        to require a district court to inquire into the applicability of § 3161(h)(4) in individual

        cases.” Romero, 833 F.3d at 1155.

               Third, the language Minton cites addressing transportation delays does not counsel

        a different result. Recall: 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(1)(F) says that “delay[s] resulting from

        transportation,” including “to or from places of examination or hospitalization” count

        toward the 70-day period. But that language is not contained within the numbered

        paragraph that excludes “[a]ny period of delay resulting from the fact that the defendant is

        mentally incompetent.” 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h)(4). Instead, it is lodged in a subpart to a

        different numbered paragraph that addresses “delay[s] resulting from other proceedings

        concerning the defendant.” § 3161(h)(1). And “there was no proceeding pending when”

        the 129-day delay took place because Minton had already been declared incompetent and

        “all proceedings had necessarily been put on hold until [Minton’s] competency was

        restored.” Romero, 833 F.3d at 1155–56. This too confirms our view that the relevant

        provision here is Section 3161(h)(4), not Section 3161(h)(1)(F).

               Finally, we reject Minton’s argument that this straightforward reading of the statute

        renders Section 3161(h)(1)(F) surplusage or violates the interpretive principle that the

        specific controls the general. That Section 3161(h)(1)(F) does not impact the Speedy Trial

        Act calculation during periods the defendant has been declared incompetent does not mean

        it does not work in other circumstances. Indeed, as Minton conceded in both his briefs and

        at oral argument, a defendant may need examination or hospitalization for reasons other

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        than competency restoration. (Think, for example, of an elderly defendant accused of

        racketeering acts who asks to be released from pretrial detention based on a medical

        condition and needs to be evaluated in connection with that request.) And the specific-

        controls-the-general canon “does not apply here, because neither section is necessarily

        more specific than the other.” Romero, 833 F.3d at 1156. Rather, as just explained, the two

        provisions address different subjects: Section 3161(h)(1) covers delays caused by “other

        proceedings” while Section 3161(h)(4) governs those caused by the defendant’s

        incompetence to stand trial.

                                               *      *       *

               A district court that agreed with Minton’s argument here worried that any other

        “interpretation would theoretically allow a mentally incompetent defendant to be held

        indefinitely and without recourse under the Speedy Trial Act despite an existing court order

        directing that the defendant be transported to undergo treatment in an effort to return him

        to competence.” United States v. Black, No. 21-CR-009-GKF, 2022 WL 17170707, at *6

        (N.D. Okla. Nov. 22, 2022). No doubt, the prospect of indefinite detention of a mentally

        incompetent defendant is a serious matter. But the Speedy Trial Act is not the only game in

        town, and both the Due Process Clause and a different federal statute limit the

        government’s ability to detain criminal defendants during competency restoration efforts.

        See, e.g., Jackson v. Indiana, 406 U.S. 715, 738 (1972) (“[A] person charged . . . with a

        criminal offense who is [civilly] committed solely on account of his incapacity to proceed

        to trial cannot be held more than the reasonable period of time necessary to determine

        whether there is a substantial probability that he will attain that capacity in the foreseeable

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        future.”); 18 U.S.C. § 4241(d). Minton, however, makes no claim under Jackson or

        Section 4241(d) (or, as we have already noted, the Speedy Trial Clause of the Sixth

        Amendment). Answering only the question necessary to resolve this appeal, we hold the

        district court correctly denied Minton’s motion to dismiss under the Speedy Trial Act

        because Section 3161(h)(4) excludes the entire period a criminal defendant is legally

        incompetent from the Act’s 70-day trial clock.

              The district court’s judgment is

                                                                                AFFIRMED.

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