Court Opinion

ID: 9528695
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:43:11.224688+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:27:13.058628
License: Public Domain

Rees, J.,
concurring: This is a municipal court misdemeanor case. It began in the Municipal Court of the City of Overland Park where defendant Barnett was charged with speeding in violation of a municipal ordinance. He was convicted and sentenced to pay a fine. He perfected an appeal to the Johnson County District Court. Subsequently, dismissal of the district court proceeding was ordered and remand of the case to the municipal court was directed. Barnett filed a motion in the district court asking for reinstatement. It was denied. Barnett has appealed.
I concur with the majority’s decision to affirm, but I cannot join in their opinion. I will not undertake a substantial recitation of my disagreements since it is obvious that there is no prospect that such recitation would achieve a productive result in this case.
As I see it, the material facts of this case include these: Barnett was convicted in the Overland Park municipal court on July 11, 1984 and sentenced to pay a fine. His timely appeal to the district court was filed and “docketed” in the office of the Johnson County District Court Clerk on July 23. Two days later, on July 25, Barnett first appeared, by counsel, before the district court; the case was set for trial to the court on August 2 at 10:30 a.m. At the appointed hour on August 2, the City appeared and announced its readiness for trial; Barnett did not appear either personally or by counsel; the district court immediately ordered dismissal of the proceeding before it and directed remand of the case to the municipal court for execution of the previously imposed sentence. Then, on August 8, Barnett filed a motion for reinstatement of the district court proceeding. The motion was argued to the district judge and denied on August 24. In his argument to us, defense counsel reasserts part of his argument made in the district court in support of the motion to reinstate.
Statutory provisions material to this case are:
K.S.A. 12-4601:
“Appeal; stay of proceedings. An appeal may be taken to the district court in the county in which said municipal court is located:
*593“(a) By the accused person in all cases; . . .
“The appeal shall stay all further proceedings upon the judgment appealed from.”
K.S.A. 12-4602;
“Same; procedure. An appeal to the district court may be taken as provided in K.S.A. 22-3609. . . . Hearing and judgment on appeal shall be as provided in K.S.A. 22-3610 and K.S.A. 22-3611.”
K.S.A. 1984 Supp. 22-3609;
“(1) The defendant shall have the right to appeal to the district court of the county from any judgment of a municipal court which adjudges the defendant guilty of a violation of the ordinances of any municipality of Kansas. . . . The appeal shall stay all further proceedings upon the judgment appealed from.
“(4) Hearing on the appeal shall be to the court unless a jury trial is requested in writing by the defendant not later than 48 hours prior to the trial.” (L. 1983, ch. 115, § 1.)
K.S.A. 1984 Supp. 22-3610:
“(a) When a case is appealed to the district court, such court shall hear and determine the cause on the original complaint .... The case shall be tried de novo in the district court.” (L. 1982, ch. 144, § 20.)
K.S.A. 22-3405:
“Presence of defendant.” . . .
“(2.) The defendant must be present, either personally or by counsel at every stage of the trial of a misdemeanor case.”
K.S.A. 22-3611:
“Judgment on appeal. If upon appeal to the district court the defendant is convicted, the district court shall impose sentence upon him and render judgment against him for all costs in the case, both in the district court and in the court appealed’Trom.”
It is of passing interest to observe that the “48-hour rule” found in K.S.A. 1984 Supp. 22-3609(4) also appears in K.S.A. 22-3404, the Code of Criminal Procedure section prescribing the method of trial of misdemeanor cases (State v. Cade, 210 Kan. 544, 546, 502 P.2d 782 [1972]),. but inexplicably it does not appear in K.S.A. 22-3609a or K.S.A. 1984 Supp. 22-3609a. The subject of K.S.A. 22-3609a and K.S.A. 1984 Supp. 22-3609a is appeals from district magistrate judges. The statutory direction there is that all appeals taken by a defendant from a district magistrate judge in misdemeanor cases shall be tried by the court unless a jury trial is requested in writing by the defendant. K.S.A. 22-3609a(5); K.S.A. 1984 Supp. 22-3609a(5).
*594In his brief, defense counsel sets forth the issues raised on appeal as follows:
“I. Is a traffic trial to the court setting a ‘stage of the trial’ pursuant to K.S.A. 22-3405(2) requiring the presence of defendant or counsel if a jury trial previously has been demanded?”
“II. Does the language ‘hearing on the appeal shall be to the court unless a jury trial is requested in writing not later than 48 hours prior to the trial,’ contained in K.S.A. [1984 Supp.] 22-3609(4), require the request to be filed 48 hours prior to trial?”
As for the first issue, K.S.A. 22-3405(2) calls for a misdemeanor defendant’s appearance “either personally or by counsel at every stage of the trial” of his case. I suggest that the ordinary and true meaning of the word “trial” is the judicial hearing where the issue of guilt or innocence is determined. Cf. Cooper v. State, 196 Kan. 421, 425-26, 411 P.2d 652 (1966); State v. Daegele, 193 Kan. 314, 316, 393 P.2d 978 (1964), cert. denied 379 U.S. 981 (1965). I see no reason for the word “trial” to have other meaning when used in K.S.A. 22-3405(2). I am discomforted by and in disagreement with that part of the majority opinion that seems to interpret the statutory phrase “every stage of the trial” so broadly as to encompass the happening of procedural events essentially administrative in nature, e.g., the assignment of a trial setting.
As for the second issue, the language of K.S.A. 1984 Supp. 22-3609(4) plainly sets forth two requirements imposed upon a defendant to afford him entitlement to jury trial in the district court. Jury trial must be (1) requested in writing by the defendant (2) not later than 48 hours prior to the trial. It is clear that compliance with both requirements is necessary. There must be a request that is both written and timely.
The foundation assertion made in Barnett’s argument with regard to the second issue is that “jury trial was requested in writing at the time it was mailed, which was more than 48 hours prior to trial.” I simply do not find support for the second part of that assertion in the record.
Trial to the court had been set for 10:30 a.m. on August 2. On July 31, defense counsel mailed the original copy of the written request to the Johnson County District Court Clerk and a copy of the written request to the Overland Park assistant city attorney handling the case. The record establishes that the original copy of the request was filed in the office of the Johnson County District Court Clerk on August 1 at 11:13 a.m. This was the day *595after mailing and less than 24 hours prior to the time that had been set for trial to the court.
At best, defense counsel’s representation of the record and endorsed certificate of mailing support a conclusion that the original copy and the assistant city attorney’s copy of the written request were mailed on July 31, the second day preceding the date set for trial to the court. The record is devoid of any showing, by evidence or representation, that fixes the hour of the day on July 31 when the copies of the written request were deposited in a United States Postal Service facility for transmittal. Whether the written request was mailed earlier than 10:30 a.m. on July 31, or later than 10:30 a.m. on July 31, is wholly incapable of direct or inferential determination from the record.
Before we can set aside a judgment it must be affirmatively made to appear that such judgment is erroneous. The burden is on the appellant to designate a record sufficient to present his points to the appellate court, and to establish the claimed error.. On appeal, error is never presumed and the burden is on the appellant to make it affirmatively appear. It is incumbent upon the appellant to include in the record on appeal any matter upon which he wishes to base a claim of error. First Nat’l Bank &Trust Co. v. Lygrisse, 231 Kan. 595, 602, 647 P.2d 1268 (1982). Neither counsel’s argument before the trial court nor assertions in the appellate briefs constitute evidence or remedy the inadequacy of the record on appeal. Rural Water Dist. No. 6 v. Zeigler Corp., 9 Kan. App. 2d 305, 310-11, 677 P.2d 573, rev. denied 235 Kan. 1042 (1984).
In sum, on the record presented to us, it is my opinion that on Barnett’s behalf there has been no affirmative showing made that a jury trial was timely requested in writing. Even if we were to agree with defense counsel that under K.S.A. 1984 Supp. 22-3609(4) a jury trial is requested in writing when the written request is mailed, the record fails to establish that in this case, the written request was mailed “not later than 48 hours prior to” 10:30 a.m. on August 2, the assigned time for trial. To me, this is dispositive.
When the district court proceeding came on for trial on August 2 and Barnett’s motion to reinstate was heard on August 24, other matters and questions were discussed and ruled upon. Even though I agree with the majority that a jury trial request made on the record in open court should constitute sufficient substantial *596compliance with the “48-hour rule” requirement of a written request, in light of my conviction that we can and should affirm on the ground the record does not show a timely request for jury trial, I view it as both unnecessary and inappropriate to address other factual and legal questions. Whether Barnett became entitled to a district court jury trial by operation of K.S.A. 1984 Supp. 22-3609(4) lies at the heart of our decision in this case. The district court decided Barnett was not entitled to a jury trial. The failure to establish on appeal that as a matter of law he had perfected that entitlement fatally subverts Barnett’s arguments to us for reversal. The reasons given by the district court for its decision are immaterial so long as its ruling was correct for any reason. Arensman v. Kitch, 160 Kan. 783, 792, 165 P.2d 441 (1946). The question for our answer is whether the district court decision was correct, not whether the grounds upon which it professed to proceed are tenable. Johnson v. Boeing Airplane Co., 175 Kan. 275, 283, 262 P.2d 808 (1953).