United States ex rel. Williams v. Morris
Decision Date | 01 February 1980 |
Docket Number | No. 77 C 2402,77 C 2184 and 77 C 1937.,77 C 2402 |
Parties | UNITED STATES of America ex rel. Lawrence WILLIAMS, Petitioner, v. Ernest MORRIS, Warden, Stateville Correctional Center, Respondent. UNITED STATES of America ex rel. Oscar SOUTHALL, Petitioner, v. Thaddeus E. PINCKNEY, Warden, Pontiac Correctional Center, Respondent. UNITED STATES of America ex rel. Emanuel WILLIAMS, Petitioner, v. PEOPLE OF the STATE OF ILLINOIS, Respondent. |
Court | U.S. District Court — Northern District of Illinois |
Martha A. Mills, Chicago, Ill., for petitioners.
William J. Scott, Atty. Gen. of the State of Illinois and Michael B. Weinstein, Asst. Atty. Gen., Chicago, Ill., for respondents.
These three habeas corpus petitions have been brought by inmates in Illinois state prisons. Petitioners, who pleaded guilty in their state court criminal prosecutions, contend that the state judges violated petitioners' Fourteenth Amendment rights by failing to inform petitioners of a mandatory parole term that would attach to their negotiated sentences. In United States ex rel. Williams v. Morris, 447 F.Supp. 95 (N.D. Ill.1978), we ruled that petitioners were entitled to relief. The Court of Appeals, in United States ex rel. Williams v. Morris, 594 F.2d 614 (7th Cir. 1979), reversed our decision, holding that petitioners had failed to exhaust an available state court remedy. Petitioners now renew their petitions seeking orders expunging their mandatory parole terms, contending that an Illinois Supreme Court ruling subsequent to the Court of Appeals' earlier decision conclusively shows the nonexistence of an available state court remedy. We agree with petitioners' contention and, accordingly, again grant the relief they seek.
In United States ex rel. Baker v. Finkbeiner, 551 F.2d 180 (7th Cir. 1977), the Court of Appeals held that a state court violated a defendant's due process rights if the judge failed to advise a defendant pleading guilty pursuant to a plea agreement that a mandatory parole term would attach to his sentence. The court held that the mandatory parole term resulted in a substantially more onerous sentence than the defendant had been promised with the result that his plea had been unfairly induced in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. The court held release from custody for a petitioner who was in prison for violating his parole term was the only adequate remedy, because vacation of the guilty plea would permit the state to reprosecute a defendant who had already performed his part of the bargain by serving the prison sentence which he had been promised. See also United States ex rel. Ferris v. Finkbeiner, 551 F.2d 185 (7th Cir. 1977) ( ).
447 F.Supp. at 98. Therefore we determined that petitioners need not exhaust state court remedies and were entitled to relief.
The Court of Appeals disagreed with our decision and reversed holding that petitioners had a state remedy. The court reasoned that the mandatory parole issue was not "crystallized" in Wills as it was in Baker, because the Wills court had simply applied the broad Boykin standard of voluntariness. 594 F.2d at 618. The Court of Appeals also cited People v. Wenger, 42 Ill.App.3d 608, 1 Ill.Dec. 306, 308, 356 N.E.2d 432, 434 (1976), in which the court held that if a guilty plea was based on an inaccurate representation of the maximum sentence, the promise implied in the representation should be fulfilled.1 Wenger, according to the Court of Appeals, indicated that the Illinois courts might afford relief to petitioners improperly warned of a mandatory parole terms.2 The court then noted two appellate decisions unfavorable to petitioners' theory for habeas relief, People v. Irons, 54 Ill.App.3d 50, 12 Ill.Dec. 61, 369 N.E.2d 558 (1977), and People v. Reese, 66 Ill.App.3d 199, 22 Ill. Dec. 951, 383 N.E.2d 759 (1978), but noted that dissents had been filed in both cases. Finally, the court cited People v. McCoy, 74 Ill.2d 398, 24 Ill.Dec. 555, 385 N.E.2d 696 (1979), in which the Illinois Supreme Court held that although the trial court failed to admonish as to mandatory parole, the guilty plea was voluntarily and intelligently made. The Supreme Court distinguished Baker because McCoy involved a recommended sentence rather than, as in Baker, an agreement as to a specific sentence.
From the foregoing cases, the Court of Appeals perceived a state of development in Illinois law "with strong indications from McCoy that hopefully the federal and state courts are tending to agree so that these matters of the constitutional rights of state prisoners may be resolved by state courts without federal interference." 594 F.2d at 619. The court reversed and remanded, with directions that we dismiss the instant petitions, but "without prejudice in the event our expectations for some reason prove to be misguided." Id.
Petitioners now contend that the Court of Appeals' expectations have proven to be "misguided." After the Court of Appeals' decision, Martha Mills, Esq., counsel for petitioners here, filed with the Illinois Supreme Court a petition for leave to appeal on behalf of another state petitioner, David McCullom. The petition presented the mandatory parole issue and, citing the Court of Appeals' Williams decision, urged the Illinois Supreme Court to resolve the issue of the availability of a state remedy. On October 1, 1979 the Illinois Supreme Court denied the petition for leave to appeal. Petitioners claim that this denial, coupled with the numerous decisions rendered by Illinois appellate courts denying relief, establishes the absence of a state remedy. Respondents argue, however, that the denial of a petition for leave to appeal is equivalent to a denial by the United States Supreme Court of a petition for a writ of certiorari and indicates neither acceptance nor approval of the lower court's decision. Therefore respondents contend that Illinois law now stands in the same position as it did when the Court of Appeals decided Williams.
We agree with petitioners that the attempted exercise of a state remedy would be futile. When we wrote our original decision in this case, we noted that all five appellate districts in Illinois, before the Court of Appeals' Baker decision, found no constitutional issue in the failure to warn of a mandatory parole term. Now, with the benefit of Baker's reasoning, Illinois appellate courts in several decisions have nevertheless found no constitutional issue. See, e. g. People v. Reese, supra; People v. Irons, supra; People v. Cosey, 66 Ill.App.3d 670, 23 Ill.Dec. 459, 384 N.E.2d 95 (1978). The Supreme Court denied leave to appeal in both Reese and Irons. Although all of these cases had been decided when the Court of Appeals rendered its Williams decision, we believe that the denial of leave to appeal in McCullom provides the necessary additional support for our original conclusion that no adequate state remedy exists. The McCullom petition made specific reference to Williams and the refusal of the Illinois appellate decisions to follow the principle established in Baker, and invited the Illinois Supreme Court to provide a definitive resolution as to the availability of a state remedy. The Supreme Court, however, declined to do so.
The Court of Appeals expressed its belief that Illinois law on this issue was in a state of development. If this is true, then we could reasonably expect the Supreme Court to reach the merits of...
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