Atkins v. People of State of Mich.

• Decision Date: 02 March 1981
• Docket Number: No. 80-1341,80-1341
• Parties: Aaron Clinton ATKINS, Petitioner-Appellee, v. PEOPLE OF the STATE OF MICHIGAN (William L. Cahalan, Wayne County Prosecuting Attorney and William Lucas, Wayne County Sheriff), Respondent-Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

Page 543

644 F.2d 543

Aaron Clinton ATKINS, Petitioner-Appellee, v. PEOPLE OF the STATE OF MICHIGAN (William L. Cahalan, Wayne

County Prosecuting Attorney and William Lucas,

Wayne County Sheriff), Respondent-Appellant.

No. 80-1341.

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

Argued Feb. 5, 1981.

Decided March 2, 1981.

William L. Cahalan, Pros. Atty., Anne B. Wetherholt, Asst. Pros. Atty., Detroit Mich., Frank J. Kelley, Atty. Gen., Lansing, Mich., for respondent-appellant.

Edward F. Bell, Bell & Hudson, Detroit, Mich., for petitioner-appellee.

Before MERRITT and BROWN, Circuit Judges, and PHILLIPS, Senior Circuit Judge.

MERRITT, Circuit Judge.

The state of Michigan appeals the District Court's grant of Atkins' petition for a writ of habeas corpus dismissing his state-court murder indictment on grounds that the state violated his sixth amendment right to a speedy trial and violated the fourteenth amendment in denying him bail. In January 1979 Atkins was arrested on the charge of first degree murder. He was released on bond by a judge of the Recorders Court in Detroit but later was remanded to jail without bond by an examining magistrate. Judge Evelyn Cooper, the trial judge, on February 6, 1979, reinstated the bond originally set, stating that neither she nor the examining magistrate had jurisdiction to disturb the bond. The state immediately applied for emergency leave to appeal this decision. On February 9, in a peremptory order, the state Court of Appeals cancelled the bond and remanded Atkins to jail without a statement of reasons. Atkins' application to appeal this ruling to the Michigan Supreme Court was denied, and he returned to jail to await trial.

The parties filed several pretrial motions, including one by a co-defendant for suppression of evidence and one by the state, brought on the date set for trial (April 5, 1979), requesting a pretrial ruling on the admissibility of evidence. The trial was postponed. On May 14 the trial court ruled against the state on the suppression motion and the prosecution's evidentiary motion and set a trial date for May 30. The prosecution again perfected an emergency appeal and moved for a stay of proceedings on May 18. The Michigan Court of Appeals agreed to hear the appeal in an expedited fashion. Oral argument was held in October 1979, when the court first returned to session, but no decision was rendered until April 16, 1980, when the trial judge's ruling was affirmed in part and reversed in part. The state's application to appeal was denied by the state Supreme Court.

Meanwhile, in August 1979, when the case was pending before the state Court of Appeals, Atkins moved the trial court to dismiss the action because his right to a speedy trial had been denied, or in the alternative to release him on bail pending trial. The court denied the motion to dismiss, but, finding that circumstances had changed since the state Court of Appeals cancelled bond in February, it ordered his release on a $50,000 bond. This was appealed by the state in an emergency fashion, and on September 12, 1979, the Court of Appeals again cancelled the bond and remanded Atkins to jail. Its decision stated simply,

It is ... ordered that the order of the trial judge setting bond be, and is hereby, set aside and the bond cancelled. Defendant is ordered remanded to the custody of the Wayne County Sheriff, pursuant to this court's order of February 9, 1979.

Atkins' request to appeal was denied by the state Supreme Court. He then filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus under 28 U.S.C. § 2254, on November 19, 1979, requesting that the district court order either that the case be dismissed or that trial commence immediately or that the bond set by the trial court be reinstated. On April 15, 1980, the district court issued an opinion granting the writ and ordering the dismissal of the case against petitioner and his release from custody. The state appealed to this court. We affirm in part and reverse in part.

I.

A.

We consider first whether the speedy trial claim may be entertained prior to a trial on the indictment brought by the state against Atkins. ¹ A body of case law has developed holding that although § 2241 establishes jurisdiction in the federal courts to consider pretrial habeas corpus petitions, the courts should abstain from the exercise of that jurisdiction if the issues raised in the petition may be resolved either by trial on the merits in the state courts or by other state procedures available to the petitioner. See, e. g., Ex parte Royall, 117 U.S. 241, 6 S.Ct. 734, 29 L.Ed. 868 (1886); Fay v. Noia, 372 U.S. 391, 417-20, 83 S.Ct. 822, 837-838, 9 L.Ed.2d 837 (1963); Braden, supra; Moore v. DeYoung, supra; Brown v. Estelle, 530 F.2d 1280 (5th Cir. 1976); United States ex rel. Scranton v. New York, 532 F.2d 292 (2d Cir. 1976). Abstention from the exercise of the habeas corpus jurisdiction is justified by the doctrine of comity, a recognition of the concurrent jurisdiction created by our federal system of government in the separate state and national sovereignties. Intrusion into state proceedings already underway is warranted only in extraordinary circumstances. Thus the doctrine of exhaustion of state remedies has developed to protect the state courts' opportunity to confront initially and resolve constitutional issues arising within their jurisdictions and to limit federal judicial interference in state adjudicatory processes. This argument is especially forceful in a situation involving a speedy trial claim, because the drastic nature of the relief usually granted dismissal of the case, Strunk v. United States, 412 U.S. 434, 93 S.Ct. 2260, 37 L.Ed.2d 56 (1973) could not be more disruptive of pending state actions.

The general argument against consideration of speedy trial habeas corpus petitions prior to exhaustion of state remedies is closely related to the doctrine that prevents appeal of adverse rulings on speedy trial motions. United States v. MacDonald, 435 U.S. 850, 98 S.Ct. 1547, 56 L.Ed.2d 18 (1978). Although applied in the context of direct appeal from an order by a district court, much of the reasoning in MacDonald is relevant in that of pretrial habeas corpus as well. Among the reasons offered in MacDonald against pretrial appeal are that the claimed violation may be remedied by decision on the merits so that the right is not irreparably lost if review is postponed until final judgment is rendered on the merits; and that an important factor developed in Barker v. Wingo, 407 U.S. 514, 92 S.Ct. 2182, 33 L.Ed.2d 101 (1972), to determine whether the right to a speedy trial has been violated the degree of prejudice suffered by the defense cannot be adequately ascertained until after the trial has been completed. 435 U.S. at 856-61, 98 S.Ct. at 1550-1553. These arguments are relevant in the context of collateral attacks as well as direct appeals and militate against a premature grant of habeas corpus relief.

These considerations, however, do not automatically resolve the question. We must distinguish between federal court orders dismissing state court cases on speedy trial grounds and federal orders requiring a prompt state trial. On occasion federal courts have, prior to trial, issued writs of habeas corpus ordering a prompt trial. The leading case on this point is Braden v. 30th Judicial Circuit Court of Kentucky, 410 U.S. 484, 93 S.Ct. 1123, 35 L.Ed.2d 443 (1973), in which charges were pending in Kentucky against the petitioner, who was incarcerated in Alabama. Although Kentucky lodged a detainer against him, the state refused to attempt to effect his return in the near future and to grant him a trial as he had repeatedly requested. After it became evident that the state court would do nothing, the petitioner applied for habeas corpus relief requesting that Kentucky be ordered to secure his presence for trial within sixty days or dismiss the indictment. The Supreme Court held that the application could be entertained despite the fact that it was brought prior to trial. It acknowledged that the petitioner could "assert a speedy trial defense when, and if, he is finally brought to trial." 410 U.S. at 489, 93 S.Ct. at 1127. But the Court continued,

Petitioner does not, however, seek at this time to litigate a federal defense to a criminal charge, but only to demand enforcement of (Kentucky's) affirmative constitutional obligation to bring him promptly to trial. Smith v. Hooey, 393 U.S. 374 (89 S.Ct. 575, 21 L.Ed.2d 607) (1969). He has made repeated demands for trial to the courts of Kentucky, offering those courts an opportunity to consider on the merits his constitutional claim of the present denial of a speedy trial. Under these circumstances it is clear that he has exhausted all available state court remedies for consideration of that constitutional claim, even though Kentucky has not yet brought him to trial.

Id. at 489-90, 93 S.Ct. at 1127 (emphasis in original).

Thus the speedy trial clause protects two related but distinct interests: the enforcement of the state's duty to provide a prompt trial and the protection of defendants from the prejudice that arises from a state's failure to carry out that duty. As noted by the Fifth Circuit in Brown v. Estelle, supra, "(t)his distinction apparently turns upon the type of relief sought: an attempt to dismiss an indictment or otherwise prevent a prosecution" protects the defendant from prejudice and is normally not attainable by way of pretrial habeas corpus; but an attempt to force the state to go to trial may be made prior to trial, although state remedies must still be exhausted. 530 F.2d at 1283. When enforcing the state's duty, then, the exhaustion requirement does not necessitate a trial on the merits, as it usually does when a petitioner is claiming that his ability to defend at trial has been prejudiced. To require a petitioner to await completion of a trial before he may challenge the state's...