Brown v. State

• Decision Date: 20 May 2015
• Docket Number: No. A14–1542.,A14–1542.
• Citation: 863 N.W.2d 781
• Parties: Jacob Stephen BROWN, petitioner, Appellant, v. STATE of Minnesota, Respondent.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

863 N.W.2d 781

Jacob Stephen BROWN, petitioner, Appellant

v.STATE of Minnesota, Respondent.

No. A14–1542.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

May 20, 2015.

Jacob Stephen Brown, Lino Lakes, MN, pro se.

Lori Swanson, Attorney General, Saint Paul, MN; and Michael O. Freeman, Hennepin County Attorney, Lee W. Barry, Assistant Hennepin County Attorney, Minneapolis, MN, for respondent.

Considered and decided by the court without oral argument.

OPINION

DIETZEN, Justice.

Appellant Jacob Stephen Brown pleaded guilty in 1988 to first-degree murder of his estranged girlfriend, Carmen Larson, and attempted first-degree murder of her friend, M.R. The district court accepted Brown's pleas and sentenced him to consecutive terms of life in prison and 130 months. After expiration of the postconviction statute of limitations under Minn.Stat. § 590.01, subd. 4(a) (2014), Brown filed his fifth request for postconviction relief, claiming his guilty pleas were not knowing, voluntary, and intelligent. He argued his claim was not time-barred because it satisfied three of the exceptions to the statute of limitations: (1) a mental disease precluded a timely assertion of his claim, (2) his claim was based on newly discovered evidence, and (3) the interests of justice required consideration of his claim. Id., subd. 4(b). The postconviction court summarily denied Brown's petition as time-barred.¹ Because the record conclusively shows that Brown's claim fails to satisfy any of the exceptions to the postconviction statute of limitations under Minn.Stat. § 590.01, subd. 4(b), we affirm.

In 1988, Brown pleaded guilty to first-degree murder of Larson and attempted first-degree murder of M.R.² See Minn.Stat. §§ 609.17 ; 609.185 (2014). The district court accepted Brown's pleas and sentenced him to consecutive terms of life in prison and 130 months. Brown subsequently filed a petition for postconviction relief seeking to make the sentences run concurrently pursuant to a “side agreement” allegedly made at the time the pleas were entered. The postconviction court granted the petition, and ordered that the sentences run concurrently. Brown v. State (Brown I ), 449 N.W.2d 180, 182 (Minn.1989).

At the hearing on this postconviction petition, Brown also made a motion to withdraw his guilty pleas. The postconviction court denied the motion, and we affirmed the denial, concluding that the record was adequate to support Brown's pleas. Id. at 182–83.

In 1990, Brown filed a second postconviction petition seeking to withdraw his guilty pleas. Brown v. State (Brown II ), 481 N.W.2d 852, 852 (Minn.1992). He claimed that he had lacked the mental capacity to enter a guilty plea, and that he was innocent because he had an alibi that the state was aware of when he pleaded guilty. Id. at 853. The postconviction court conducted an evidentiary hearing at which Brown introduced the testimony of his mother and presented oral argument. Id. The postconviction court denied the petition, and we affirmed, concluding that there was no error and that the court properly denied the petition because Brown “failed to prove by a preponderance of the evidence that he lacked the mental capacity to enter a valid guilty plea.”Id. We held that there was “no evidence of mental incompetence.” Id.

Brown filed a third petition for postconviction relief in 1995 that alleged several grounds for relief, including that the plea procedures violated procedural rules, that the State had failed to fulfill the plea agreement, and that his conviction was the result of racial discrimination. In that petition, Brown asked for specific performance of the agreement that he claimed had induced him to enter his pleas. The postconviction court summarily denied his petition for relief, and we affirmed by an order. Brown v. State, No. C6–95–718, Order at 1 (Minn. filed Jan. 27, 1997).

In 2007, Brown filed a fourth petition for postconviction relief, arguing that his guilty pleas should be withdrawn as involuntary because he was incompetent when the pleas were entered, based on two psychiatric evaluations from 2006 diagnosing him with paranoid schizophrenia. Brown v. State

(Brown III ), 746 N.W.2d 640, 641 (Minn.2008). The postconviction court denied the petition without an evidentiary hearing, concluding that the 2006 psychiatric evaluation provided little information regarding Brown's mental state 20 years earlier, and that Brown's argument that his pleas were involuntary had previously been rejected by this court. Id. We affirmed, concluding that Brown's arguments were procedurally barred by State v. Knaffla, 309 Minn. 246, 252, 243 N.W.2d 737, 741 (1976). Brown III, 746 N.W.2d at 642.

Brown has now filed his fifth postconviction petition, under Minn.Stat. § 590.01, subd. 1, arguing that his guilty pleas should be withdrawn as involuntary because he was incompetent at the time they were entered, based on four documents that he describes as newly discovered evidence of his mental illness.

The first document is a one-page report from a consulting psychiatrist at the Minnesota Correctional Facility in Saint Cloud, Dr. Richard G. Lunzer (“Lunzer report”). This report is dated August 16, 1988, 11 days after Brown's conviction, and summarizes Dr. Lunzer's psychiatric interview with Brown. The Lunzer report noted that Brown “admits that he hears voices which are apparently female and he sometimes talks to them.” Lunzer noted that Brown is “extremely articulate and intelligent” and that “he will remain quite independent and self-sufficient.” Lunzer opined that Brown's responses “certainly reflected the kind of stress that a person would experience having committed the crimes that he is guilty of.”

The second document is a memorandum dated October 1, 2008, from Ronald H. Weill, a psychologist, to the Commissioner's Advisory Panel for the Minnesota Department of Corrections (“Weill report”).³ Weill summarized Brown's participation in psychotherapy and diagnosed Brown with schizophrenia, paranoid type. Brown disclosed examples to Weill of how he was paranoid in the Navy, including Brown's belief that he was the victim of medical experimentation by the military. Brown told Weill that he believed Larson was plotting to kill him the day he went to her residence, and that he has hallucinations that usually involve seeing his mother or his victim in his cell. Weill said that Brown had “above average intelligence” and had no trouble maintaining consistent employment and appropriate hygiene. Weill concluded that Brown's “mental illness is a key factor to understanding his offense and to reducing his risk to others in the future.”

The third document is a U.S. Navy medical history report dated July 30, 1987, completed by Brown and signed by Warrant Officer James A. Fleck (“Fleck report”). In the report, which was written more than a year before Brown's guilty pleas, Brown stated he was depressed and suffered from a number of ailments. Brown checked “yes” to the question, “Have you ever been treated for a mental condition?”

The fourth document is an affidavit of Jerome C. Samuelson, Brown's former defense counsel, dated June 10, 1988, which was two months prior to Brown's pleas (“Samuelson affidavit”). The affidavit was drafted in response to a meeting between Brown and the prosecutors at which Samuelson was not present. In the affidavit, Samuelson observed that Brown was “under a great deal of stress because of the enormity of the charge against him, and in no emotional position to waive rights or make professional decisions without professional counsel.” The Samuelson affidavit was part of Brown's second postconviction petition.

The postconviction court denied Brown's fifth petition for postconviction relief without an evidentiary hearing. The court held in part that Brown's claims were time-barred by the postconviction statute of limitations, Minn.Stat. § 590.01. Brown submitted a letter to the postconviction court, along with the Weill report, asking the court to reconsider its ruling. The postconviction court again denied Brown's petition. This appeal follows.

I.

We review the denial of a petition for postconviction relief for an abuse of discretion. Riley v. State, 819 N.W.2d 162, 167 (Minn.2012). We review legal issues de novo, but our review of factual matters is limited to whether there is sufficient evidence in the record to support the postconviction court's findings. Rickert v. State, 795 N.W.2d 236, 239 (Minn.2011). We do not reverse the postconviction court “unless the postconviction court exercised its discretion in an arbitrary or capricious manner, based its ruling on an erroneous view of the law, or made clearly erroneous factual findings.” Reed v. State, 793 N.W.2d 725, 729 (Minn.2010).

A postconviction court need not grant a hearing on a claim if the files and records of the proceeding conclusively establish that the petitioner is not entitled to relief. Minn.Stat. § 590.04, subd. 1 (2014). Accordingly, a postconviction court may summarily deny a claim that is time barred by the postconviction statute of limitations. Riley, 819 N.W.2d at 170–71.

The postconviction statute of limitations provides that “[n]o petition for postconviction relief may be filed more than two years after the later of (1) the entry of judgment of conviction or sentence if no direct appeal is filed; or (2) an appellate court's disposition of petitioner's direct appeal.” Minn.Stat. § 590.01, subd. 4(a).⁴ However, when this statute was enacted, the Legislature provided a two-year grace period for anyone whose conviction became final before August 1, 2005. Act of June 2, 2005, ch. 136, art. 14, § 13, 2005 Minn. Laws 1080, 1098 (codified at Minn.Stat. § 590.01 ). Therefore, Brown had until July 31, 2007, to file a petition for postconviction relief. Brown acknowledges that his current, fifth petition was filed several years past that date. Nevertheless, he argues his petition is not time barred because it satisfies three of the exceptions to the statute of...