Burford v. State

• Decision Date: 21 December 1992
• Citation: 845 S.W.2d 204
• Parties: Daryl K. BURFORD, Appellant, v. STATE of Tennessee, Appellee.
• Court: Tennessee Supreme Court

Page 204

845 S.W.2d 204

Daryl K. BURFORD, Appellant, v. STATE of Tennessee, Appellee.

Supreme Court of Tennessee at Nashville.

Dec. 21, 1992.

Comer L. Donnell, Dist. Public Defender, Lebanon, for appellant.

Charles W. Burson, Atty. Gen. & Reporter, and Kimbra R. Spann, Asst. Atty. Gen., Nashville, for appellee.

OPINION

ANDERSON, Justice.

In this case, the only issue presented for our review is whether the petitioner's claim for post-conviction relief is barred by the three-year statute of limitations contained in Tenn.Code Ann. Sec. 40-30-102. Clearly, the post-conviction claim here was filed more than three years after the "final action of the state's highest appellate court" and ordinarily would have been barred under the plain language of the statute. However, the grounds for relief (earlier enhancing convictions were declared void) occurred after the "state's highest appellate court" action, and the question arose as to the effect of the later arising grounds on the statute of limitations period. The trial court found that the petitioner's claim was barred and dismissed the petition. The Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed. We conclude that, while the statute of limitations is not unconstitutional on its face, it is unconstitutional as applied in petitioner's case because it denies him due process under the state and federal constitutions. Therefore, we hold that the petition is not barred by the statute of limitations. As a result, we reverse the Court of Criminal Appeals judgment dismissing the petition and remand for an evidentiary hearing.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

On August 11, 1976, the petitioner, Daryl K. Burford, pled guilty and was convicted on five counts of armed robbery in Wilson County. On November 18, 1982, Burford was convicted of simple robbery in Davidson County. On November 28, 1984, Burford was convicted of robbery with a deadly weapon once again in Wilson County. At the sentencing hearing, the State used this conviction and the five robbery convictions from 1976 to establish that Burford was an habitual criminal and, as a result, he was sentenced to life.

On February 20, 1985, Burford was convicted of robbery with a deadly weapon in Trousdale County. The State used this conviction and the 1976 robbery convictions to have Burford sentenced as a persistent offender to 50 years, with the sentence running concurrent to the life sentence he was already serving. The Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the conviction and the sentence, and we denied Burford's application for permission to appeal on August 4, 1986.

In 1988 Burford filed a petition for post-conviction relief in Wilson County. The petition alleged that the 1976 robbery convictions were constitutionally infirm because Burford had not been advised of his right against self incrimination before he pled guilty, and therefore, the 1984 life sentence for being an habitual criminal, which was based upon the 1976 convictions, was invalid. On October 24, 1988, the Wilson County Criminal Court granted Burford relief, holding four of the 1976 convictions to be void and vacating the 1984 life sentence. The trial court resentenced Burford on the 1984 robbery conviction to a term of forty years, to be served concurrently with any other sentences. Neither Burford nor the State appealed the trial court's ruling.

On May 10, 1990, Burford filed the present post-conviction action in Trousdale County. The petition alleged that the 50-year persistent offender sentence imposed upon him for the 1985 robbery conviction was excessive in light of the fact that four of the 1976 robbery convictions had been set aside by the Wilson County Criminal Court. The State defended on the basis of waiver and the three-year statute of limitations contained in Tenn.Code Ann. Sec. 40-30-102.

The Trousdale County Criminal Court found that the three-year statute of limitations began to run on the 1985 conviction when this Court denied Burford's application for permission to appeal on August 4, 1986. Since the petition was not filed until May 10, 1990, the trial court found that Burford's claim was barred by the statute of limitations. The Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed.

POST-CONVICTION STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS

The U.S. Supreme Court recommended, in Case v. Nebraska, 381 U.S. 336, 85 S.Ct. 1486, 14 L.Ed.2d 422 (1965), that the states create post-conviction procedures for addressing alleged constitutional errors occurring during the conviction process in order to supplement habeas corpus remedies. The General Assembly of Tennessee responded to that recommendation in 1967 by enacting the Post-Conviction Procedure Act. See Luttrell v. State, 644 S.W.2d 408, 409 (Tenn.Crim.App.1982). See also 1967 Tenn.Pub. Acts, ch. 310.

Under the Act, a prisoner may file a petition for post-conviction relief with the clerk of the court where the conviction occurred, Tenn.Code Ann. Sec. 40-30-103 (1990), and "[r]elief shall be granted when the conviction or sentence is void or voidable because of the abridgement in any way of any right guaranteed by the constitution of this state or the Constitution of the United States." Tenn.Code Ann. Sec. 40-30-105 (1990). Prior to the 1986 amendment to the Act, a prisoner could petition for post-conviction relief under the Act "at any time after he ha[d] exhausted his appellate remedies and before the sentence ha[d] expired or ha[d] been fully satisfied." Tenn.Code Ann. Sec. 40-30-102 (1982). In 1986, however, the legislature passed Tenn.Pub.Acts, ch. 634, which amended Sec. 40-30-102 to provide that

[a] prisoner in custody under sentence of a court of this state must petition for post-conviction relief under this chapter within three (3) years of the date of the final action of the highest state appellate court to which an appeal is taken or consideration of such petition shall be barred.

The petitioner contends that his claim for relief is not barred by the statute of limitations because he did not have a claim for relief in Trousdale County until the Wilson County Criminal Court set aside four of the 1976 robbery convictions. In other words, Burford argues that the statute of limitations did not begin to run until the 1976 convictions were set aside, thereby exposing to collateral attack the persistent offender sentence imposed after the Trousdale County conviction in 1985.

The petitioner argues in the alternative that we should strike down the statute of limitations as a violation of due process under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, and Article 1, Sec. 8 of the Tennessee Constitution, because it prevents the assertion of constitutional rights in collateral challenges to convictions and sentences solely on the basis of a time bar. In addition, the defendant argues that application of the statute of limitations to bar his petition for post-conviction relief deprives him of liberty without due process because he will have to serve the persistent offender sentence despite the fact that four of the five convictions used to enhance his sentence have been set aside.

The State, on the other hand, contends that the statute of limitations began to run on the Trousdale County conviction and sentence when this Court denied Burford's application for permission to appeal that conviction on August 4, 1986. Since the petition for post-conviction relief was not filed in Trousdale County until May 10 1990, the State argues that the claim is barred.

The State also argues that it was well within the legislature's power to enact the three-year statute of limitations, and that the statute does not violate due process because it provides a reasonable period of time in which claims can be asserted. In addition, the State contends that application of Tenn.Code Ann. Sec. 40-30-102 to bar Burford's petition does not deprive him of his due process rights.

The Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which is applicable to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment, see Malloy v. Hogan, 378 U.S. 1, 84 S.Ct. 1489, 12 L.Ed.2d 653 (1964), provides, in part, that "[n]o person shall ... be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law." In addition, the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides, in part, that "[n]o state shall ... deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law." The corresponding provision of the Tennessee Constitution provides "[t]hat no man shall be taken or imprisoned, or disseized of his freehold, liberties or privileges, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any manner destroyed or deprived of his life, liberty or property, but by the judgment of his peers or the law of the land." Tenn. Const. art. I, Sec. 8.

Although the language of these provisions is different, the "law of the land" provision of Article I, Sec. 8 of the Tennessee Constitution has been construed as synonymous with the "due process of law" provisions of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution. See Daugherty v. State, 216 Tenn. 666, 393 S.W.2d 739 (1965). However, U.S. Supreme Court interpretations of the due process clauses of the U.S. Constitution only establish a minimum level of protection, and this Court, as the final arbiter of the Tennessee Constitution, is always free to expand the minimum level of protection mandated by the federal constitution. Doe v. Norris, 751 S.W.2d 834, 838 (Tenn.1988).

Identification of the precise dictates of due process requires consideration of both the governmental interests involved and the private interests affected by the official action. Fusari v. Steinberg, 419 U.S. 379, 389, 95 S.Ct. 533, 539, 42 L.Ed.2d 521, 529 (1975). The Tennessee Post-Conviction Procedure Act only provides relief for a prisoner in custody under sentence of a court of this state "when the conviction or sentence is void or voidable because of the abridgement in any way of any right guaranteed by the constitution of this state or the...