Carpentier v. Lainson, 49200

• Decision Date: 26 June 1957
• Docket Number: No. 49200,49200
• Citation: 71 A.L.R.2d 1151,248 Iowa 1275,84 N.W.2d 32
• Parties: , 71 A.L.R.2d 1151 John CARPENTIER, Petitioner-Appellee, v. Percy A. LAINSON, Warden, Iowa State Penitentiary, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: Iowa Supreme Court

Page 32

84 N.W.2d 32

248 Iowa 1275, 71 A.L.R.2d 1151

John CARPENTIER, Petitioner-Appellee, v. Percy A. LAINSON, Warden, Iowa State Penitentiary, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 49200.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

June 26, 1957.

Rehearing Denied Sept. 20, 1957.

Norman A. Erbe, Atty. Gen. of Iowa, Raphael R. R. Dvorak, First Asst. Atty. Gen., and Howard M. Remley, County Atty., Anamosa, for defendant-appellant.

Joseph L. Phelan, Fort Madison, for petitioner-appellee.

LARSON, Justice.

Due process of law under both federal and state constitutions requires that one charged with a crime receive a fair trial. The right to advice and aid of counsel in serious offenses, especially in capital offenses, is recognized in most jurisdictions including Iowa. By most authorities this representation or advice of counsel may be waived if done so intentionally and competently. The sole question involved in this case is whether, under the related circumstances, a youth of seventeen years may do so. The trial court throught he could not, but we disagree.

The facts are not in dispute. Petitioner's parents separated when he was about seven years of age. For a time he lived with his mother, two sisters, and a brother. The mother remarried and petitioner went to live with his father in California. While there he had his first brush with the law and was sent to a boys training school. After his release he returned to his mother's home in Minnesota, finished the eighth grade and, after flunking out midway in the ninth grade, came to Fort Dodge, Iowa, to visit a sister. Together with another yourth, he stole a car and headed for California. At Corydon, Iowa, he was caught and charged with the crime of larceny of a motor vehicle. Petitioner was then sixteen years of age, and the court appointed counsel to advise and aid him. To this offense he pleaded guilty and was committed to the boys training school at Eldora, Iowa, until he became 21 years old. He was assigned a work detail, and a few months later when he was 17 years old he escaped, stole a school pickup truck, and was apprehended in Indiana. When arraigned on the charge of larceny of a motor vehicle in the Hardin County District Court a few weeks later, and after being advised of his right to counsel, which he declined, he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to a term of ten years in the State Reformatory at Anamosa, Iowa. A few months later he again escaped, stole another car, was apprehended in Illinois, and returned to the reformatory. In due time he was arraigned before the Jones County District Court on another motor vehicle larceny charge. Subsequent to some negotiations with the county attorney and after being advised of his right to counsel by the court, petitioner declined said aid and pleaded guilty. As a result, he received a ten year sentence in the reformatory to run concurrently with the sentence imposed in Hardin County. Still later and before a different judge, petitioner, after being advised of his right to counsel in open court, which he again declined, pleaded guilty to the charge of escape and received an additional five years sentence in the reformatory November 10, 1951.

No appeals were taken, but after his transfer to the State Penitentiary at Fort Madison, he prepared and filed on his own behalf a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the Lee County District Court contending he was denied the services of counsel in each of the three district court cases, had no funds to hire counsel, was but seventeen years of age, and was thus denied due process of law under the state and federal constitutions. Prior to that hearing, present counsel was procured to assist him. The writ was granted, but petitioner was held under bail pending the warden's appeal to this court.

The sole question considered by the trial court was whether under the circumstances the petitioner should have been permitted to waive his right to counsel, and we shall consider no other.

I. We have often said, it is not the purpose of a habeas corpus proceeding to determine the guilt or innocence of the petitioner of the crime for which he is held, nor to pass upon errors in his trial, nor to retry the facts and pass upon the sufficiency of the evidence to sustain the charge. Unless there was no jurisdiction in the court, the judgment is not void and he cannot attack it collaterally by habeas corpus. Gibson v. Lainson, 244 Iowa 1396, 1398, 60 N.W.2d 797, 798; Reeves v. Lainson, 234 Iowa 1034, 1035, 14 N.W.2d 625; Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U.S. 458, 58 S.Ct. 1019, 82 L.Ed. 1461.

To fall within the concept of the federal as well as the state constitutions, petitioner's claim must therefore sustain his claim that the denials alleged were so fatal to a fair trial that respective courts had no jurisdiction to act in the matters before them and their judgments were void. Betts v. Brady, 316 U.S. 455, 62 S.Ct. 1252, 86 L.Ed. 1595; Sewell v. Lainson, 244 Iowa 555, 57 N.W.2d 556; State v. Karston, Iowa, 72 N.W.2d 463; Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments to Federal Constitution.

II. Generally, where an accused without counsel acquiesces in a trial resulting in his conviction, and later seeks release by the extraordinary remedy of habeas corpus, the burden rests upon him to establish that he did not competently and intelligently waive his right to assistance of counsel. There would seem to be, then, a strong presumption of regularity connected with such proceedings before the trial court. 25 Am.Jur., § 50, page 180; Johnson v. Zerbst, supra. However, it is also true in this latter case the United States Supreme Court said, courts indulge every reasonable presumption against a waiver of fundamental constitutional rights, and do not presume acquiescence in their loss, and defined waiver as ordinarily an intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right or privilege. It further said, whether one accused of crime has waived his right to the assistance of counsel for his defense must depend in each case upon the particular facts and circumstances surrounding that case, including the background experience and conduct of the accused. See Patton v. United States, 281 U.S. 276, 50 S.Ct. 253, 74 N.Ed. 854, 70 A.L.R. 263. The federal rule, it seems, is well established now that the waiver of constitutional and statutory rights to counsel is occasioned only when the accused acts understandably, competently, and intelligently. Rice v. Olson, 324 U.S. 786, 65 S.Ct. 989, 89 L.Ed. 1367; Williams v. Kaiser, 323 U.S. 471, 65 S.Ct. 363, 89 L.Ed. 398.

It is well to remember that while the Sixth Amendment to the Federal Constitution has been held to apply to all federal cases, the failure of a state court to appoint counsel is only an element of due process to be considered as a means of determining whether or not a prisoner in a given instance has had a fair trial, and that the Fourteenth Amendment does not require the appointment of counsel for indigent prisoners by state courts where such prisoners are charged with crimes less than capital. Betts v. Brady, supra, 316 U.S. 455, 62 S.Ct. 1252, 86 L.Ed. 1595; In re McKnight, C.C., 52 F. 799; Powell v. State of Alabama, 287 U.S. 45, 53 S.Ct. 55, 77 L.Ed. 158, 84 A.L.R. 527; Glasser v. United States, 315 U.S. 60, 62 S.Ct. 457, 86 L.Ed. 680.

If, then, under all the facts disclosed and the permissible inferences surrounding the conviction, the petitioner sustains his burden by showing he was treated so unfairly as to disclose a denial of due process of law, the supreme court has said it will entertain the review to determine whether petitioner had a fair trial. It is also true we said in Sewell v. Lainson, supra, at page 566 of 244 Iowa, at page 562 of 57 N.W.2d, that since the federal courts will make such a review we will do likewise should the circumstances so warrant it.

III. In Iowa, as petitioner admits, our decisions have uniformly held that an accused can waive his right to have an attorney appointed to defend him, under the constitution and under section 775.4, Code of 1954, I.C.A.; State v. Meeks, 245 Iowa 1231, 1240, 65 N.W.2d 76. In a leading case on this point we said in Korf v. Jasper County, 132 Iowa 682, 685, 108 N.W. 1031, 1032: 'The Constitution guaranties to every person accused of crime, involving his life or liberty, the assistance of counsel. Section 10, art. 1, Const. [of Iowa]. But such assistance cannot be forced upon any one not desiring it, nor is the court required to appoint counsel save upon request. [Citing cases.]' It is clear, therefore, that one charged with a crime involving life or liberty in this state may waive his right to have counsel appointed for him if he does so intentionally and competently without outside pressure or coercion.

IV. This brings us to the key question--a very troublesome one for most courts across the land. Should any minor charged with a crime involving life or liberty be permitted to waive his right to counsel, or must the court appoint counsel for him regardless of his wishes, expressed or implied? There seems to be able authority on each side of this question, although in most every instance the court states that it does not hold that a minor defendant may not waive his right to counsel in a criminal case. See Ex parte Cook, 84 Okl.Cr. 404, 183 P.2d 595; McCarty v. Hudspeth, 166 Kan. 476, 201 P.2d 658; Willey v. Hudspeth, 162 Kan. 516, 178 P.2d 246; Ex parte Grayson, 153 Tex.Cr.R. 91, 217 S.W.2d 1007; People v. Adomaitis, 201 Misc. 707, 112 N.Y.S.2d 38; Haughey v. Smyth, 187 Va. 320, 321, 46 S.E.2d 419. Also see discussion in Right to Counsel, by Beaney, page 114 (Univ. of Mich. Pub.)

It seems, however, in most of the cases we have been able to find, the rule is applied without exception that the defendant must waive, intentionally, understandably, and competently, without coercion, to be effective; and to determine this fact, evidence as to his education, mental capacity, experience, and understanding, is...