Crawford v. State

• Decision Date: 08 September 2017
• Docket Number: Court of Appeals No. A-10855.
• Citation: 404 P.3d 204
• Parties: Keane-Alexander CRAWFORD, Appellant, v. STATE of Alaska, Appellee.
• Court: Alaska Court of Appeals

404 P.3d 204

Keane-Alexander CRAWFORD, Appellant,

v.STATE of Alaska, Appellee.

Court of Appeals No. A-10855.

Court of Appeals of Alaska.

September 8, 2017

Rehearing Denied October 20, 2017

Keane-Alexander Crawford, in propria persona, Seward, for the Appellant. Andrew Steiner, Attorney at Law, Bend, Oregon, appearing at the Court's request to argue the Appellant's position.

Diane L. Wendlandt, Assistant Attorney General, Office of Criminal Appeals, Anchorage, and Craig W. Richards, Attorney General, Juneau, for the Appellee. Douglas O. Moody, Assistant Public Defender, and Quinlan Steiner, Public Defender, Anchorage, appearing for amicus curiae Alaska Public Defender Agency, aligned with the Appellee.

Chad Holt, Deputy Public Advocate, Anchorage (the brief), Margaret McWilliams, Assistant Public Advocate, Juneau (oral argument), and Richard Allen, Public Advocate, Anchorage, appearing for amicus curiae Office of Public Advocacy, aligned with the Appellee.

Before: Mannheimer, Chief Judge, Allard, Judge, and Suddock, Superior Court Judge.^*

OPINION

Judge MANNHEIMER.

If a person is charged with a crime by the State of Alaska, and if that person is unable to afford a private defense attorney, that person is entitled to the services of a defense attorney at public expense under the auspices of either the Public Defender Agency or the Office of Public Advocacy.¹

The pertinent statute, AS 18.85.100(a), actually declares that indigent criminal defendants are entitled to two types of services at public expense: (1) "to be represented ... by an attorney to the same extent as a person retaining an attorney is entitled", and (2) "to be provided with the necessary services and facilities of this representation, including investigation and other preparation."

Thus, when a criminal defendant receives the services of a court-appointed attorney through either the Public Defender Agency or the Office of Public Advocacy, the defendant is entitled to have the agency provide the necessary incidents of that legal representation—for example, to pay for any necessary clerical support, investigative services, and expert evaluations and testimony.

The defendant in this case, Keane-Alexander Crawford, was charged with murder for shooting and killing his sister's fiancé, Anthony Brown, following a physical altercation between the two men. Crawford qualified for representation at public expense, but he waived his right to counsel and chose to represent himself. (There were various times during the trial court proceedings when Crawford received court-appointed "standby counsel" to assist him, but Crawford remained in control of the litigation of his case.)

At various times during the pre-trial proceedings in this case, Crawford asked the superior court to supply him with public funds to hire a number of expert witnesses. In one instance (a request to hire a DNA testing laboratory), Crawford identified the type of expert evidence that he wished to introduce, and he explained why he believed that this evidence would be important to his defense. After hearing Crawford's explanation, the superior court ruled that reasonable attorneys would not spend money for the DNA testing that Crawford proposed, so the superior court denied Crawford's request for funds. Crawford has not appealed this ruling.

Aside from this one instance, Crawford failed to apprise the superior court of concrete, case-specific reasons why he wanted to retain the various experts he talked about, and he failed to explain why these experts' evaluations or analyses would constitute a significant component of his defense case.

The superior court denied Crawford's various requests for public funds to hire experts, and Crawford now argues that the superior court's rulings on this issue violated his right to due process of law.

In particular, Crawford argues that the superior court committed error when the court denied Crawford's request for public funds to hire a medical expert. In his brief to this Court, Crawford asserts that he needed a medical expert who might support Crawford's assertions (1) that just before the shooting, the victim, Anthony Brown, strangled Crawford to the point where Crawford became unconscious or semi-conscious, and (2) that as a result of this alleged strangulation, even after Crawford regained consciousness, he was "deprived ... of the ability to accurately or rationally perceive his surroundings, including what he [mistakenly] believed to be his pursuit by Brown."

As we explain in more detail in this opinion, we reject Crawford's claim of error because Crawford never informed the superior court of this theory of relevance when he made his requests for a medical expert. Under the pertinent decisions of the United States Supreme Court, an indigent defendant who seeks public funding for an expert must affirmatively explain the significance of, and the need for, that particular type of expert analysis. Because Crawford never informed the superior court of the theory that he currently proposes for needing a medical expert's analysis, we hold that the superior court did not commit error when it denied Crawford's request for public funding.

To analyze Crawford's case, we must discuss other legal issues. Paramount among these issues is the question of whether an indigent criminal defendant is entitled to have the Public Defender Agency or the Office of Public Advocacy provide the funding for litigation support services—for example, clerical and secretarial services, investigative services, and consultation with experts—even though the indigent defendant declines legal representation at public expense through these agencies.

To answer this question, we must interpret AS 18.85.100(a) —the statute that guarantees indigent defendants "[representation] by an attorney to the same extent as a person retaining an attorney" and "the necessary services and facilities of this representation". More specifically, we must decide whether the services described in this statute are a unified package of services that indigent defendants are entitled to receive when they invoke their right to counsel at public expense—or whether, instead, indigent defendants have a right to demand that the Public Defender Agency or the Office of Public Advocacy provide them with ancillary "services and facilities" at public expense even if they reject the assistance of a publicly funded attorney.

In our earlier decision in Crawford's case— Crawford v. State , 337 P.3d 4 (Alaska App. 2014) —we addressed this question of statutory interpretation but did not answer it. Instead, because this is an issue of first impression in Alaska, and because the resolution of this issue will obviously affect many other criminal defendants, we asked for supplemental briefing—not only from Crawford and the State, but also from the Public Defender Agency and the Office of Public Advocacy. When those two agencies informed us that their interests in this litigation were adverse to Crawford's interests, we allowed the agencies to file amicus curiae briefs, but we appointed independent counsel to argue Crawford's side of this issue.

Now, having fully considered this matter, we conclude that the various services described in AS 18.85.100(a)(1)-(2) are one integrated whole. The statute guarantees this package of services to indigent defendants who invoke their right to counsel at public expense. But the statute does not create separate and severable guarantees of public funding for each service listed in the statute.

We additionally conclude (for reasons explained in this opinion) that Alaska Administrative Rule 12(e) does not authorize a court to directly appoint investigators or experts for criminal defendants.

Administrative Rule 12(e) authorizes a court to appoint "counsel, or a guardian ad litem, or other representative" for an indigent person if the court determines that the appointment is not authorized by AS 18.85.100(a), and that the appointment is required by law or rule. Although Rule 12(e) anticipates that attorneys and guardians ad litem appointed under this rule might need the services of investigators or expert witnesses (and might ask the Court System to pay for these services), Rule 12(e) does not authorize a trial court to provide money directly to pro se defendants who wish to obtain these investigative or expert services.

Our interpretation of AS 18.85.100(a) and Administrative Rule 12(e) raises other significant questions.

First, there is the question of whether it is constitutional for a state to link representative services and ancillary services in this manner—that is, can the state require indigent criminal defendants to accept legal representation at public expense in order to obtain the other litigation support services at public expense?

Second, if it is not constitutional to link these services—in other words, if indigent defendants who reject legal representation at public expense are nevertheless entitled to public funding for other litigation support services such as clerical staff, investigators, and experts—then where is this public funding to come from?

We raise these questions because, ultimately, they must be answered, and because (depending on the answers) our legislature may be required to take action.

We now explain our conclusions in more detail.

Crawford's constitutional right to have expert witnesses and other support services funded at public expense, even though Alaska statutes and court rules currently do not provide public funding for these support services

As a matter of constitutional law, indigent criminal defendants have a circumscribed right to obtain the services of experts at public expense. The seminal case on this point of law is Ake v. Oklahoma .²

The indigent defendant in Ake was prosecuted for murder. Ake's attorney wished to present a defense of insanity, but the trial court refused a defense request to have Ake examined by a psychiatrist at public expense.³ The Supreme Court reversed...