Henderson v. Bannan

• Decision Date: 04 June 1958
• Docket Number: No. 13208.,13208.
• Citation: 256 F.2d 363
• Parties: James HENDERSON, Appellant, v. William H. BANNAN, Warden, Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

256 F.2d 363 (1958)

James HENDERSON, Appellant, v. William H. BANNAN, Warden, Appellee.

No. 13208.

United States Court of Appeals Sixth Circuit.

June 4, 1958.

Ernest Goodman, Detroit, Mich. (Goodman, Crockett, Eden & Robb, G. Leslie Field, Detroit, Mich., on the brief), for appellant.

Samuel J. Torina, Lansing, Mich. (Thomas M. Kavanagh, Atty. Gen., Daniel J. O'Hara, Perry A. Maynard, Asst. Attys. Gen., on the brief), for appellee.

Before McALLISTER, MILLER and STEWART, Circuit Judges.

McALLISTER, Circuit Judge.

This is an appeal from an order of the district court denying appellant's petition for a writ of habeas corpus.

Appellant was arrested on August 5, 1942, for the crime of rape. He pleaded guilty on that day and was sentenced to life imprisonment by the Circuit Court for Macomb County, Michigan. More than five years after he had been sentenced to prison, on October 20, 1947, appellant filed with the Circuit Court for Macomb County an application for leave to file a delayed motion for a new trial and to set aside the sentence imposed upon him. In his motion for a new trial, he set forth, among other contentions, that his constitutional rights were disregarded on his trial, and that he did not have the assistance of counsel. He further set forth that he had not known the full consequences of a plea of guilty; but he did not claim that he was innocent of the crime charged. The Circuit Court thereafter denied appellant's application to file a delayed motion for a new trial, on March 31, 1948.

On June 24, 1952, a further motion for a new trial was filed by counsel presently representing appellant. The Circuit Court for Macomb County denied this motion also.

Thereafter, application for leave to appeal to the Michigan Supreme Court was filed, and, in June, 1953, was denied without opinion.

A petition for a writ of certiorari was then filed with the United States Supreme Court; but before that court had taken any action upon the application, the Michigan Supreme Court, on the petition of the Attorney General of Michigan, in 1953, remanded the case to the Circuit Court of Macomb County for the purpose of taking additional evidence, and for reconsideration.

On the remand, the Circuit Court for Macomb County heard twelve witnesses in open court, including appellant, and in a written opinion, again denied the motion for a new trial.

An appeal was taken to the Michigan Supreme Court, which, in a comprehensive opinion, People v. Henderson, 343 Mich. 465, 72 N.W.2d 177, affirmed the order denying a new trial. Thereafter, a motion for rehearing was denied. Subsequently, a petition to the United States Supreme Court for a writ of certiorari was denied. 351 U.S. 967, 76 S.Ct. 1033, 100 L.Ed. 1487.

After the conclusion of all the above proceedings, appellant filed the petition for a writ of habeas corpus in this case, on August 1, 1956, in the district court, and, on December 21, 1956, Judge Lederle, after filing findings of fact and conclusions of law, denied the petition for the writ. From the denial of the petition, appeal was taken to this court.

On this appeal from the order of the district court denying the writ of habeas corpus, Henderson claims: (1) that his conviction and sentence were not in accordance with the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, under the circumstances disclosed by the record, since he was without legal counsel and was not offered counsel; and (2) that appellant was denied due process, under the circumstances disclosed by the record, since his plea and conviction took place at a specially convened night session of the court, and that he pleaded guilty because of fear of action by a mob then surrounding the courthouse.

The more detailed factual background of the case, as appears from the state court hearing on the plea of guilty, is as follows: Appellant, a Negro, had resided in Mount Clemens, Macomb County, Michigan, for about seven years before the incidents herein related. On the morning of July 29, 1942, he obtained a job at a tavern near Mount Clemens. This job required that he live on the premises. At about midnight of his first day of work, the manager of the tavern asked a waitress, who was a young married white woman, to drive appellant, in her car, to the place where he stayed in Mount Clemens, in order that he could pick up his clothing, and then to bring him back to the tavern. She agreed, and proceeded to drive appellant to the place where he stayed. It was during this drive that, after midnight, the claimed rape occurred. Immediately thereafter, appellant disappeared. In the morning, the woman filed a complaint against him, charging him with the crime of rape committed against her. It appears that appellant went that night to Detroit, afterward to Ypsilanti, and then to Chicago where he got a job for a few days. He subsequently went to South Bend, Indiana, and on August 5, came back to Ypsilanti, on his way to Mount Clemens, where he had been waiting to be drafted into the Army. He returned because he thought the time had arrived for the draft. While in Ypsilanti, he stopped with friends who told him that the police had been at their home looking for him; and they showed him a newspaper stating that he was wanted for rape. Appellant's friends then told him that if he were not guilty, he had better go back to Mount Clemens and see what he was wanted for. Appellant replied to them that there was nothing for him to do except turn himself in. He went to the State Police Office in Ypsilanti and identified himself. The State Police then took him to their barracks near Detroit, where the Mount Clemens police met him and took him to the jail in Mount Clemens. Appellant stated that he was questioned at the jail and that he there signed a confession. Some hours later, he was taken to the courtroom of Judge James Spier, the Circuit Judge for Macomb County, about 10:00 p. m. Thereafter, Judge Spier arrived and opened court about 10:20 p. m. The case against appellant was then called and the information which charged him with rape was read, in open court. There then took place a comprehensive questioning and examination by Judge Spier, and by the Prosecuting Attorney.

Proceedings on Plea of Guilty.

Judge Spier first inquired of Henderson whether he knew what he was charged with, and appellant replied that he did. In answer to the questions of the court, appellant stated that he wanted to plead guilty of his own free will; that nobody had threatened him, or "beat up" on him, or promised him anything to get him to plead guilty; and that the reason he pleaded guilty was because he had actually forced the woman to have intercourse with him. In response to questions of the prosecuting attorney, appellant stated, in open court, that he had wanted to tell the prosecutor "all about it" when the latter came to the jail; that the prosecutor had explained what his constitutional rights were; that everything the appellant told the prosecutor was of his own free will, and done with knowledge that it could be used against him; that he wanted to make a full confession and get the matter over; that he was told, by the prosecutor, that no threats or promises or inducements of any kind could be made or offered to get him to make any statement; that no one could in any way intimidate him or use any force to make him confess; that no such tactics were used upon him, by any police or law enforcement officer; and that no one had laid hands upon him, or touched him.

Appellant told the court, further, that he had never seen the woman before that one day that he worked at the tavern, where she was a waitress. He stated that his job was to rise early in the morning, to clean the place up. It was understood that he was to stay out of the public part of the tavern. Appellant further stated that the manager of the place, in his presence, had asked the young woman if she would drive appellant to his place to get his clothes; and that she, at the request of, and as an accommodation to the manager, agreed. Appellant then told the court that, that night he had with him a piece of steel about fourteen inches long, with black cloth around it; that, after the young woman had driven him a certain distance, he took the steel out of a bag and "made out" that it was a knife; that he then threatened her with the "knife," to frighten her into submitting to intercourse with him; that he made her stop and get out of the car; that the girl was in fear of her life, because of his threats with the knife, and told him: "Don't hurt me, I will do anything you want"; and that, because of her fear of being killed, she let him have intercourse with her. After getting into the car again, he had her continue to drive and then forced her to have intercourse again with him; that "the second time I did not threaten her, but I guess she was still scared from the first time from seeing (the knife) so she said `put it away, I am going to do what you said.'" In answer to the question of the circuit judge, appellant stated that when he had intercourse with the girl, he knew she was in fear of her life, and that that was the reason she submitted. Finally, on the highway to Detroit, appellant had the car stopped and got out. He stated that he had taken everything the girl had in her purse, amounting to $2.90. She had practically no gasoline left, and when he was leaving her in the midst of the country, sometime after midnight, and had no money to get any gas, as he told the court, he gave her back fifty cents of the money that he had taken from her.

Appellant, at the time he pleaded guilty, told the court that he had previously been convicted of robbery, unarmed, in Detroit, Michigan, and had been sentenced to serve one to ten years. After serving eighteen months in the Ionia Reformatory, he had been released. Appellant had also been arrested in Cleveland, Ohio, for having intercourse with a girl under the age of...