Jett v. Castaneda, 78-1198

• Decision Date: 21 July 1978
• Docket Number: No. 78-1198,78-1198
• Citation: 578 F.2d 842
• Parties: Lee B. JETT, Warden, Federal Correctional Institute, Terminal Island, and the United States of America, Appellants, v. Marcus Robert CASTANEDA, Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

Page 842

578 F.2d 842

Lee B. JETT, Warden, Federal Correctional Institute Terminal Island, and the United States of America Appellants, v. Marcus Robert CASTANEDA, Appellee.

No. 78-1198.

United States Court of Appeals Ninth Circuit.

July 21, 1978.

Robert Ramsey, Jr., Asst. U. S. Atty., Los Angeles, Cal., for appellants.

James R. Dunn, Federal Public Defender, Los Angeles, Cal., for appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California.

Before TRASK, GOODWIN and TANG, Circuit Judges.

GOODWIN, Circuit Judge:

The warden of the Federal Correctional Institute, Terminal Island, appeals a judgment of contempt entered upon the application of Marcus Robert Castaneda, a prisoner. We reverse.

Castaneda was an inmate of Terminal Island, and while there became the prime suspect in a fatal stabbing that occurred in the prison yard. During the investigation he refused to answer questions until he talked with the assistant Public Defender who had represented him previously. Investigators then notified that attorney, who thereupon filed a motion in the district court for his appointment as Castaneda's counsel. The district court granted the motion.

Because of possible defenses of self-defense and insanity, the attorney also desired a list of and access to witnesses to the stabbing and an opportunity for a psychiatrist to examine Castaneda. The attorney presented motions and the district court entered orders without notice to the warden or to the United States Attorney. After a series of events partially described in United States v. Castaneda, 571 F.2d 444, 448 (9th Cir. 1977) (two opinions), which culminated in this finding of contempt against the warden, this court stayed the district court's actions pending appeal.

A threshold question is whether the district court had the authority to appoint an attorney for Castaneda before charges relating to the stabbing had been filed. The government now concedes this point, but because the district court and Castaneda's attorney treated the right to counsel as the jurisdictional basis for all that followed we will consider it independently.

The Criminal Justice Act, 18 U.S.C. § 3006A, provides for the appointment of counsel for anyone "for whom the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution requires the appointment of counsel or for whom, in a case in which he faces loss of liberty, any Federal law requires the appointment of counsel." § 3006A(a)(4).

The right to counsel during preindictment custodial interrogation is settled law. Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 469-73, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966); Escobedo v. Illinois, 378 U.S. 478, 484-85, 84 S.Ct. 1758, 12 L.Ed.2d 977 (1964). This right includes appointed counsel if the suspect is indigent. Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. at 472-73, 86 S.Ct. 1602. The right attaches to any custodial interrogation, even if the custody involves a different charge from that under which the suspect is held. Mathis v. United States, 391 U.S. 1, 88 S.Ct. 1503, 20 L.Ed.2d 381 (1968).

The right to counsel during custodial interrogation implements the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. It does not proceed directly from the Sixth Amendment. However, this constitutional rationale need not detract from the district court's power under § 3006A. While a literal reading of § 3006A appears to limit its applicability to the Sixth Amendment right to counsel, the intent of Congress was clearly broader. Congress acted after Mathis, Miranda, and Escobedo, and it intended by its action to extend the "coverage of the act to include those instances where judicial decisions may require the appointment of counsel * * *." Its purpose was to obviate "the need to amend the act each time the right to counsel may be extended to new situations". H.Rep. No. 91-1546 (October 5, 1970), in 1970 U.S.Code Cong. and Admin.News, pp. 3982, 3988. In the light of this history, we are satisfied that Congress used "Sixth Amendment" as shorthand for "constitutional right to counsel", whatever the specific derivation of the right. The district court had the power to appoint counsel for Castaneda, and it acted correctly in doing so. ¹

The district court's jurisdiction under § 3006A extended, however, only to the appointment of counsel. The power of a court to enter discovery orders in a criminal investigation when no case is pending before any court presents difficult problems of separation of powers. Granted, as Judge Chambers suggested earlier in this litigation (United States v. Castaneda, 571 F.2d at 445), something in the nature of mandamus under the All Writs Act, 28 U.S.C. § 1651, might have been available under appropriate procedure. But the informality of the procedures followed in this case led nowhere but to confusion, and to confusion compounded.

Federal courts exercise the judicial power of the United States pursuant to Article III of the Constitution and specific statutory grants of power. Wh...