Kniatt v. State
| Decision Date | 21 June 2006 |
| Docket Number | No. PD-0323-05.,PD-0323-05. |
| Parties | Nathan Andrew KNIATT, Appellant, v. The STATE of Texas. |
| Court | Texas Court of Criminal Appeals |
Richard Gladden, Denton, for Appellant.
Cynthia W. Hellstern, Asst. County & District Attorney, Waxahachie, Matthew Paul, State's Attorney, Austin, for the State.
The Tenth Court of Appeals "found" that appellant had "met his burden of showing . . . that his guilty plea [had been] involuntarily given," and ordered the trial court to grant appellant the habeas relief that he had requested. Kniatt v. State, 157 S.W.3d 83, 87 (Tex.App.-Waco 2005). We reverse and remand.
The relevant, undisputed facts, as reflected in the record, are as follows. On June 10, 2001, law enforcement officials in Ellis County searched appellant's person without a warrant, found methamphetamine, and then arrested him for possession of that methamphetamine. The officials then placed appellant in the Ellis County Jail, where he stayed until released on bond about a week later.
On August 22, 2001, an Ellis County grand jury returned an indictment charging appellant with felony possession of less than one gram of methamphetamine. See Tex. Health & Safety Code § 481.115(a) & (b).
On December 7, 2001, the trial court held a pretrial hearing in this case. At that hearing, appellant's trial counsel, Ted Redington, and the assistant district attorney, Patrick Wilson, both informed the trial court that appellant had decided to reject a plea bargain to which he had previously agreed. Redington also informed the trial court that appellant had decided to retain different counsel. The trial court, speaking for the record and to appellant, responded as follows:
On December 11, 2001, appellant, accompanied by Redington, returned to court and entered a guilty plea pursuant to a plea bargain substantially similar to the one he had rejected previously. Appellant, who was eighteen years old at that time and of sound mind and average intelligence, swore under oath that his guilty plea was being entered "freely and voluntarily." The trial court, in accordance with the terms of the plea bargain, deferred an adjudication of appellant's guilt, placed him on community supervision for three years, and fined him $3,000.
On February 23, 2003, the State filed a motion to proceed with an adjudication of guilt. In its motion, the State alleged that appellant had violated several of the conditions of his community supervision.
On April 3, 2003, appellant filed a pre-conviction application for writ of habeas corpus, pursuant to Article 11.08 of the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure, and a motion to recuse the trial court judge from hearing that application or from hearing the State's motion to proceed with an adjudication of guilt. In his application, appellant alleged that his December 7, 2001, guilty plea had been entered "involuntarily." In his brief accompanying his application, appellant argued that "the trial court's [unlawful] action in [revoking his bond] and remanding [him] into the custody of the Ellis County Sheriff [to await] trial [coerced him and] rendered [his] subsequent plea involuntary." Appellant also argued that "the statements and actions of his former counsel, Redington, as well as those of Assistant District Attorney Wilson, operated to coerce [him into an] involuntary plea."
On April 28, 2003, an assigned judge held an evidentiary hearing on appellant's motion to recuse and denied it.
On June 4, 2003, the trial court held an evidentiary hearing on both the State's motion to proceed with an adjudication of guilt and appellant's application for writ of habeas corpus.2 Midway through the hearing, the State asked that "the writ portion of [the] hearing" be postponed to a later date, so that the State would have more time in which to locate one of its witnesses. The trial court granted the State's request. At the conclusion of the hearing, the trial court also granted the State's motion to proceed with an adjudication of guilt, and then adjudicated appellant guilty of the primary offense. The court assessed appellant's punishment at incarceration for 200 days and a $3,000 fine.
On June 13, 2003, the trial court held an evidentiary hearing on appellant's application for writ of habeas corpus. At that hearing, the trial court received the testimony of four witnesses: appellant; appellant's father, Paul Kniatt; Redington; and Wilson.3 Appellant testified that (1) immediately before the pretrial hearing on December 7, 2001, Wilson had "threatened" him "that if [he] didn't take the plea bargain on that day, that they wouldn't offer it again and they would give [him] the maximum sentence;" (2) contrary to what Redington and Wilson had told the trial court on December 7, 2001, he had never agreed to a plea bargain until shortly before his guilty plea on December 11, 2001; and (3) he had agreed to the plea bargain on December 11, 2001, only because he "didn't want to sit in jail without a bond for who knows how long."
Appellant's father, Paul Kniatt, testified that immediately before the pretrial hearing on December 7, 2001, he had heard Redington warn appellant that if he rejected the plea bargain, "the judge was going to put him in jail."
Redington testified that (1) in late November 2001, he had met with appellant and had discussed with him all of his options, including the State's offer of a plea bargain involving deferred adjudication; (2) he had advised appellant "that a plea would probably be in his best interest," because appellant's only possible defense was an "arguable" motion to suppress; (3) appellant had telephoned him a few days after their November meeting and had accepted the State's offer; (4) immediately before the pretrial hearing on December 7, 2001, appellant "came [in] with his dad, and . . . they were both in kind of a tizzy and talking about not wanting the plea bargain anymore;" (5) he had advised appellant at that time that if he reneged on the plea bargain, the trial court might revoke his bond and put him in jail to await trial; (6) sometime after the pretrial hearing on December 7, 2001, appellant's stepmother had telephoned him to relate that appellant had decided to accept the State's plea bargain offer after all; (7) neither he (i.e., Redington) nor Wilson had ever tried to coerce appellant into accepting the plea bargain offer; and (8) appellant had never told him that he was pleading guilty because it was his only way to get out of jail. Redington's testimony continued:
Q [by defense counsel]: Knowing this defendant and your interaction with him, 18-year-old young man, as to him particularly, did what [the trial court] did [i.e., revoking appellant's bond], was it likely to cause, likely to interfere with him completely exercising his own volition freely and voluntarily [on December 11, 2001] as to whether or not to take that plea [bargain offer]?
Finally, Wilson testified in relevant part that he had never threatened or coerced appellant in any way.
At the close of the evidence at the June 13, 2003, habeas hearing, appellant argued that he had proved by a preponderance of the evidence that his guilty plea had been entered involuntarily. More specifically, appellant argued that he had proved that on December 11, 2001, "he [had] reasonably felt that he was coerced and that his only avenue to get out of jail was to waive his right to trial by jury and . . . accept the plea bargain." Appellant argued further that he had proved that, in pleading guilty, he had "acquiesc[ed] to what he [had] perceived to be actions by this court, by his own attorney, as well as the prosecution to coerce him into accepting that plea agreement." As for the relief sought, appellant asked the trial court to set aside both the order placing him on deferred adjudication and the subsequent judgment of conviction.
On June 19, 2003, the trial court issued an order denying appellant's request for habeas corpus relief....
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