Piehl v. State

• Decision Date: 18 March 1965
• Docket Number: No. F-256,F-256
• Citation: 173 So.2d 723
• Parties: Donald Ray PIEHL, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida Appellee.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

Page 723

173 So.2d 723

Donald Ray PIEHL, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida Appellee.

No. F-256.

District Court of Appeal of Florida, First District.

March 18, 1965.

Rehearing Denied April 26, 1965.

Donald Ray Piehl, in pro. per.

Earl Faircloth, Atty. Gen., and James G. Mahorner, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.

CARROLL, DONALD K., Judge.

The appellant has taken this appeal from an order entered by the Circuit Court for Marion County, denying his motion for post-conviction relief filed pursuant to Florida Criminal Procedure Rule No. 1, F.S.A. ch. 924 Appendix.

The correctness of that order in the light of the so-called 'Gideon doctrine' is the question presented for our determination in this appeal.

On July 7, 1961, an information was filed against the appellant charging him with assault with intent to commit murder (a felony under Sec. 784.06, Florida Statutes, F.S.A.). On the same date he was arraigned, tried, convicted, and sentenced, the entire record of such proceedings being as follows:

'The defendant was less than 21 years of age. His parents were notified by registered mail this arraignment. His parents replied that they could not be present.

'Now on this day comes the State of Florida by Wm. Randall Slaughter, State Attorney, who prosecutes for said State; comes also the defendant, Donald Ray Piehl, in proper person, and being duly and legally arraigned, entered a plea of guilty of the offense of assault with intent to commit murder, as charged in the Information. He was by the Court adjudged to be guilty of said offense. He was asked if he had anything to say why sentence of the law and judgment of the Court should not be passed upon him. He answered nothing.

'It is the sentence of the law and judgment of the Court that you, Donald Ray Piehl, for you [sic] said offense, be confined in the State Prison for a period of eight (8) years.'

After conceding that the appellant 'was sentenced without benefit of counsel,' the State informs us in its appellate brief that on August 3, 1963, the appellant had filed a motion to vacate on the ground that he had not been provided an attorney at the arraignment, and that this motion was denied by the court. The said motion and the order denying it, however, are not set forth in the transcript of record filed in this appeal nor in any appendix filed by either party.

On November 9, 1963, the appellant filed in the said court a motion which he denominated 'Amended Motion to Vacate Sentence, Judgment, and Information,' which motion was denied by the court in the order appealed from herein, which order was entered on January 6, 1964. Both the said motion and order are set forth in the transcript of record filed in this appeal.

The appellant's said motion to vacate, filed on November 9, 1963, alleges substantially as follows: that at the time of his arraignment the appellant was not presented with a copy of the information or indictment specifying the charges against him; that at such time he did not possess sufficient assets 'with which to hire an attorney for the purpose of assisting him in the preparation of his defense' and so at such time he did not have an attorney to assist him; that the court did not appoint counsel for him as prescribed by the United States Constitution, and so he was 'placed in the position of being confronted by a prosecuting attorney without the benefit of counsel.'

The appellant further alleges in his said motion to vacate: that, upon the court's failure to appoint counsel, he pleaded guilty of the offense charged, which guilty plea was predicated upon the following factors: (a) that prior to his said arraignment he was not familiar with court procedure, matters of evidence, or criminal law; (b) that, when the court did not appoint counsel, 'he was confronted with a mental image of prosecution at the hands of a powerful state, hostile and adverse witnesses, technical procedural matters of which he had no knowledge, fear of prejudice, a confused mental and emotional state, and the realization that he had no attorney to assist him in coping with these matters'; and (c) that 'each of the foregoing circumstances discouraged and demoralized said defendant to the extent that he became oppressed and thereupon entered a Guilty plea.'

In our opinion, the foregoing paraphrased and quoted averments in the appellant's said motion to vacate allege almost a classic case for post-conviction relief under the doctrine recognized by the United States Supreme Court in Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335, 83 S.Ct. 792, 9 L.Ed.2d 799 (1963), holding that the right to counsel in criminal cases in state courts in felony cases is one of the fundamental rights guaranteed by the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution. Gideon had been convicted of a felony in a Florida court. The question whether the said holding is applicable to crimes other than felonies is not before us since in the case at bar the appellant was convicted of a felony under Florida law. In any event, the rule announced in the gideon case has been followed in literally thousands of subsequent state and federal decisions.

The reasoning which underlies the so-called 'Gideon doctrine' seems to fit exactly the situation alleged in the appellant's said motion. That reasoning was revealed when the Supreme Court in its Gideon decision declared that a defendant's 'need for a lawyer is nowhere better stated than in the moving words of Mr. Justice Sutherland in Powell v. Alabama [287 U.S. 45, 53 S.Ct. 55, 77 L.Ed. 158]' as follows:

'The right to be heard would be, in many cases, of little avail if it did not comprehend the right to be heard by counsel. Even the intelligent and educated layman has small and sometimes no skill in the science of law. If charged with crime, he is incapable, generally, of determining for himself whether the indictment is good or bad. He is unfamiliar with the rules of evidence. Left without the aid of counsel he may be put on trial without a proper charge, and convicted upon incompetent evidence, or evidence irrelevant to the issue or otherwise inadmissible. He lacks both the skill and knowledge...