Riley v. Rhay, 40291

• Decision Date: 15 May 1969
• Docket Number: No. 40291,40291
• Citation: 76 Wn.2d 32,454 P.2d 820
• Court: Washington Supreme Court
• Parties: In the Matter of the Application for a Writ of Habeas Corpus of Michael J. RILEY, Appellant, v. B. J. RHAY, as Superintendent of the Washington State Penitentiary at Walla Walla, Washington, Respondent.

Page 32

76 Wn.2d 32

454 P.2d 820

In the Matter of the Application for a Writ of Habeas Corpus

of Michael J. RILEY, Appellant, v. B. J. RHAY, as Superintendent of the Washington State

Penitentiary at Walla Walla, Washington, Respondent.

No. 40291.

Supreme Court of Washington, Department 1.

May 15, 1969.

Michael J. Riley, pro per.

Slade Gorton, Atty. Gen., Dean Pontius, Asst. Atty. Gen., Olympia, for respondent.

FINLEY, Judge.

Appellant-petitioner, Michael J. Riley, is presently confined in the Washington State Penitentiary upon a commitment for burglary in the second-degree, pursuant to judgment and sentence entered in the Superior Court for Skagit County. In an original writ of habeas corpus filed in this court, and denied without formal opinion November 14, 1967, petitioner challenged the validity of the guilty plea upon which the judgment was based, contending that it was involuntary because it had been induced by representations that he would thereby obtain medical treatment unavailable in Skagit County. This court, in denying the writ, concluded that the petitioner's motive in no way deprived him of his choice to plead guilty or not guilty.

In the instant proceeding, appellant did not seek to relitigate the voluntariness issue. The voluminous briefs which he has submitted are solely directed to the question of whether his counsel, laboring under a mistake of fact as to the appellant's health, could effectively advise him and assist him in his defense.

If petitioner-appellant's theory were predicated upon findings of fact, it would require more extended discussion. However, appellant has assigned no error to the findings of fact entered by the trial court, and they must therefore be accepted as verities. The trial court had before it the transcript of proceedings at the arraignment. It had before it evidence that the appellant had upon five prior occasions gained admittance to a hospital facility through malingering while he was serving a prison sentence, and then escaped from the looser custody restraints of the hospital. It had before it information that Riley, whose true name is John Jacob McDaniel, was at the time of his arrest an escapee from penal custody in Wyoming, and could have had other motives for seeking a prompt confinement under his assumed name than receiving medical care.

With this information before it, the trial court found that the appellant's plea was considered and voluntary, that appellant had been afforded the...