State v. Beauchene

• Decision Date: 28 April 1988
• Citation: 541 A.2d 914
• Parties: STATE of Maine v. Donald BEAUCHENE.
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

Page 914

541 A.2d 914

STATE of Maine v. Donald BEAUCHENE.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Argued March 9, 1988.

Decided April 28, 1988.

Lisa Pelky Marchese, Charles K. Leadbetter (orally) Asst. Attys. Gen., Augusta, for state.

Ronald W. Bourget (orally), Bourget & Bourget, Augusta, for defendant.

Before McKUSICK, C.J., and NICHOLS, ROBERTS, GLASSMAN, SCOLNIK and CLIFFORD, JJ.

McKUSICK, Chief Justice.

Defendant Donald Beauchene appeals from a judgment entered on a jury verdict in Superior Court (Kennebec County) convicting him of escape from the Augusta Mental Health Institute (AMHI) under 17-A M.R.S.A. § 755(1) (1983). Beauchene makes four appellate contentions: (1) that the indictment charging escape was insufficient in identifying the nature of the official custody from which he escaped; (2) that a section 755 "escape" does not apply to individuals committed to a state mental health facility following a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity; (3) that the State failed to comply with the Interstate Compact on Detainers; and (4) that the long period between indictment and trial violated his constitutional right to a speedy trial. We affirm the judgment.

On June 9, 1970, after a jury trial on a murder charge, the Superior Court (Cumberland County) found Donald Beauchene not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect (BRI). Pursuant to 15 M.R.S.A. § 103 the presiding justice committed Beauchene to the custody of the Commissioner of Mental Health and Corrections, who placed him at AMHI. On September 15, 1978, Beauchene left AMHI without permission. ¹ On October 4, 1978, a Kennebec County grand jury indicted Beauchene for escape in violation of 17-A M.R.S.A. § 755. At the time of the indictment, Maine officials were not aware of Beauchene's whereabouts. On October 19, 1978, however, New York City police contacted the Maine State Police to inform them that Beauchene had been arrested in New York City on three serious criminal charges. On April 16, 1980, a New York court convicted Beauchene on those charges and sentenced him to concurrent indeterminate sentences the longest of which was 8 1/3 to 25 years. By letter dated August 8, 1980, an officer of the Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemore, New York, informed Maine authorities that Beauchene was incarcerated at that facility and that the State of New York was aware of the escape charge pending against Beauchene in Maine. On or soon after that date Beauchene received a copy of that letter and filed a form indicating his intent to contest extradition to Maine. On October 17, 1986, Maine requested temporary custody of Beauchene pursuant to article IV of the Interstate Compact on Detainers, 34-A M.R.S.A. § 9604 (1988), and Beauchene was returned to Maine from New York on March 18, 1987. Two days later Beauchene pleaded not guilty at his arraignment on the escape charge. On June 1, 1987, the Superior Court denied Beauchene's motion to dismiss based on the ground that the State had violated his right to a speedy trial. On June 11, 1987, Beauchene was tried and convicted of escape. He now appeals from his conviction.

I.

Defendant first contends that the October 4, 1978, indictment on the charge of escape under 17-A M.R.S.A. § 755 ² is fatally defective because it incorrectly characterizes the circumstances of the official custody from which he escaped and that therefore the indictment failed to inform him properly of the charge against him. The indictment charged that:

On or about the fifteenth day of September 1978, at Augusta, in the County of Kennebec and State of Maine, Donald J. Beauchene being a person in official custody at the Augusta Mental Health Institute, at said Augusta, having been committed on January 24, 1978, to the Augusta Mental Health Institute by Justice Lewis I. Naiman, Kennebec County Superior Court, pursuant to a commitment order dated June 9, 1970, by Judge Sidney Wernick committing the said Donald J. Beauchene to the custody of the Department of Mental Health and Corrections for care and treatment, did without official permission, intentionally leave the official custody of the Superintendent of the said August[a] Mental Health Institute.

(Emphasis added) Defendant asserts that the emphasized language incorrectly characterized the January 24, 1978, order by Justice Naiman as a commitment order when it was actually no more than an order transferring Beauchene to AMHI from the Kennebec County jail where he had been held pending disposition of an earlier charge of escape from AMHI. Defendant contends that the indictment's linking of his actual 1970 commitment by Justice Wernick to Justice Naiman's transfer order prejudiced his defense by confusing him as to the exact nature of his official custody.

Even if we should accept defendant's contention that the reference to Justice Naiman's order did not accurately reflect the authority for his official custody, defendant would take nothing from this point on appeal. Under 17-A M.R.S.A. § 755, the State must plead and prove that defendant intentionally left official custody without permission. State v. Hannon, 395 A.2d 118, 120 (Me.1978), cert. denied, 444 U.S. 1089, 100 S.Ct. 1052, 62 L.Ed.2d 777 (1980). The language in the indictment alleging that defendant was "a person in official custody at [AMHI] ... [and] did without official permission, intentionally leave the official custody of the Superintendent of [AMHI]" was not confusing; that language without more adequately informed defendant of the crime charged and fully protected him against any risk of double jeopardy. See State v. Charette, 159 Me. 124, 127, 188 A.2d 898, 900 (1963). The indictment's reference to the justices' orders therefore was surplusage, and defendant's argument that he was prejudiced thereby is unconvincing. See M.R.Crim.P. 7(d); 1 Cluchey & Seitzinger, Maine Criminal Practice § 7.10 (1987).

II.

Defendant next contends that escape from "official custody" under 17-A M.R.S.A. § 755 does not encompass an unauthorized departure from a mental health facility by a BRI acquittee committed to the custody of the Commissioner of Mental Health pursuant to 15 M.R.S.A. § 103 (1980). ³ Defendant argues that commitment by a section 103 order does not constitute "official custody" within the meaning of that term as used in 17-A M.R.S.A. § 755(3). ⁴

We rejected this same contention in relation to the pre-Code escape statute, 17 M.R.S.A. § 1405 (1965) (repealed by P.L.1975 ch. 499, § 7). See State v. Flemming, 377 A.2d 448 (Me.1977). See also State v. Beauchene, 382 A.2d 329 (Me.1978). In determining that now-repealed 17 M.R.S.A. § 1405 applied to escapes by individuals committed pursuant to a section 103 order, we concluded after examining the statutory history of the pre-Code escape statute, that "an escape by an individual confined in a mental health institution as the result of being acquitted of a crime by reason of mental disease or defect is a crime in the State of Maine." State v. Flemming, 377 A.2d at 451. A court orders a BRI acquittee committed to AMHI for the protection of both himself and the public. See State v. Shackford, 262 A.2d 359, 366 (Me.1970). Within the plain language of the statutory definition of "official custody" in the Criminal Code, AMHI's custody of Beauchene in 1978 was most certainly "custody pursuant to court order." See n. 4 above. That custody order resulted from a criminal proceeding and no possible implication arises from the context of the statutory definition of "official custody" that the order of a court committing a person to AMHI as a consequence of the verdict in that criminal proceeding is somehow to be excluded from the application of the criminal escape statute. We do not share with defense counsel any difficulty in distinguishing this custody order from a child custody order entered in a child protection or similar civil proceeding. It makes no sense at all to ascribe to the legislature an intent that the Criminal Code would decriminalize escapes by BRI acquittees from AMHI. Flemming and Beauchene continue as precedent for rejecting defendant's renewed effort to read the criminal escape statute narrowly.

III.

Defendant also contends that the State misused the Uniform Interstate Compact on Detainers to bring him to Maine from his incarceration in New York. Defendant argues that the terms of the Compact required Maine actively to seek his custody as soon as Maine became aware of his incarceration in New York.

Both New York and Maine have adopted the Uniform Interstate Compact on Detainers. See 34-A M.R.S.A. §§ 9601-9636; N.Y.Crim.Pro.L. & R. § 580.20 (McKinney 1971). The Compact is designed to facilitate the trial in one jurisdiction of charges there pending against an individual who is at the time incarcerated in another jurisdiction. 34-A M.R.S.A. § 9601. A careful reading of the Compact does not support defendant's assertion that it places an affirmative duty on a state to seek custody of the prisoner for expeditious transport to the charging state. ⁵ See United States v. Dowl, 394 F.Supp. 1250, 1255 (D.Minn.1975). Article III of the Compact gives the prisoner the right to request final disposition of pending charges and provides for time limits within which the state seeking custody must act after the prisoner has requested final disposition. 34-A M.R.S.A. § 9603. Article IV imposes time limits within which the state must act only after it has requested custody. Id. § 9604. Thus the time limits of the Compact do not come into play until either the charging state has filed a request under the Compact for temporary custody of the prisoner or the prisoner has filed a request for disposition of the pending charge pursuant to the Compact.

We also reject defendant's contention that he is beyond the reach of the Interstate Compact on Detainers because he was committed BRI to AMHI pursuant to a section 103 order. Defendant correctly notes that article VI(B) of the...