State v. Bent
| Decision Date | 22 October 2012 |
| Docket Number | No. 33,136.,33,136. |
| Citation | 2012 NMSC 038,289 P.3d 1225 |
| Parties | STATE of New Mexico, Plaintiff–Petitioner, v. Wayne BENT, Defendant–Respondent. |
| Court | New Mexico Supreme Court |
Gary K. King, Attorney General, Nicole Beder, Assistant Attorney General, Santa Fe, NM, for Petitioner.
Law Works, L.L.C., John A. McCall, Albuquerque, NM, for Respondent.
BOSSON
, Justice.
{1} By the time Defendant was indicted, the grand jury allegedly had exceeded its statutory term of service. Having been convicted subsequently of most of the charges in the indictment, Defendant appeals on the basis of that untimely indictment. He claims that the untimely indictment deprived the grand jury of jurisdiction and that we should overturn the subsequent jury verdict against him because of that initial defect in the grand jury. Persuaded by this argument, our Court of Appeals reversed Defendant's convictions, in effect instructing the State to begin the criminal process all over again. On certiorari we assume without deciding that the indictment was issued late as Defendant alleges. We hold, however, that statutory challenges to the indictment like those presented here must be adjudicated before trial and before a verdict issues on those same charges. Accordingly, we reverse the Court of Appeals and remand to that Court for consideration of all other issues raised but not yet decided in Defendant's appeal.
BACKGROUND
{2} On May 20, 2008, Wayne Bent (Defendant) was indicted on two counts of criminal sexual contact of a minor and two counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. Defendant is the leader of a religious sect and has always maintained that any contact with the minors was innocent, and is part of a “healing ritual which the sect practiced” with all members, not just those under eighteen years of age.
{3} Soon after the indictment, Defendant filed a motion to quash the indictment, alleging, among other things, that the grand jury had ceased to exist by operation of law before handing down Defendant's indictment. Central to the motion to quash was NMSA 1978, Section 31–6–1 (1983)
, which states that “[a] grand jury shall serve for a period of no longer than three months.” Significant to this issue, the sequence of dates is as follows.
{4} The grand jury process began when the district court entered an order dated October 3, 2007, requiring the court clerk to send a summons to 125 citizens of Union County. They were told to report to the courthouse on November 13, 2007, to begin grand jury duty for a term of three months. The record is unclear what, if anything, actually happened on November 13, 2007.
{5} Instead, the State claims that the “grand jury met for the first time” eight days later, on November 21, 2007, to consider unrelated criminal charges against another individual, although the citations to the record proper do not support any such claim. Both counsel agree, however, that after the completion of business on November 21, 2007, District Judge Sam Sanchez, presiding over the grand jury, orally extended the grand jury's term of service by another three months. Although there is no written record of that extension, neither party denies it. The grand jury did not meet again until six months later, May 20, 2008, when it heard evidence and issued the foregoing indictments against Defendant.
{6} In his motion to quash the indictment, Defendant challenged the court's authority to extend grand jury service in light of the statutory three-month limit provided in Section 31–6–1
(). As Defendant calculated, the grand jury's three-month term expired long before the indictment issued on May 20, 2008, and therefore, according to Defendant, the grand jury had no authority even to convene, much less indict, as of that date.
{7} After conducting a pre-trial hearing on the motion, District Judge Gerald Baca, assigned to preside over the criminal trial, declined to quash the indictment. Defendant filed a motion for leave to file an interlocutory appeal, which was denied. Defendant filed no request with this Court for extraordinary relief, and the case proceeded to trial on the charges in the indictment.
{8} At trial, the jury convicted Defendant of one of the two counts of criminal sexual contact of a minor as well as the two counts of contributing to the delinquency of a minor. In his appeal to the Court of Appeals, Defendant raised multiple issues that are not before us now, as well as the one issue that is, namely, the authority of the grand jury to indict after its three-month term had expired.
{9} Addressing this one issue only, the Court of Appeals held that the indictment should have been quashed as a matter of law, and reversed all convictions. State v. Bent, 2011–NMCA–093, ¶ 24, 150 N.M. 561, 263 P.3d 903.
The Court concluded that the grand jury's three-month statutory limit is mandatory and jurisdictional, and therefore, an indictment handed down after that time is “void ab initio.” Id. ¶ 2.
{10} We granted certiorari, 2011–NMCERT–009, 269 P.3d 904,
to consider an important issue of public policy that questions, first, the authority of the grand jury to indict, and second, whether that indictment can be challenged at this late date, after a petit jury has already convicted Defendant on the charges in the indictment. Because the Court of Appeals deferred action on the many other issues in Defendant's appeal, we limit our review to this one before us.
DISCUSSION
[1]
{11} Article II, Section 14 of the New Mexico Constitution states that “[n]o person shall be held to answer for a capital, felonious or infamous crime unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury or information filed by a district attorney or attorney general or their deputies.” While our Constitution makes general provisions for the grand jury, the three-month term of service derives solely from statute. Section 31–6–1.
{12} Both parties have made extensive arguments directed at the length of the grand jury's term in this instance. Those arguments include whether a district judge has authority to extend the statutory three-month term. If so, should that extension be limited to an incidental matter of a few hours or days, or can the term be extended for another three months, as appears to have occurred in this instance? Additionally, we are asked to decide whether the initial term begins either (a) when the initial order convening the grand jury is signed, or on the date potential grand jurors were told to initially report to the courthouse (both of which occurred over six months before the date of this indictment); or (b) whether the initial term begins on the date the grand jury actually convenes, in this case November 21, 2008, which is exactly six months before the date of the indictment.
{13} Although the parties raise meritorious questions, we need not decide them at this juncture. Instead, we assume, without deciding, that Defendant is correct, that the grand jury's term of service had already expired by the time he was indicted. We do this because, in our view, the pivotal question is whether a procedural, statutory error in the grand jury proceedings arising from Section 31–6–1
can be raised and decided after a petit jury has already found Defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. We proceed to an analysis of that specific issue.
[t]he district judge may convene one or more grand juries at any time, without regard to court terms. A grand jury shall serve for a period of no longer than three months. The district judge shall summon and qualify as a panel for grand jury service such number of jurors as he deems necessary. Each grand jury shall be composed of twelve regular jurors and a sufficient number of alternates to insure the continuity of the inquiry and the taking of testimony. All deliberations shall be conducted by any twelve jurors, comprised of regular jurors or substituted alternates. No more than twelve jurors may deliberate. No juror may vote on an indictment unless the juror has heard all evidence presented on the charge. The district judge may discharge or excuse members of a grand jury and substitute alternate grand jurors as necessary. The names of jurors summoned for grand jury service shall be drawn from the master jury wheel of the district court for the county.
Section 31–6–1
(emphasis added).
{15} If this same question had come to us pre-trial, such as by way of an extraordinary writ, then this Court could have addressed the statutory term of the grand jury and quashed the indictment, if appropriate. See State v. Ulibarri, 1999–NMCA–142, ¶ 25, 128 N.M. 546, 994 P.2d 1164
(), aff'd 2000–NMSC–007, 128 N.M. 686, 997 P.2d 818. We could have sent the matter back to the district court for a new grand jury proceeding, one conducted in full compliance with the statute. Faced with the challenge now, however, after a petit jury has already found Defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of these same charges—as opposed to a grand jury finding of mere probable cause—we are compelled to recognize a prudential limit on the exercise of our appellate jurisdiction. In doing so, we first examine the fundamental purpose of grand juries in our criminal justice system.
{16} The grand jury is one of the...
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