State v. Brownfield
| Decision Date | 13 May 2022 |
| Docket Number | 123,645 |
| Citation | 509 P.3d 598 (Table) |
| Parties | STATE of Kansas, Appellee, v. Chauncey L. BROWNFIELD, Appellant. |
| Court | Kansas Court of Appeals |
Kasper Schirer, of Kansas Appellate Defender Office, for appellant.
Thomas R. Stanton, district attorney, and Derek Schmidt, attorney general, for appellee.
Before Atcheson, P.J., Hill and Gardner, JJ.
Under Kansas law, after a prisoner properly begins the disposition of pending charges, the State's failure to bring those charges to trial within 180 days deprives the district court of jurisdiction and to hear the matter, and any charges must be dismissed. This appeal asks us to decide whether a prison inmate complied with the Uniform Mandatory Disposition of Detainers Act, K.S.A. 22-4301 et seq., to the extent that the charges pending against him must be dismissed because his detainer was not timely adjudicated. The district court ruled that the prisoner did not substantially comply with the Detainers Act. The prisoner argues that actions of the prison officials misled him and the court should have dismissed the pending charges. Our review of the record persuades us that the district court is correct. We affirm.
This case has been appealed before.
Chauncy Brownfield pleaded guilty to aggravated battery. His crime was committed in December 2015 while he was incarcerated at Reno County Correctional Facility. But before he was sentenced he moved to withdraw his plea. The district court denied his motion and sentenced him to prison for 23 months. He appealed the denial of his motion to withdraw his plea.
A panel of this court in State v. Brownfield , No. 119,853, 2020 WL 499711, at *3 (Kan. App. 2020) (unpublished opinion), held that the district court had properly exercised its discretion in denying Brownfield's motion to withdraw his plea.
The panel also ruled that the record on appeal was insufficient to determine whether Brownfield had sufficiently complied with the Detainers Act to the extent that the charges should be dismissed. 2020 WL 499711, at *4. Brownfield claimed he had tried to initiate action on his detainer caused by this pending charge while he was incarcerated at the Norton Correctional Facility in March 2016. The panel remanded that question to the district court for further consideration. 2020 WL 499711, at *4.
On remand, the district court heard testimony of two witnesses.
Brownfield and the Norton Correctional Facility's detainer clerk who handled Brownfield's request both testified at the remand hearing. Brownfield testified that he filed a Form-9 with the Norton Correctional Facility and expected that it would forward the request to be brought to court on his detainer within 180 days. He testified that he was asked to fill out two account withdrawal request (AWR) forms for mailing costs in the amount of $6.74 each, but he did not do so. Brownfield testified if he filled out the AWR forms, Norton Correctional Facility either would have withdrawn funds from his account or, if he did not have funds, charged his account and withdrawn them when he got funds.
Brownfield said he believed the detainer clerk's request that he fill out AWR forms was unlawful based on his research. Brownfield testified that a Kansas case— State v. Lomon , No. 116,497, 2017 WL 1535229 (Kan. App. 2017) (unpublished opinion)—says that the prison has no authority to make him pay for mailing his Detainers Act request and that once he wrote his request and provided the necessary information, the burden shifted to the prison officials to mail his request. We note that Lomon was decided about a year after Brownfield had filed his Form-9.
The State called Anna Laura Laws, the detainer clerk at Norton Correctional Facility, to testify. Laws explained that when an inmate submits a Form-9 request for the disposition of a detainer, she reviews the request to see if it is legitimate. If the inmate's request is legitimate, Laws returns the Form-9 with instructions for the inmate to fill out an AWR so that she can mail a detainer request to the county attorney and county court clerk informing them that the inmate wants to file for a 180-day writ under the Detainers Act.
Laws testified that Brownfield sent her a Form-9 in early March 2016 requesting a 180-day writ. She responded with instructions for filling out the AWRs but Brownfield never filled them out or contacted her with questions about payment of the mailing costs. Laws testified that if Brownfield had filled out the AWRs she would have filed the 180-day writ for him. Laws explained that she would still file a 180-day writ for an inmate even if they do not have funds in their account because indigent inmates also need to fill out an AWR. She explained that if Brownfield had funds in his account, he would have been charged for the mailing costs. If Brownfield did not have funds in his account, the facility would pay for the mailing costs, but Brownfield would be charged if he ever received funds.
The district court admitted four documents into evidence:
Brownfield argued before the district court that he had substantially complied with the Detainers Act by simply sending a request to prison officials with his case number and the name of the county where the charges were pending. He maintained the prison officials had misled him by saying he had to file an AWR instead of telling him he could file the writ by addressing a written request to the district court and the county attorney. Brownfield contended the prison officials were placing a burden on him that is not authorized by the Detainers Act by requiring payment to file the writ. He asked the court to set aside his conviction and dismiss the case.
Unconvinced by Brownfield's arguments, the district court held that he had not substantially complied with the Detainers Act. Thus, the court had jurisdiction to accept his plea and to sentence him accordingly. There was no legal reason to dismiss this case.
In its opinion, the district court cited two regulations: (1) K.A.R. 44-12-601, which requires that inmates pay the cost of "legal" or "official" mail unless they are indigent; and (2) IMPP 05-108A, which specifies the procedure for handling detainer requests under the Detainers Act and requires that an inmate sign an AWR for each item of mail sent to the district court and prosecutor. The court held that these regulations, along with the Detainers Act, provided the procedure for Brownfield to have his case promptly disposed of.
The district court reasoned that this process of filing a request under the Detainers Act is analogous with filing a habeas corpus petition. The court noted that inmates filing habeas corpus petitions are not excused from complying with K.A.R. 44-12-601 or the relevant IMPP that addresses mailing costs. Brownfield was thus not excused from complying with the rules.
The district court distinguished this case from the Lomon decision. In Lomon , prison officials misled the defendant into believing his detainer request could not be processed until he paid filing fees. The district court noted that the Lomon court found that Lomon substantially complied because the prison authorities misled him, not because he could not be required to pay the cost of mailing his request as Brownfield argued.
The district court ruled that Brownfield was not misled; Laws told him that he needed to fill out the AWR forms, not that he had to pay before his request could be filed. The court noted that if Brownfield had signed the AWRs, Law could have completed all of the other steps and sent a "Written Request" to the district court and prosecutor. Instead, Brownfield refused to sign the AWRs, and the court and prosecutor received nothing.
In this appeal, Brownfield maintains that the district court erred when it held that he had not complied with the Detainers Act and that it should have dismissed the charge against him because the court no longer had jurisdiction to decide the matter. This is a question of law.
The law that guides us
The Detainers Act provides the procedure for Kansas prisoners to request the disposition of pending charges within the state. State v. Burnett , 297 Kan. 477, 448, 301 P.3d 698 (2013). Its purpose is "to prevent indefinite suspension of pending criminal charges while a prisoner is incarcerated on other charges" and "to prevent delays in the administration of justice by placing an obligation on the courts to hear cases within a reasonable amount of time." Burnett , 297 Kan. at 453.
Two statutes are pertinent here. K.S.A. 2020 Supp. 22-4301 provides:
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