State v. Smith, 528

• Decision Date: 09 December 1987
• Docket Number: No. 528,528
• Parties: STATE of Maryland v. Russell James SMITH. Sept. Term 1987.
• Court: Court of Special Appeals of Maryland

Page 378

73 Md.App. 378

534 A.2d 371

STATE of Maryland v. Russell James SMITH.

No. 528 Sept. Term 1987.

Court of Special Appeals of Maryland.

Dec. 9, 1987.

Ann E. Singleton, Asst. Atty. Gen. (J. Joseph Curran, Jr., Atty. Gen., Baltimore, Alexander Williams, Jr., State's Atty. for Prince George's County and Thomas A. Krehely, Jr., Asst. State's Atty. for Prince George's County on the brief, Upper Marlboro), for appellant.

Mark Colvin, Asst. Public Defender (Alan H. Murrell, Public Defender, on the brief), Baltimore, for appellee.

Argued before GILBERT, C.J., and MOYLAN and BISHOP, JJ.

GILBERT, Chief Judge.

"[W]ords are chameleons, which reflect the color of their environment." Commissioner of Internal Rev. v. National Carbide Co., 167 F.2d 304, 306 ( [2d Cir.] 1948). "The same words, in different settings, may not mean the same thing." Skelly Oil Company v. Phillips Co., 339 U.S. 667, 678, 70 S.Ct. 876 , 94 L.Ed. 1194 (1950).

We are here asked to determine whether an "Arrest Warrant on Charging Document" constitutes an untried "complaint" within the meaning of the Interstate Agreement on Detainers (IAD) ¹, Md.Code Ann. art. 27, § 616A et seq. (1982 Repl.Vol.).

The factual predicate upon which the question to us is posed may be briefly stated. Russell James Smith Jr. is alleged to have broken into and entered a MAACO Auto Body Shop in Prince George's County, Maryland, on January 26, 1986. An "Arrest Warrant on Charging Document" was issued on February 13, 1986. The warrant given to the Prince George's Police Department specifically charged Smith with the offenses of "++ BREAK & STEAL--SHOP ETC +++ Code 2-2203."

Significantly the warrant provided in part:

"IF DEFENDANT IS IN CUSTODY FOR ANOTHER OFFENSE, this Warrant is to be lodged as a detainer for the continued detention of the Defendant for the offense charged in the charging document. When the Defendant is served with a copy of the charging document and Warrant, the Defendant shall be taken before a judicial officer of the District Court."

Having determined that Smith was incarcerated in the District of Columbia, the State, on March 28, 1986, lodged a detainer against Smith. When he was notified by the prison officials at Lorton of the detainer, Smith exercised his right pursuant to Article III of the IAD (Md.Ann.Code art. 27, § 616D), and he requested a final disposition of the Maryland charges. The State received Smith's request on June 17, 1986. One hundred fifty-two days later, the State, in order to gain temporary custody over Smith, served him in the District of Columbia with another detainer. Finally on January 21, 1987, Smith was indicted. As can readily be seen, the indictment was handed up two hundred eighteen days after Smith's request for disposition had been received by the proper State authorities. Not unexpectedly, Smith moved to dismiss the indictment on the ground that the State had failed to bring him to trial within the IAD's prescribed one hundred eighty days from the date of his request for disposition. Therefore, said Smith, the State, pursuant to the terms of the IAD, was without jurisdiction to try him. Md.Ann.Code art. 27, § 616F(c); see also Hoss v. State, 266 Md. 136, 292 A.2d 48 (1972); Dennett v. State, 19 Md.App. 376, 384, 311 A.2d 437 (1973).

Smith's motion was heard by Judge Howard A. Chasanow, who dismissed the indictment against Smith. The State appealed.

The Maryland Extradition Manual was published in 1985 ² "through the assistance" of the then Governor, Attorney General, Secretary of State and the State's Attorney Coordinator. ³ The manual, edited by Nolan H. Rogers, Esq., an Assistant Attorney General, declares:

"A detainer is a formal or informal request filed by a criminal justice agency with the institution in which a prisoner is incarcerated, asking the custodian to notify the agency when the release of the prisoner is imminent. It can be an arrest warrant, indictment, commitment order, judgment, or even a letter or note sent to the custodian of a prisoner by a prosecutor, court, police chief, sheriff, or parole board." (Footnote omitted).

Maryland Extradition Manual, "Detainers," p. 43. The State, in light of that manual, would be hard pressed to assert that the arrest warrant was not a detainer. The question is rather whether the arrest warrant detainer is sufficient to trigger the provisions of the IAD.

Article III of the IAD (Md.Ann.Code art. 27, § 616D) articulates the methodology by which a prisoner may initiate the resolution of pending charges:

"Whenever a person has entered upon a term of imprisonment in a penal or correctional institution of a party state, ⁴ and whenever during the continuance of the term of imprisonment there is pending in any other party state any untried indictment, information or complaint on the basis of which a detainer has been lodged against the prisoner, he shall be brought to trial within one hundred eighty days after he shall have caused to be delivered to the prosecuting officer and the appropriate court of the prosecuting officer's jurisdiction written notice of the place of his imprisonment and his request for a final disposition to be made of the indictment, information or complaint[.]" (Emphasis added).

To answer the particular question posed at the outset of our opinion, we must focus on the italicized words "pending ... untried indictment, information or complaint." The State's argument, reduced to its most simplistic form, runs as follows: An arrest warrant is not an indictment, information or complaint, hence the provisions of the IAD are not ignited by a prisoner's demand that he be tried because of the detainer.

The State, in reliance upon State v. Gee, 298 Md. 565, 471 A.2d 712 (1984), argues that since an arrest warrant-statement of charges for a felony does not require a person to go to trial in Maryland ⁵ it cannot be considered a "complaint" under the IAD. Gee held that a warrant-statement of charges "does not mark the onset of formal prosecutorial proceedings to which the Sixth Amendment guarantee [of a speedy trial] is applicable[.]" Gee, 298 Md. at 574, 471 A.2d 712. Gee, however, was not explicating the meaning of complaint within the IAD but was addressing the question of when the Speedy Trial, Sixth Amendment right commences.

Admittedly, the arrest warrant is not an indictment or information. Moreover, the State avers that it is not a "complaint" in the technical sense the word is employed in § 616D. The State contends that since the words "indictment" and "information" refer to formal charging documents the word "complaint" should also be interpreted as a reference to a formal charging document. This somewhat hypertechnical pilpul approach was followed in United States v. Bottoms, 755 F.2d 1349 (9th Cir.1985). There a post-escape arrest warrant was held not to be a complaint under the IAD. The Bottoms Court applied the doctrine of ejusdem generis ⁶ to define "complaint" narrowly as a "legal word of art" which did not include warrants. Bottoms, 755 F.2d at 1350. What Bottoms either overlooks or ignores is that a rule of statutory construction provides only an aid to interpretation. A rule should not be invoked to restrict word meanings and thereby subvert the purposes of the statute. We think the Bottoms court misinterpreted the statute, in favor of strained reliance upon a rule that forced a conclusion that is contrary to the clear legislative intent. In that connection we believe that Judge Learned Hand had it right when, in Guiseppi v. Walling, 144 F.2d 608, 624 (2d Cir.1944), he penned:

"There is no surer way to misread any document than to read it literally; in every interpretation we must pass between Scylla and Charybdis; and I certainly do not wish to add to the barrels of ink that have been spent in logging the route. As nearly as we can, we must put ourselves in the place of those who uttered the words, and try to divine how they would have dealt with the unforeseen situations; and, although their words are by far the most decisive evidence of what they would have done, they are by no means final."

The Bottoms court seemingly paid little, if any, heed to Article IX of the IAD (Md.Ann.Code art. 27, § 616J) which directs that "[t]his agreement...