Thacker v. Peyton
| Decision Date | 17 January 1966 |
| Citation | 146 S.E.2d 176,206 Va. 771 |
| Parties | James THACKER v. C. C. PEYTON, Superintendent of the Virginia State Penitentiary. |
| Court | Virginia Supreme Court |
Robert T. Winston, Jr., Norton, for plaintiff in error.
Reno S. Harp, III, Asst. Atty. Gen. (Robert Y. Button, Atty. Gen., on brief), for defendant in error.
Before EGGLESTON, C. J., and SPRATLEY, BUCHANAN, SNEAD, I'ANSON, CARRICO, and GORDON, JJ.
A grand jury of Wise county returned four indictments against James Thacker the appellant, herein called defendant, charging him with first-degree murder, malicious wounding, attempted murder and robbery. The court appointed two experienced attorneys, members of the Wise County Bar, to represent him, and after conferring with them the defendant entered pleas of not guilty to the indictments and waived trial by jury. The court heard the evidence, found the defendant guilty on each charge, and on April 24, 1962, sentenced him to life imprisonment on the murder charge and to terms in the penitentiary on the other charges totaling thirty years, ten thereof on the robbery charge to run concurrently with the life term.
On November 18, 1963, defendant filed a petition for habeas corpus in the Law and Equity Court of the City of Richmond, which issued the writ returnable to the Circuit Court of Wise County. Code § 8-598. The latter court appointed Robert T. Winston, an experienced member of the Wise County Bar, to represent the defendant and he has diligently performed that duty in the trial court and in this court. After hearing the testimony of the defendant and other witnesses the court, for reasons stated in a written opinion, denied and dismissed the writ, remanded the defendant to the penitentiary, and defendant has appealed.
Defendant's petition for habeas corpus was prepared by a fellow inmate in the penitentiary, sometimes referred to by the prisoners as 'writ-writer,' and asserted that the defendant had been denied his constitutional rights on the now familiar grounds, including lack of counsel at his preliminary hearing, failure to summon a witness, denial of a jury trial, mistreatment by officers, ineffective assistance of counsel and conferences by the court and counsel out of his presence. The evidence clearly established that there was no substance to any of these allegations.
However, defendant was allowed to amend his petition to charge that no reporter was provided to take the evidence at his trial, with the result that there was no transcript of the testimony and he was deprived of his right to take an appeal. His only contention of any substance on the present appeal is that he was denied the right of appeal.
Defendant testified that he did not tell the trial judge 1 after his trial was over that he wanted to appeal because he was not permitted to tell the judge in person, but that he told Mr. Shannon, one of his attorneys, before leaving the courtroom that he wanted to appeal. Mr. Shannon testified that he did not recall whether defendant told him that or not, but that he did get several letters from the defendant. There were four of these letters and they were introduced in evidence. They were dated respectively April 27, May 2, May 21 and May 27, 1962. All of them stated that defendant wanted to appeal and urged Mr. Shannon to apply for an appeal and get him a new trial.
Mr. Shannon replied in a letter dated May 31, 1962, that 'neither I nor your mother think you could have anything at all to gain by a new trial, and you should work toward a parole.' Mr. Shannon testified:
In the recent case of Cabaniss v. Cunningham, decided September 10, 1965, 206 Va. 330, 143 S.E.2d 911, Mr. Justice Spratley for the court pointed to the holdings of the United States Supreme Court that an indigent defendant has a constitutional right to have a free transcript of the record of his trial, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense. 'The right to defend,' we said, 'includes the right of assistance in perfecting an appeal.'
There were cited also the holdings of the Supreme Court that it makes no difference that court-appointed counsel may think there are no...
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Coleman v. Thompson
...for appeal in that case would have abridged Cabaniss' constitutional right to counsel on appeal. See also Thacker v. Peyton, 206 Va. 771, 146 S.E.2d 176 (1966) (same); Stokes v. Peyton, 207 Va. 1, 147 S.E.2d 773 (1966) (same). Such a rule would be of no help to Coleman. He does not contend ......
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Wise v. Williams
...cert. denied, 389 U.S. 825, 88 S.Ct. 65, 19 L.Ed.2d 80 (1967); Stokes v. Peyton, 207 Va. 1, 147 S.E.2d 773 (1966); Thacker v. Peyton, 206 Va. 771, 146 S.E.2d 176 (1966); Cabaniss v. Cunningham, 206 Va. 330, 143 S.E.2d 911 (1965)). The Supreme Court in Coleman explicitly considered all five ......
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Bryant v. Peyton
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O'Brien v. Socony Mobil Oil Co.
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