U.S. v. Beckford

• Decision Date: 28 March 1997
• Docket Number: Criminal No. 3:96CR66-01.,Criminal No. 3:96CR66-07.,Criminal No. 3:96CR66-06.,Criminal No. 3:96CR66-05.
• Citation: 962 F.Supp. 748
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, v. Dean Anthony BECKFORD, Claude Gerald Dennis, Leonel Romeo Cazaco, and Richard Anthony Thomas.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Virginia

962 F.Supp. 748

UNITED STATES of America, v. Dean Anthony BECKFORD, Claude Gerald Dennis, Leonel Romeo Cazaco, and Richard Anthony Thomas.

Criminal No. 3:96CR66-01.

Criminal No. 3:96CR66-05.

Criminal No. 3:96CR66-06.

Criminal No. 3:96CR66-07.

United States District Court, E.D. Virginia, Richmond Division.

March 28, 1997.

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David Novak, Stephen Miller, Andrew McBridge, Asst. U.S. Attys., Richmond, VA, for U.S.

Gerald T. Zerkin, Robert J. Wagner, Richmond, VA, for Dean Beckford.

John C. Jones, Quinton, VA, Scott Brettschneider, Kew Gardens, NY, for Claude Dennis.

Reginald M. Barley, Richmond, VA, Cary B. Bowen, Bowen & Bowen, Richmond, VA, for Leonel Cazaco.

David P. Baugh, Richmond, VA, Elizabeth D. Scher, Morchower, Luxton & Whaley, Richmond, VA, for Richard Thomas.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

PAYNE, District Judge.

Defendants Dean Anthony Beckford, Claude Gerald Dennis, Leonel Romeo Cazaco, and Richard Anthony Thomas have been charged in the Superseding Indictment with intentional murder in furtherance of a Continuing Criminal Enterprise in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 848(e). Pursuant to 21 U.S.C. § 848(h), the Government has notified each defendant that it intends to seek a penalty of death in the event of conviction and has posited with specificity the statutory and non-statutory aggravating factors which it will seek to prove as the basis for imposition of the death penalty. This is, then, a capital case under Section 848(e).

The Government has filed a Motion For Notice and Reciprocal Discovery of Mental Health Defenses to be Raised at Either the Guilt or Penalty Phases of the Trial ("Government's Motion") Therein, the Government moves for entry of an order:

(1) requiring any defendant who intends to introduce evidence of his mental health or capacity at any phase of the trial to file a notice of intent by a date certain and therein to specify:

(a) the nature of the proffered mental condition or defect and the date of its onset;

(b) the identity and qualifications of the mental health experts who will testify or whose opinions will be relied upon; and

(c) a summary of the diagnosis or diagnoses of said mental health experts and a summary of the basis for their opinions;

(2) requiring that any examination of the defendant undertaken by a defense expert, whether at government expense or otherwise, be properly recorded by videotape, audiotape, and/or stenography so that the Government and its experts may have adequate opportunity to evaluate the accuracy of said examination and prepare a rebuttal to the mental health evidence offered by the defendant;

(3) requiring any defendant who gives notice of intent to raise a mental health defense to submit to examination by an expert or experts of the Government's choosing;

(4) requiring the defense to provide the Government with any and all materials that form the basis of the defense expert's opinion; and

(5) ordering the defendants to comply with the reciprocal discovery obligations set forth in Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure 12.2 and 16(b) by a date certain set by this Court.

For the reasons set forth below, the Government's Motion is granted in part and denied in part.

BACKGROUND

The mental health and mental capacity of a capital defendant is relevant to a sentencing proceeding under 21 U.S.C. § 848 in several respects. First, at least three statutory mitigating factors may implicate the defendant's mental health or capacities, either at the time of the offense or at the time of sentencing. See, e.g. Section 848(m)(1) ("[t]he defendant's capacity to appreciate the wrongfulness of the defendant's conduct or to conform conduct to the requirements of the law was significantly impaired"); Section 848(m)(7) ("[t]he defendant committed the offense under severe mental or emotional disturbance"); and Section 848(m)(10) ("[t]hat other factors in the defendant's background or character mitigate against imposition of the death sentence"). Second, Section 848(1) provides that "a sentence of death shall not be carried out upon a person who is mentally retarded." This provision constitutes a legal bar to imposition of capital punishment on a certain class of defendants based on mental status.

Thus, the controlling statute affords a death-eligible defendant several opportunities to rely on his mental health or condition to oppose imposition of the death penalty. Section 848 also explicitly provides that the Government "shall be permitted to rebut any information received at the hearing and shall be given a fair opportunity to present argument as to the adequacy of the information to establish the existence of any of the ... mitigating factors ..." 21 U.S.C. § 848(j).¹

The Government anticipates that, if Beckford, Dennis, Cazaco, and Thomas are convicted of capital charges, they will introduce expert testimony respecting their mental condition during the penalty phase of the trial to support reliance on some, or perhaps all, of the statutory mitigating factors summarized above. The Government also apprehends, based on statements made by counsel for Cazaco, that Thomas may raise the bar of Section 848(1). The Government asserts that it can meaningfully rebut this expected evidence only by offering the testimony of its experts after those experts are permitted to examine the defendants. Defendants respond that there is no statutory or other authority permitting a court to order an independent mental examination for the penalty phase of a capital trial, and that any such examination would violate the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination.

DISCUSSION

The Government's Motion and the positions taken by the defendants raise several issues of significance. Resolution of those issues necessitates a careful assessment of the tension between 21 U.S.C. § 848 and the constitutional protections afforded the defendants by the Fifth Amendment and, to some extent, by the Sixth Amendment. Many of those issues have not been accorded extensive judicial consideration and none of them are the subject of controlling authority in the Fourth Circuit.

I. GUILT PHASE MENTAL HEALTH NOTICE, EXAMINATION AND DISCOVERY

The defendants recognize that Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure 12.2 and 16(b) impose discovery requirements on capital defendants with respect the presentation of mental health defenses at the guilt phase of the trial. See, Fed.R.Crim.P. 12.2, 16(b). Rules 12.2(a) and 12.2(b) require that defendants provide notice of their intention to present evidence of mental health illness or defect during the guilt phase of any criminal trial. If such a notice is given, a court may order a defendant to submit to an examination by a government expert. Fed.R.Crim.P. 12.2(c). The defendants further recognize the reciprocal discovery provisions of Rule 16(b)(1) relating to a defendant's guilt phase evidence and do not contest that those obligations extend to evidence respecting mental condition.

The timing of the defendants' reciprocal discovery is governed by Rule 12.2. That rule provides that, if a defendant intends at trial to rely on the defense of insanity at the time of the alleged offense or intends to introduce expert testimony relating to any other mental condition, he shall provide notice to the Government and the Court "within the time provided for the filing of pretrial motions or at such later time as the Court may direct." Fed.R.Crim.P. 12.2(a); see also Fed.R.Crim.P. 12.2(b) (same). In this case, the Court set November 11, 1996 as the date upon which all pretrial motions "then knowable to counsel" were to be filed.² See Order, October 8, 1996 at 3. That Order also provided, however, that "[a]ny party may thereafter file a motion with supporting brief if the ground for such motion was not reasonably knowable on November 11, 1996 and upon a showing of good cause for the proposed late filing." Id. The Government's Motion has created the potential for misunderstanding this previous Order with respect to the deadlines set for the filing of pretrial motions.

To date, no defendant has provided Rule 12.2 notice, and the time to do so has come and gone because the time for filing pretrial motions has expired, and the Court has not directed a later time for the filing of Rule 12.2 notice, nor has any defendant requested an extended time for filing such a notice. However, some confusion has been interjected into the proceedings because of the Government's request in its Motion that the Court "set a uniform deadline for all [defendants] for notice of any mental health defenses going to either guilt or sentence." Therefore, notwithstanding the Orders of October 8, 1996 and December 23, 1996, it is possible that defendants have been waiting for the resolution of the Government's Motion to determine whether they intend to rely on mental health defenses at the trial as well as at sentencing. Therefore, to afford the defendants a full opportunity to consider whether they will present mental health testimony at the guilt phase, the Court will allow the defendants to provide notice under Rule 12.2 not later than April 28, 1997.

II. PENALTY PHASE MENTAL HEALTH NOTICE, EXAMINATION AND DISCOVERY

A. THE LEGAL PRINCIPLES APPLICABLE TO NOTICE, EXAMINATION AND DISCOVERY IN THE DEATH PENALTY PHASE OF PROSECUTIONS UNDER 21 U.S.C. § 848.

The threshold questions are whether a defendant in a capital case under Section 848 can be required to give notice of his intent to introduce mental health testimony bearing on the determination of an appropriate penalty, and whether he may be subjected to a court-ordered examination and to reciprocal discovery obligations. The analysis of these issues implicates the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, the inherent judicial power to regulate the course of criminal cases, and the terms of 21 U.S.C. § 848(j), which confers the right of rebuttal upon the Government. And, of course, this...