United States v. Kripplebauer

• Decision Date: 12 October 1978
• Docket Number: Crim. No. 78-143.
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America v. Louis J. KRIPPLEBAUER, Jr.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Pennsylvania

463 F. Supp. 291

UNITED STATES of America v. Louis J. KRIPPLEBAUER, Jr.

Crim. No. 78-143.

United States District Court, E. D. Pennsylvania.

October 12, 1978.

Pamela Phillips Maki, Asst. U. S. Atty., Philadelphia, Pa., for the U. S.

Thomas C. Branca, Philadelphia, Pa., for Kripplebauer.

OPINION

DITTER, District Judge.

The defendant was convicted of failing to appear for incarceration as required by a sentence of court. Post-trial motions contend that he was prejudiced by the Government's delay in seeking his indictment, that there were trial and suppression hearing errors, and that even under the Government's contentions as to the facts, he is entitled to a judgment of acquittal.

On August 17, 1976, the Honorable Daniel H. Huyett of this court sentenced Louis James Kripplebauer to imprisonment for interstate shipment of stolen property. Execution of the sentence was stayed for 60 days during which time Kripplebauer's bail was continued. The terms of that bail required him to remain within the Greater Philadelphia area. Within the 60 days, local authorities in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, issued an arrest warrant for the defendant, charging him with receiving stolen goods and unlawful possession of firearms which had been found in his residence following the execution of two search warrants. Efforts to locate Kripplebauer under the New Jersey arrest warrant, however, proved futile. The police were told by his wife that she had not known his whereabouts for several weeks. Federal authorities also received an informant's tip that the defendant planned to flee prior to the date set for commencement of his sentence.

Armed with this information, the Government petitioned Judge Huyett to revoke defendant's bail for the violation of its conditions. As a result, the court issued a bench warrant for Kripplebauer's arrest on October 7, 1976, 11 days before he was scheduled to report for incarceration. Over five months later, in March, 1977, the defendant was arrested on this bench warrant in California. On May 3, 1978, more than one year later, Kripplebauer was indicted for willfully failing to appear as ordered by the court in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 3150.

The defendant first contends that the indictment against him should be dismissed because of the Government's delay in obtaining it for 13 months following his arrest. Speedy trial times are triggered, however, by arrest (or indictment) for the crime in question, not detention for some other offense. Here the record amply demonstrates that Kripplebauer was not arrested for failing to appear¹ but on Judge Huyett's bench warrant. Kripplebauer argues that there is a substantial identity between the crime for which he was tried and that for which he was arrested and that therefore speedy trial guarantees attached when he was taken into custody. In this regard he cites United States v. DeTienne, 468 F.2d 151, 155 (7th Cir. 1972):

It would be absurd in the extreme if an arrest on one charge triggered the Sixth Amendment's speedy trial protection as to prosecutions for any other chargeable offenses. Of course, if the crimes for which a defendant is ultimately prosecuted really only gild the charge underlying his initial arrest and the different accusatorial dates between them are not reasonably explicable, the initial arrest may well mark the speedy trial provision's applicability as to prosecution for all the interrelated offenses.

He also points to the application of this doctrine in United States v. Cabral, 475 F.2d 715 (1st Cir. 1973).

I am not persuaded. Kripplebauer was indicted and convicted for failing to appear on October 18 in obedience to Judge Huyett's order. He was arrested on a bench warrant issued in response to the charge that he had violated the conditions of his bail by leaving New Jersey without authority on or before September 23. There is no gilding and no substantial identity. In fact, there is no identity at all. If he had appeared on October 18, he could still have been guilty of violating his bail conditions. He could have abided by the conditions of bail and, had he not reported for incarceration on October 18, been charged with failing to appear. The fact that there is an underlying relationship between Kripplebauer's violating the terms of his bail and his being prosecuted for failing to appear does not mean that he became an accused for the purposes of the latter when he was arrested for the former.²

Since the defendant's arrest was for a matter other than that for which he was tried, a consideration of the factors announced in Barker v. Wingo, 407 U.S. 514, 92 S.Ct. 2182, 33 L.Ed.2d 161 (1972), is unnecessary. The same is true so far as defendant's argument is addressed to this court's Speedy Trial Act Plan for Achieving Prompt Disposition of Criminal Cases, adopted pursuant to the Speedy Trial Act of 1974, 18 U.S.C. § 3165. In this regard, the defendant urges that I exercise my discretion to dismiss the indictment because of the delay involved. His request is refused. The dismissal of an indictment is a severe remedy, not warranted by the...