United States v. Mahan, Civ. A. No. 392-64

• Decision Date: 04 September 1964
• Docket Number: 394-64.,Civ. A. No. 392-64
• Citation: 233 F. Supp. 1
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America ex rel. Susan KAISER, Petitioner, v. Edna MAHAN, Superintendent New Jersey State Reformatory for Women, at Clinton, N. J., Respondent. UNITED STATES of America ex rel. Harry J. KAISER, Petitioner, v. Howard YEAGER, Principal Keeper, New Jersey State Prison, Respondent.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of New Jersey

233 F. Supp. 1

UNITED STATES of America ex rel. Susan KAISER, Petitioner, v. Edna MAHAN, Superintendent New Jersey State Reformatory for Women, at Clinton, N. J., Respondent.

UNITED STATES of America ex rel. Harry J. KAISER, Petitioner, v. Howard YEAGER, Principal Keeper, New Jersey State Prison, Respondent.

Civ. A. Nos. 392-64, 394-64.

United States District Court D. New Jersey.

September 4, 1964.

John J. Corcoran, Jr., Jersey City, N. J., for petitioners.

Guy W. Calissi, Bergen County Prosecutor, by Ronald J. Picinich, Asst. Prosecutor, for the State of New Jersey.

WORTENDYKE, District Judge:

These two petitions involve common questions of law and fact. They were heard and are considered together.

Relator Susan Kaiser is presently in the custody of the respondent Mahan, by virtue of concurrent sentences imposed upon her after conviction by a jury in the Bergen County Court, of accusations of violations of the criminal laws of the State of New Jersey, embodied in four indictments and tried together.

Relator Harry J. Kaiser (the son of Susan) is presently in the custody of respondent Yeager, by virtue of concurrent sentences imposed upon him after conviction, by the same jury in the Bergen County Court, of accusations of violations of the criminal laws of the State of New Jersey, embodied in four indictments and tried together.

Each petitioner contends that his present incarceration amounts to the deprivation of his liberty without due process of law in violation of the guarantees afforded by the Fourth, Fourteenth and Fifth Amendments to the Constitution of the United States in that his convictions resulted from the use of evidence illegally searched for and seized on a search warrant issued upon a concededly insufficient affidavit.¹

Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2243, the application of relator Susan Kaiser was entertained by the undersigned who thereupon issued an order directing respondent to show cause why a writ of habeas corpus should not be issued to her. The order to show cause was treated, upon its return, as having been issued upon the application of Harry J. Kaiser as well.

An answer was filed by the respondent in each of the captioned cases in behalf of the State of New Jersey and an evidentiary hearing upon the applications of both relators was held on June 8, 1964. At that hearing, oral testimony was given by each of the relators and by an additional witness, and portions of the trial and appellate records of each of the relators, together with a certified copy of an order of the Hudson County Court, Law Division, entered on June 22, 1962 in State of New Jersey v. Joseph Moriarty, sur Indictment 813-61, were admitted in evidence. No evidence in behalf of the State of New Jersey was adduced on the hearing.

Relators' applications are in writing, signed and verified by John J. Corcoran, Jr., Esq., an attorney-at-law of New Jersey, their retained counsel, acting in their behalf in these proceedings. Petitioners were represented by other retained counsel upon their trial, appellate and other post-trial proceedings. They were represented upon the trial by Benedict Lucchi, Esq., and on their appeals by Abraham J. Slurzberg, Esq., Irving I. Vogelman, Esq. and Jay R. Reuben, Esq., all members of the New Jersey Bar.

The sentences presently being served by relators were imposed on June 23, 1961, following their convictions on May 18 of that year. Relators, in June 1961, appealed from their convictions to the Appellate Division of the Superior Court of New Jersey, which affirmed the same in May, 1962. See 74 N.J.Super. 257, 181 A.2d 184. Petitions for certification to the New Jersey Supreme Court, filed on June 25, 1962, were denied without opinion on September 17, 1962, 38 N.J. 310, 184 A.2d 422.

The single ground upon which relators base their present applications is found in their contention that their convictions resulted from the use of evidence searched for and seized under a search warrant issued upon an insufficient affidavit. See State v. Macri, 1963, 39 N.J. 250, 188 A.2d 389; United States Constitution, Fourth Amendment; Nathanson v. United States, 1933, 290 U.S. 41, 54 S.Ct. 11, 78 L.Ed. 159; Weller v. Russell, 3 Cir. 1963, 321 F.2d 848. The material discovered and obtained pursuant to the warrant was admitted in evidence without objection by relators and constituted the principal evidential basis for the convictions which resulted. Upon the appeals of the convictions to the Appellate Division of the Superior Court, no criticism was made by the appellants of the admission of the evidence procured through the search and seizure, nor was the sufficiency of the warrant therefor impugned as a ground of appeal.² The convictions were affirmed by the Appellate Division of the New Jersey Superior Court on May 14, 1962, 74 N.J.Super. 257, 181 A.2d 184. The Supreme Court of the United States decided Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643, 81 S.Ct. 1684, 6 L.Ed. 2d 1081, on June 19, 1961, which was thirty-two days after the convictions of the relators and four days prior to the imposition (on June 23, 1961) of sentences thereunder. On November 9, 1962, relators moved the Bergen County Court, in which they had been convicted, to set aside the convictions and for a new trial of each of the indictments. They based the motions upon Mapp v. Ohio, supra, and Weeks v. United States, 1914, 232 U.S. 383, 34 S.Ct. 341, 58 L.Ed. 652. These motions were denied by the trial Court for the failure of relators to object on the trial to the admission of the evidence obtained by the seizure, and also because of relators' failure to invoke the Mapp rule on their appeals to the Appellate Division and their subsequent petitions for certification. From the denial of their motions, relators appealed to the Appellate Division of the New Jersey Superior Court, where the denial was affirmed. See 80 N.J.Super. 176, 193 A.2d 270. From the last mentioned decision, relators petitioned the New Jersey Supreme Court for certification, claiming that the decision in Mapp v. Ohio was retroactive, and citing and relying upon State v. Smith, 1962, 37 N.J. 481, 181 A.2d 761 and State v. Scrotsky, 1962, 38 N.J. 14, 182 A.2d 868. The New Jersey Supreme Court denied, without opinion, the petitions for certification on November 26, 1963, 41 N.J. 200, 195 A.2d 468. Relators then obtained a stay of execution of their sentences and petitioned the Supreme Court of the United States for certiorari. That petition was denied without opinion on March 23, 1964. Relators' subsequent petition to the same Court for rehearing was denied on April 20, 1964. Relators commenced the service of their sentences on April 7, 1964. The present applications for the writs were filed in this Court on April 23, 1964.

Although petitioners failed to allege the applicability of Mapp on their initial direct appeal from conviction, in a subsequent post-conviction proceeding (application to the trial Judge for a new trial) they did urge that doctrine through the New Jersey Supreme Court, and thus satisfied the requirements of § 2254, as interpreted in Brown v. Allen, 1953, 344 U.S. 443, 447-450, 73 S.Ct. 397, 97 L.Ed. 469, and qualified in Fay v. Noia, 1963, 372 U.S. 391, 83 S.Ct. 822, 9 L.Ed.2d 837.

At the hearing on the present petitions the testimony revealed that, after sentence and pending appeal from their convictions to the Appellate Division of the New Jersey Superior Court, relators suggested to their attorney that he urge as a ground for reversal, the rule in Mapp v. Ohio. This suggestion was renewed in contemplation of relators' petitions for certification to the New Jersey Supreme Court. Relators testified that they became aware of the decision in Mapp v. Ohio because it had been mentioned in a newspaper account of a successful motion to suppress similar evidence in connection with the case of State of New Jersey v. Moriarty, Indictment No. 813-61 in the Hudson County (New Jersey) Court, Law Division. The attorney, Mr. Slurzberg, refused to raise the Mapp decision because, according to the testimony of Harry Kaiser, "he Slurzberg didn't understand the phrase `probable cause'." Attorney Lucchi, who tried relators' cases, had been recommended to them by another attorney whose identity was not disclosed on the hearing. Harry Kaiser testified that Mr. Slurzberg was recommended to him by Abraham Miller, Esq., a lifelong friend, who is also a member of the New Jersey Bar. Both attorneys Lucchi and Slurzberg were present in the trial court when the sentences were imposed, but although on that occasion Slurzberg discussed Mapp v. Ohio with the sentencing Judge, Harry Kaiser had not heard of the case previously. It was not until after the relators were unsuccessful on their first appeal, before filing a petition for certification, that Kaiser read about the Mapp case in the press account of the Moriarty case. Harry Kaiser made no effort to inquire of Abraham Miller, Esq., respecting Slurzberg's difficulty with the phrase "probable cause", nor did Kaiser discuss the Mapp case with anyone else. The petition for certification was filed by Slurzberg for the Kaisers; but Mapp v. Ohio was not urged as a ground for reversal. After lack of success before the New Jersey Supreme Court, Kaiser retained another lawyer, Irving I. Vogelman, Esq., and later retained Mr. Corcoran, who presently appears for both of the relators.

Susan Kaiser testified substantially in accord with the testimony of her son, Harry. Learning that Moriarty "got out of it" with a defective warrant under the rule in Mapp v. Ohio, Mrs. Kaiser testified that she discussed with Slurzberg the desirability of urging the Mapp decision before the New Jersey Supreme Court in her case, but she acceded to his refusal to do so because she had confidence in his judgment. Harry Kaiser's wife also testified on the hearing before me to the effect that after her husband had lost the appeal, she made efforts through Mr. Miller to...