United States v. Sutton, CRIMINAL ACTION NO. 05-90-DLB-CJS-1
| Decision Date | 27 April 2016 |
| Docket Number | CRIMINAL ACTION NO. 05-90-DLB-CJS-1 |
| Citation | 184 F.Supp.3d 503 |
| Parties | United States of America, Plaintiff v. Randall Sutton, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Kentucky |
Anthony J. Bracke, U.S. Attorney's Office, Covington, KY, for Plaintiff.
This matter is before the Court upon the Defendant's Motion to Dismiss the Indictment based on alleged violations of his speedy trial rights. (Doc. # 121). The United States having submitted its Response in Opposition to the Motion (Doc. # 123), and the Court having heard oral argument (Doc. # 127), the Motion is now ripe for review. For the reasons that follow, Defendant's Motion will be denied .
On December 14, 2005, the Defendant and co-defendant Jessie Monghan1 were charged in the Eastern District of Kentucky with armed bank robbery, brandishing a firearm in furtherance of a crime of violence, and being a felon in possession of a firearm. (Doc. # 1). According to the Indictment, the crimes occurred on July 27, 2005. Id. On December 21, 2005, the Defendant was charged in the Southern District of Ohio with three additional bank robberies and related firearms offenses. When the Kentucky Indictment was returned, the Defendant was in the custody of the U.S. Marshal in the Southern District of Ohio.
On November 1, 2006, the Defendant signed and entered into a global plea agreement whereby he agreed to plead guilty to two of the Ohio charges and both of the Kentucky charges. (Doc. # 123-2). The plea agreement required Defendant to plead guilty to the Kentucky charges pursuant to Rule 20 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. (Doc. # 123-2). Soon thereafter, and as part of the plea agreement, the Defendant formally requested transfer of the Kentucky charges for disposition in Ohio under Rule 20. (Doc. # 4). In the Rule 20 paperwork, Defendant waived his right to trial on the Kentucky charges in the Eastern District of Kentucky and expressed his desire to enter a guilty plea to those charges in the Southern District of Ohio.
On February 15, 2007, Defendant appeared before the Southern District of Ohio and pled guilty to two of the Ohio charges—one count of armed bank robbery in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2113(a) and (d) and one count of brandishing a firearm in furtherance of a crime of violence in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c). The transcript of that hearing reflects that the Defendant expressed his intent to plead guilty to the Kentucky charges during that proceeding. (Doc. # 123-1). However, because the Clerk's Office in Cincinnati had not yet received the Rule 20 paperwork transferring that case from Kentucky to Ohio, the Defendant was unable to formally enter his guilty plea to the Kentucky charges at that time. Rather, the parties agreed that he would enter a guilty plea to the Ohio charges and that the Court would take up the Kentucky charges at a later date. Although Defendant could not formally enter a guilty plea to the Kentucky charges at that time, the transcript reflects that the Defendant acknowledged his role in the Kentucky armed bank robbery. Id. In fact, the transcript reveals that Defendant agreed to the facts as summarized by FBI Agent Tony Ott, which included the Kentucky conduct. (Doc. # 123-1, at 22-23). The statement of facts signed by the Defendant also included facts related to the Kentucky charges. (Doc. # 123-3). At the conclusion of the plea proceeding, the Court told the attorneys that the Defendant would be brought back in for a formal plea to the Kentucky charges once the Rule 20 paperwork was completed.
On June 27, 2007, the Rule 20 paperwork was filed in the Southern District of Ohio, and one week later, the court granted a Motion to Consolidate the Kentucky case with the Ohio case for sentencing purposes. On August 29, 2007, the Defendant was sentenced on both the Ohio and Kentucky charges. Although the Defendant had not formally plead guilty to the Kentucky charges, neither party objected to sentencing him for offenses committed in both districts and neither party brought the need for a guilty plea to the Kentucky charges to the Court's attention. The Defendant was sentenced to concurrent terms of eleven years on both bank robbery charges (one in the Southern District of Ohio and one in the Eastern District of Kentucky), and consecutive terms of seven years for the Ohio § 924(c) charge and twenty-five years for the Kentucky § 924(c) charge, for a total sentence of forty-three years. The Court also ordered the Defendant to pay restitution to both banks, including $10,046.00 to Huntington Bank for the Kentucky bank robbery.
The Defendant filed a Notice of Appeal on September 1, 2007 in the Southern District of Ohio, but did not raise the lack of a formal guilty plea as an issue in his direct appeal. Almost five years later, on April 19, 2012, Defendant filed a Motion to Vacate under 28 U.S.C. § 2255, challenging his conviction and sentence on the Kentucky charges. In his § 2255 Motion in the Southern District of Ohio, Defendant alleged, in part, that he never pled guilty to the Kentucky charges. On September 30, 2015, the Southern District of Ohio granted Defendant's § 2255 Motion in part and vacated his conviction and sentence on the Kentucky charges. On December 23, 2015, the Southern District of Ohio returned the Kentucky charges back to the Eastern District of Kentucky. (Doc. # 111).
On January 20, 2016, the Eastern District of Kentucky held a brief status conference and appointed counsel for Defendant. (Doc. # 115). He was arraigned and entered a plea of not guilty to the Indictment on February 18, 2016. (Doc. # 117). Another status conference was held on February 23, 2016, wherein a pre-trial conference was scheduled for April 11, 2016, and jury trial for April 18, 2016. (Doc. # 120). Thereafter, on February 26, 2016, Defendant filed the pending Motion to Dismiss, alleging violations of the statute of limitations, the Speedy Trial Act, and his Sixth Amendment right to a speedy trial. (Doc. # 121). The Court took Defendant's Motion under submission after hearing oral argument on April 12, 2016. (Doc. # 127).
The applicable statute of limitations, 18 U.S.C. § 3823(a), requires a Defendant to be indicted within five years of the conduct being committed. The statute of limitations does not address delays that occur after indictment. In this case, the offense was committed on July 27, 2005, and the Defendant was indicted on December 14, 2005, approximately five months after the offense was committed. Therefore, no violation of the statute of limitations occurred.
"The Speedy Trial Act requires that in any case in which the defendant has not entered a guilty plea, trial must commence within 70 days of the filing of the indictment or the date of the defendant's arraignment, whichever occurs later." United States v. Brown , 819 F.3d 800 (6th Cir.2016) (citing 18 U.S.C. § 3161(c)(1) ). The Act "also includes a list of delays that must be excluded from the 70-day period." Id. (citing 18 U.S.C. § 3161(h) ). "If the government exceeds these limits and the Act does not exclude the delays ... the Act requires the district court to dismiss the case on the defendant's motion." United States v. Myers , 666 F.3d 402, 404 (6th Cir.2012). The Sixth Circuit has held that establishing "a prima facie case that the government violated" the Speedy Trial Act is "a simple matter of producing a calendar and showing that more than seventy days have passed since the indictment (or first appearance) and trial has yet to begin;" however, there are certain cases where the Speedy Trial Act analysis is slightly more complicated than looking at a calendar. United States v. Jenkins , 92 F.3d 430 (6th Cir.1996). This is certainly one of those cases.
Defendant claims that his rights under the Speedy Trial Act have been violated and thus, dismissal of the indictment is required. (Doc. # 121, p. 5). Specifically, Defendant suggests two possible dates for the start of the Speedy Trial Act clock in this case: (1) February 15, 2007, the date Defendant pled guilty to the Ohio charges, or (2) August 29, 2007, the date Defendant was sentenced on both the Ohio and Kentucky charges. Id. at 6. Using either start date, Defendant asserts that the seventy-day time limitation outlined in the Speedy Trial Act was "exceeded by over eight years." Id. In response, the United States claims that January 20, 2016, the date Defendant first appeared before the Eastern District of Kentucky, should be the start date for Speedy Trial Act purposes. However, Sixth Circuit precedent establishes that neither Defendant nor the United States have offered the correct start date for calculating compliance with the Speedy Trial Act's time limitations.
First, the Court rejects Defendant's suggestion that the Speedy Trial Act clock began during one of his appearances before the Southern District of Ohio. "The plain language of the [Speedy Trial Act] requires a not guilty plea to begin the clock running." United States v. O'Dell , 154 F.3d 358, 360 (6th Cir.1998). Section 3161(c)(1) provides that "in any case in which a plea of not guilty is entered , the trial of a defendant charged in an information or indictment with the commission of an offense shall commence within seventy days ..." O'Dell , 154 F.3d at 360 (citing 18 U.S.C. § 3161(c)(1) ). After examining the legislative history of the Speedy Trial Act, the Sixth Circuit determined that "the purpose of the not guilty plea requirement is to conserve judicial resources by avoiding unnecessary trial scheduling in cases where it is more likely that the defendant will plead guilty or nolo contendre." O'Dell , 154 F.3d at 360. In addition, the Sixth Circuit found that "[r]equiring a not guilty plea also serves to conserve prosecutorial resources; a prosecutor...
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