Wedding v. Wingo, 72-2160.
Decision Date | 31 August 1973 |
Docket Number | No. 72-2160.,72-2160. |
Citation | 483 F.2d 1131 |
Parties | Carl James WEDDING, Petitioner-Appellant, v. John W. WINGO, Respondent-Appellee. |
Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit |
Joseph G. Glass, court-appointed, Louisville, Ky., on brief, for petitioner-appellant.
Ed W. Hancock, Atty. Gen., James M. Ringo, Asst. Atty. Gen., Commonwealth of Kentucky, Frankfort, Ky., on brief, for respondent-appellee.
Before PHILLIPS, Chief Judge, WEICK, Circuit Judge, and CECIL, Senior Circuit Judge.
Wedding appeals from the denial by the District Court of his petition for a writ of habeas corpus after an evidentiary hearing conducted by a United States Magistrate. Wedding is presently serving a life sentence imposed in 1949 by the Webster Circuit Court of Kentucky after a plea of guilty to a charge of murder. He had filed his petition for the writ in the District Court in 1971, alleging among other things that his counsel was not appointed until the day of the trial; that he was not advised of his right of trial by jury; and that his guilty plea was coerced by threat of a possible death sentence.
Wedding's petition was denied without a hearing. He appealed to this Court and we reversed and remanded with instructions to conduct an evidentiary hearing on the petitioner's claims of constitutional violation. 456 F.2d 245 (6th Cir. 1972).
Upon remand, a United States Magistrate, acting pursuant to a rule adopted by the District Court, issued an order assigning the evidentiary hearing to himself. Prior to this hearing, however, the petitioner moved to disqualify the Magistrate from holding such hearing on the ground that a Magistrate was not authorized and empowered under authority of the Federal Magistrates Act of 1968 (28 U.S.C. §§ 631 to 639 (1973 supp.)) to hold evidentiary hearings. That motion was overruled by the District Court.
The evidentiary hearing was then conducted by the Magistrate on June 26, 1972, at which time an electronic recording was made of the testimony of the witnesses. Thereafter the Magistrate adopted findings of fact and conclusions of law, in writing, ruling that no constitutional right of petitioner had been violated, and recommending that the petition be dismissed. The Magistrate submitted to the Court his findings and conclusions, together with a recording (a plastic phonograph record) of the proceedings.
The petitioner moved to have the Court give the matter de novo consideration. The Court listened to the recording and adopted the findings of fact and conclusions of law of the Magistrate as his own, and dismissed the petition as without merit.
The petitioner has again appealed to this Court, contending that the proceedings of the District Court were invalid because the United States Magistrate had no authority under the Act to conduct an evidentiary hearing on his habeas corpus petition. We agree.
The Federal Magistrates Act of 1968, 28 U.S.C. §§ 631 to 639 (1973 Supp.) provides in relevant part:
Pursuant to this statute, the Judges of the United States District Court for the Western District of Kentucky signed an Order which amended Rule 16, Rules of that District, by adding to paragraph (c) (3) the following:
The interpretation by the rule which the Western District of Kentucky has placed upon the congressional grant of power to United States Magistrates is, in our opinion, incorrect.1 The Act granted authority to the Magistrate to conduct only a preliminary review of applications for post-trial relief in order to facilitate the decision of the District Court as to whether there should be a hearing. This Court, in its mandate, had already directed that an evidentiary hearing be conducted. This rule of the District Court, quoted above, attempts to expand the jurisdiction of the Magistrate and, as will be pointed out, conflicts with the Act, and is therefore invalid.
Our analysis begins with Holiday v. Johnston, 313 U.S. 342, 61 S.Ct. 1015, 85 L.Ed. 1392 (1941), wherein the Court assessed the respondent's claim that a United States Commissioner (the predecessor of the United States Magistrate) could conduct evidentiary hearings for habeas corpus by virtue of Rule 53(a) and (b) of the Rules of Civil Procedure. The Court stated:
By virtue of Holiday, the conduct of habeas corpus hearings by United States Commissioners became a dead issue.
Subsequently, however, Congress modified the habeas corpus statute so to provide that "the court shall summarily hear and determine the facts, and dispose of the matter as law and justice require", rather than "the court, or justice or judge, shall proceed in a summary way to determine the facts of the case . . ." as was formerly provided. 28 U.S.C. § 2243 (1971). (Emphasis added.) The same judicial district involved in this case, the Western District of Kentucky, interpreted this modification of the habeas corpus statute as a new authorization by Congress to have officers other than United States Judges, hold habeas corpus evidentiary hearings.
In Payne v. Wingo, 442 F.2d 1192 (6th Cir. 1971), we squarely rejected this interpretation. We stated therein:
To continue reading
Request your trial-
Cruz v. Hauck
...District Court, 501 F.2d 196 (9th Cir. 1974), cert. denied, 419 U.S. 879, 95 S.Ct. 143, 42 L.Ed.2d 119 (1975), with Wedding v. Wingo, 483 F.2d 1131 (6th Cir. 1973) (alternate holding), aff'd on other grounds, 418 U.S. 461, 94 S.Ct. 2842, 41 L.Ed.2d 879 (1974) and TPO, Inc. v. McMillen, 460 ......
-
Lo Duca v. U.S.
...S.Ct. 2842, 2847 n. 4, 41 L.Ed.2d 879 (1974) (magistrate judges are " 'outside the pale of Article III' ") (quoting Wedding v. Wingo, 483 F.2d 1131, 1133 n. 1 (6th Cir.1973)). Nothing in Mistretta suggests that federal magistrate judges would be precluded from conducting extradition Lo Duca......
-
Colonial Times, Inc. v. Gasch
...has stated that an untranscribed phonographic record of a habeas corpus proceeding violates Fed.R.App.P. 10. See Wedding v. Wingo, 483 F.2d 1131, 1137 (6th Cir. 1973), aff'd on other grounds, 418 U.S. 461, 94 S.Ct. 2842, 41 L.Ed.2d 879 (1974). Provision of an untranscribed tape recording to......
-
Brown v. United States
...whether there should be a hearing in a habeas case was the exclusive power granted to magistrates in that area. Wedding v. Wingo, 483 F.2d 1131, 1135 (6th Cir.1973)aff'd,418 U.S. 461, 94 S.Ct. 2842, 41 L.Ed.2d 879 (1974). Six years after Wingo, the Court described its holding in that case a......