United States ex rel. Van Pelt v. Warden

461 F. Supp. 618, 1978 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 14007
District Court, N.D. Illinois·Decided December 5, 1978·No. No. 75 C 2664·Published·Cited by 2 cases

Opinion

DECISION

McMILLEN, District Judge.

Following the Court of Appeals’ remand of the petition in the above case by an order entered February 18, 1977, the court has held hearings and conducted other proceedings to determine whether a mistrial was properly declared in the petitioner’s first trial. (See Court of Appeals Order, p. 5.) Also since that time the United States Supreme Court has handed down a decision on double jeopardy in Arizona v. Washington, 434 U.S. 497, 98 S.Ct. 824, 54 L.Ed.2d 717 (1978), and has vacated and remanded the decision in United States v. Grasso, 552 F.2d 46 (2d Cir. 1977). Based upon all of the law and available evidence, the court has decided that a mistrial was not properly declared in the petitioner’s first trial and that he should be granted a writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254.*

The Supreme Court in Arizona v. Washington held at 434 U.S. 498, 98 S.Ct. 824 that a finding of double jeopardy must be based upon whether the entire trial court record reflects the kind of “necessity” which justifies depriving the defendant-petitioner of his right to have his trial completed by a particular tribunal. Accord, United States v. Jorn, 400 U.S. 470, 484, 91 S.Ct. 547, 27 L.Ed.2d 543 (1971). The Court likewise held that the decision of the trial judge to declare a mistrial is entitled to “great deference” and that that court need not make a full or explicit finding of “manifest necessity” for his action. The justification of a mistrial can be determined from the record as a whole, absent a finding by the trial court of the factors on which his [620] exercise of discretion was based. In the case at bar, we have found it necessary to go beyond the record, pursuant to the Court of Appeals’ mandate.

The petitioner’s first trial, in which the mistrial was declared, was held in October 1971 in Moline, Illinois. Because of the remoteness of the trial both spacially and temporally from the court in which the petition for writ of habeas corpus is pending, it has not been possible to reconstruct all of the factors by which the trial judge’s decision must be weighed, since memories are fallible and witnesses disappear. Nevertheless, we have in the 'record affidavits by the trial judge, by the defendant’s trial attorney, and by the prosecutor. We also have taken the testimony of the petitioner, who was then still incarcerated, and of a witness whom he called. This, and additional evidence, will be referred to hereinafter, to the extent significant.

On the basis of all this evidence, some of which is conflicting, we find and conclude, firstly, that the petitioner has borne his burden of showing that he did not knowingly consent to the direction of a mistrial on or before October 27, 1971, although we find that his attorney did advise him that such a decision was forthcoming.

The record shows that the trial judge declared a mistrial not only without the specific consent or motion of the petitioner, but also without a full explanation to him of the circumstances or alternatives available. The attorney told the petitioner that the jury was “deadlocked,” but he was not able to tell him how it stood and did not advise him that a mistrial would result in a retrial. No one except his attorney had any communication with petitioner on this subject, and the petitioner was not given an opportunity to object.

Therefore, the next question is whether the trial judge was under a “manifest necessity” to declare a mistrial without defendant’s concurrence. After the jury had deliberated for about five and one-half hours, the judge’s affidavit states that the bailiff told him that, according to the foreman, the jury was unable to agree on a verdict. This purported deadlock was not made a part of the trial court record, although petitioner’s attorney admittedly was advised of it. Two jurors, James Driessen and Jack E. Couch, have filed statements herein dated July 19, and August 10, 1978, respectively, to the effect that the jury was still deliberating when the mistrial was declared and may have stood 11 to 1 for acquittal. Driessen states, “It would be my recollection that we could have reached a verdict if we had been allowed to continue to deliberate.” \

The foregoing indicates that the trial judge did not properly exercise his discretion if the basis for his decision was a deadlocked jury. He made no formal inquiry of the foreman, he did not ask the parties to agree or the defendant to move for a mistrial, he did not consider the alternative of allowing the jury to take a recess and resume deliberations the following day (at least by agreement), nor did he give the State equivalent of an Allen or even a Silvern instruction.

This leads us to the conclusion that the major factor causing the trial judge to declare a mistrial was the emergency which he believed had been encountered with respect to the illness of one juror’s son. The judge had been advised of this situation about three hours before he declared a mistrial and had kept in touch with the hospital and with counsel to see whether the emergency might resolve itself. Just before declaring a mistrial, he was “very concerned about continuing to withhold information relative to the condition of her son” from the juror, although, as it turned out, the boy’s father had been found and had signed a consent for an operation. Thus the trial judge, had he been fully informed, would have known that there was no longer any manifest necessity to release this juror. Even if he had not known this, he could have attempted to obtain a stipulation from the parties to allow this juror to go to the hospital in the custody of a bailiff to cope with the emergency, or to allow the jury to separate until the next day.

[621] These were possible alternatives to his course of action which the judge did not explore, at least with the attorneys or on the record. The case of United States v. Grasso, supra, p. 619, although vacated and remanded for further consideration in the light of Arizona v. Washington, supra, p. 619, is still unscathed on this point, discussed at 552 F.2d 53. A trial judge cannot be expected to be omniscient or to find all of the facts accurately by his own ex parte investigation, but we find and conclude that as a matter of law he cannot deprive a defendant of his constitutional rights because of the emergency illness of a juror’s son. Rather, assuming that the emergency still existed after three and one-half hours from the first notification, we believe that a defendant’s rights are superi- or to those of an individual juror’s if that juror is willing and able to continue deliberations.

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United States ex rel. Van Pelt v. Warden, 461 F. Supp. 618, 1978 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 14007 (N.D. Ill. 1978).

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