United States v. Perron

53 M.J. 774, 2000 CCA LEXIS 202, 2000 WL 1211608
U S Coast Guard Court of Criminal Appeals·Decided August 28, 2000·No. CGCMS 24172; Docket No. 1115·Published·Cited by 7 cases

Opinion

McClelland, Judge:

Appellant was tried by a special court-martial judge alone. Pursuant to his pleas of guilty, entered in accordance with a pretrial agreement, Appellant was convicted of one specification of possession of marijuana and two specifications of use of marijuana in violation of Article 112a of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). The judge sentenced Appellant to a bad-conduct discharge (BCD), confinement for 90 days, and reduction to paygrade E-3. The convening authority approved the sentence as adjudged, but suspended all confinement in excess of 60 days, as required by the pretrial agreement. Before this Court, Appellant has assigned and orally argued one error: that his pleas of guilty were improvident based on an honest and substantial misunderstanding of a material term of his pretrial agreement.

[775] According to Appellant, that term of his plea bargain would have prevented financial harm to his family from the court-martial sentence. On the face of it, the third paragraph of the agreement’s maximum sentence appendix appears to accomplish that objective by stating the following:

Forfeiture or Fine: Any fine or forfeiture will be disapproved. In accordance with Art. 58(b) [sic], UCMJ, 10 U.S.C. § 858(b), the convening authority agrees to waive any or all forfeitures and pay the dependents of the accused.

That provision’s purpose was thwarted, however, when Appellant was placed in a non-pay status upon his confinement after trial, with the result that there were no forfeitures to be waived and no money to be sent to his dependents. Appellant learned of his situation a little over a month after being confined. At that time, his counsel ascertained that this action was based on a pay determination at the Coast Guard Human Resources Service and Information Center (the Coast Guard’s pay center) that placed Appellant in a non-pay status upon his confinement due to the expiration of his enlistment prior to trial.1 Appellant contends that at the time he agreed to plead guilty in return for limitations on his approved sentence, which included the waiver of forfeitures provision for the benefit of his family, he misunderstood the pay consequences that would occur when confined after expiration of his enlistment. Citing U.S. v. Mitchell, 50 M.J. 79, 82 (1999) and U.S. v. Olson, 25 M.J. 293 (CMA 1987), Appellant asserts that the effect of this misunderstanding on his plea bargain necessitates corrective action by this Court.

The Government, on the other hand, argues that no remedial action is necessary because Appellant received the benefit of his bargain when the convening authority sent a letter dated March 9, 1999, to the pay center stating that any forfeitures arising by operation of Article 58b, UCMJ, 10 U.S.C. § 858b, were waived as of February 2, 1999. That letter, which was sent the day after the convening authority was informed of Appellant’s pay status in a clemency request from defense counsel, could not have had the result it directed, because there was no pay to be forfeited and, therefore, no pay for Appellant’s dependents to receive. It seems to us disingenuous for the Government to contend that Appellant received the benefit of his bargain when the convening authority’s letter could not cause pay to be sent to Appellant’s dependents, as required by the agreement. The Government’s argument boils down to the assertion that by merely sending the letter to the pay center, the convening authority met the requirements of the pretrial agreement. It is essentially an argument that the technical terms of the agreement had been fully honored by the Government, even though no forfeitures of pay were actually waived.2 We find this argument difficult to accept, particularly since it reduces the pretrial agreement’s words “and pay the dependents of the accused” to a nullity.

[776] We turn now to the assigned issue of whether Appellant misunderstood a material term of the pretrial agreement, as he contends. It is undisputed that the effect of the pretrial agreement on Appellant’s pay — i.e. that it would have no effect because there would be no pay — was not understood, by the Appellant or by either counsel at trial. The question is whether the misunderstanding pertains to a material term of the agreement.

According to Rule for Courts-Martial (R.C.M.) 910(h)(3) and U.S. v. Olson, supra, “If appellant did ‘not understand the material terms of the agreement’ and if, thereafter, it was not conformed to his understanding, he is entitled to withdraw his guilty plea.” 25 M.J. at 297. Moreover, if the agreement cannot be. conformed to Appellant’s understanding, it also may be possible to fashion another remedy that will suffice. U.S. v. Olson, 25 M.J. at 298-299; U.S. v. Mitchell, 50 M.J. at 82-83. Appellant asks this Court to take the latter step by disapproving the BCD. In the alternative, he asks that the findings' and sentence be set aside and a rehearing ordered so that he may enter pleas with a full understanding of the consequences. The Government argues that the relief urged by Appellant should not be granted because waiver of Article 58b forfeitures was a collateral aspect of the pretrial agreement rather than a material term entitling Appellant to conforming of the agreement or withdrawal of the pleas of guilty.3 We disagree. The government’s reliance on Appellant’s failure to mention his family’s financial needs in his unsworn statement at trial as “the best evidence of Appellant’s state of mind” as to the importance of the waiver provision is singularly unconvincing. The absence therein of reference to financial concerns may just as well reflect Appellant’s belief that his pretrial agreement protected his income.

The waiver-of-automatic-forfeitures requirement was an agreed-upon term of the pretrial agreement’s clause that also required disapproval of any adjudged fine or forfeiture. As such, it is clear that Appellant specifically bargained for a provision that would allow him to receive full pay and that expressly required waiver of any automatic forfeitures of that pay under Article 58b, UCMJ, so that amount would be paid to his dependents. This term undeniably is a part of the agreement, and undeniably would be expected to have consequences amounting to many hundreds of dollars, in the likely event of a sentence that included a BCD and some confinement. Surely this term is material.

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United States v. Perron, 53 M.J. 774, 2000 CCA LEXIS 202, 2000 WL 1211608 (uscgcoca 2000).

53 M.J. 774 (United States v. Perron) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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