U.S. Supreme Court decides local speedy trial case

                 By Donna Walter
                 donna.walter@molawyersmedia.com

 A St. Louis criminal defense lawyer says the U.S. Supreme Court decision interpreting the Speedy Trail Act is a victory not only for his client but for the rights of criminal defendants throughout the country.
        “The Supreme Court made it clear that the Speedy Trial Act means what it says and that the judges are going to protect the defendants’ rights at every step of the process and not create any loopholes that render the act meaningless,” said St. Louis lawyer Stephen Welby, of The Welby Law Firm.
         The federal Speedy Trial Act gives criminal defendants the right to have a trial within 70 days of indictment or first appearance, whichever is later. If defendants aren’t tried within this 70-day period, the pending charges will be dismissed, according to the law.
         Another criminal defense lawyer from St. Louis doubts the opinion will benefit criminal defendants or their lawyers.
        “In my experience, given the complexity of a lot of federally prosecuted criminal cases, that 70 days is inadequate,” said Chet Pleban, of Pleban & Associates, who is not involved in this case.

        “If we’re not going to exclude the time to reasonably address what can be some complicated motion issues, I think that disadvantages the defendant in the long run,” he said.
         Welby’s client, who was convicted of being a felon in possession of a firearm and of possessing cocaine with intent to distribute, now has the opportunity to argue to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that the case against him should be dismissed.
         Defendant Taylor James Bloate says his rights were violated when then-Senior U.S. District Judge Stephen N. Limbaugh, of the Eastern District of Missouri, denied his motion to dismiss the charges the month before his trial was scheduled. Upon conviction, Limbaugh sentenced Bloate to 30 years in prison.
        The 8th Circuit affirmed the conviction and sentence in July 2008.
       Bloate said the time granted to prepare pre trail motions should count against the speedy trial clock, or, to put it another way, is not excludable under the Speedy Trail Act. Twenty-eight days are ay issue in Bloate’s case- Sept. 7, 2007, when Limbaugh allowed Bloate to waive his right to file pre trial motions.
       In a 7-2 decision, the Supreme Court on Monday reversed the 9th Circuit and said time to prepare pretrial motions is not automatically excludable.
       Justice Clarence Thomas wrote the majority opinion, and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote a separate concurring opinion.
       Justice Samuel Alito, joined by Justice Stephen Breyer, dissented.
      “I was pleased to see a broad coalition in the majority,” said Mark T. Stancil, of Robbins, Russell, Englert, Orseck & Untereiner in Washington, D.C., who represented Bloate before the high court.
      “I think it just goes to show that judges from all different judicial philosophies will agree that defendants’ fundamental rights need to be protected,” Welby said.
       Stancil said the court’s decision was a “straightforward statutory interpretation” of the Speedy Trail Act. The court’s decision, he said, “will encourage judges to keep the process moving, which is exactly what the act is supposed to do.”
      Solicitor General Elena Kagan and Matthew D. Roberts, assistant to the solicitor general, represented the U.S. Department of Justice.
      The department had no comment. A message left for U.S. Attorney Richard Callahan was not returned by press time.   
      Section 3161(h) of the act lists the types of delays that are excludable from the 70-day calculation period. Subsection(h)(1) requires automatic exclusion of “any period of delay resulting from other proceedings concerning the defendant, including but not limited to” eight subcategories of proceedings.
      The majority said the issue in the Bloate case is governed by subcategory D, which is about: “delay resulting from any pretrial motion, from the filing of the motion through the conclusion of the hearing on, or other prompt disposition of, such motion.”
      This means that the only delays resulting from pretrial motions that are excludable are those “from the filing of the motion through the conclusion of the hearing on,” the majority said.
      The majority said another provision of the law, Section 3161(h)(7), may be used to exclude time for preparing pretrial motions.
      Although the government agreed that a district judge could use this subsection to exclude time for preparing pretrial motions, it argued in its brief that “automatic exclusion of the time under Section 3161(h)(1) is more consistent with the structure and purpose of the Act.”
      Subsection (h)(7) “is designed to cover more unusual situations in which it is important for the district court to make a specific determination whether delay of the trial is warranted,” the government argued.
      Stancil and Welby rejected the dissent’s argument that the decision creates a “windfall” for criminal defendants, allowing them to delay proceedings and then argue for dismissal based upon the Speedy Trial Act.
      “That argument is premised on the idea that district courts will forget to consider these things on a case-by-case basis. But I think what that overlooks is you’ll have prosecutors reminding the courts” to do so, Stancil said.
      Welby said, as did the majority, that the dismissal could be without prejudice, “and the defendant wouldn’t gain anything from that maneuver.”
      The case is Bloate v. U.S., 08-728

St. Louis Daily Record
March 9, 2010
Vol. 121, No.67