Martin v. State

306 A.3d 50

Darnell MARTIN, Defendant Below, Appellant,

v.STATE of Delaware, Plaintiff Below, Appellee.

No. 112, 2021

Supreme Court of Delaware.

Submitted: July 12, 2023

Decided: October 9, 2023

Court Below: Superior Court of the State of Delaware, Cr. ID No. 1702005493 (N)

Upon appeal from the Superior Court of the State of Delaware. REVERSED AND REMANDED.

Benjamin S. Gifford, IV, Esquire, The Law Office of Benjamin S. Gifford IV, Wilmington, DE, Attorney for Defendant Below, Appellant.

Brian L. Arban, Esquire, Deputy Attorney General, Department of Justice, Wilmington, DE, Attorney for Plaintiff Below, Appellee.

Dwayne J. Bensing, Esquire, American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Delaware, Wilmington, DE and Brendan Bernicker, Esquire, Megha Ram, Esquire, Roderick & Solange MacArthur Justice Center, Washington, DC, as Amici Curiae American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Delaware, Roderick & Solange MacArthur Justice Center, and the Innocence Network in support of Defendant Below, Appellant.

Before SEITZ, Chief Justice;

VALIHURA, TRAYNOR, LEGROW, and GRIFFITHS, Justices.

LEGROW, Justice:

In 2013, the defendant below-appellant, Darnell Martin, received an unconditional gubernatorial pardon for his previous criminal convictions, which included several felony convictions. Several years later, Martin was arrested and charged with new offenses. After his convictions for those charges were affirmed on direct appeal, he filed a motion for postconviction relief, arguing that his trial counsel was ineffective. More than two years passed as the parties briefed Martin’s motion and the trial court considered it. During that time, Martin served his prison sentence and his term of probation. He was discharged from probation while the postconviction motion was under advisement with the Superior Court.

After Martin’s probation was discharged, the Superior Court dismissed his postconviction motion as moot, concluding that he no longer was "in custody" as required by Rule 61(a) and, given his extensive criminal history, he would not suffer any collateral consequences as a result of the convictions he was challenging. When the Superior Court dismissed the motion, it was not aware that Martin’s previous convictions had been pardoned. Martin appealed, and we remanded to the Superior Court to further consider the effect of Martin’s pardon, including whether a pardoned defendant suffers collateral consequences in the same manner as a first-time felon and therefore should not have his postconviction motion mooted if he is released from custody before the motion is resolved. The Superior Court concluded that the collateral consequences doctrine, which this Court adopted more than 50 years ago based on United States Supreme Court precedent, has no continuing application in postconviction proceedings in Delaware.

Martin’s appeal then returned to this Court, where he continues to challenge the dismissal of his motion and the Superior Court’s application of the mootness doctrine. Having carefully considered the Superior Court’s decision and the parties’ submissions, we conclude that the Superior Court erred in dismissing Martin’s postconviction motion as moot. Based on the applicable rule’s language and structure and the collateral consequences exception’s history, we hold that the collateral consequences exception to the mootness doctrine continues to apply in cases, like Martin’s, where a movant’s release from custody during postconviction proceedings would otherwise extinguish his standing to seek postconviction relief. Martin adequately pleaded that he faces collateral consequences arising from these convictions because he was unconditionally pardoned for all his previous crimes. We therefore reverse the Superior Court’s order and remand this case for further proceedings.

I. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

The factual background relevant to this appeal is undisputed and relatively uncomplicated. Martin was arrested on several drug-related offenses in February 2017. After the Superior Court denied his motion to suppress evidence obtained during a search of his vehicle, Martin waived his right to a jury trial and agreed to a stipulated bench trial.¹ The Superior Court convicted Martin on January 9, 2018 of Drug Dealing (Marijuana) and Aggravated Possession (Marijuana). The Aggravated Possession charge was a lesser-included offense of the Drug Dealing charge, so the two convictions merged for sentencing purposes.² The Superior Court sentenced Martin to 25 years at Level V, suspended after 2 years for 18 months of probation.³

Martin appealed his conviction to this Court, arguing that the Superior Court erred in denying his motion to suppress evidence. We affirmed Martin’s conviction,⁴ and he then filed a timely pro se motion for postconviction relief and a motion to appoint counsel under Superior Court Criminal Rule 61.

A. Martin Files the Postconviction Motion

The Superior Court granted Martin’s motion for counsel, and postconviction counsel was appointed on April 4, 2019. The Superior Court ordered postconviction counsel to file an amended postconviction motion or a motion to withdraw by July 12, 2019. Postconviction counsel requested three extensions of that deadline, all of which the Superior Court granted. Postconviction counsel filed an amended motion for postconviction relief on December 3, 2019, arguing that Martin’s trial counsel was ineffective because he failed to identify the correct legal basis to suppress the search of the vehicle. Martin’s trial counsel and the State responded to the amended postconviction motion, and Martin filed a reply on August 13, 2020.

On November 30, 2020, the Superior Court requested supplemental briefing from the parties regarding the application of Rule 61(i)(4) and Green v. State⁵ to Martin’s postconviction motion. The parties filed simultaneous responses on December 31, 2020.

On February 24, 2021, Martin completed his probation sentence and was discharged from probation. On March 17, 2021, the Superior Court dismissed Martin’s amended postconviction motion sua sponte, holding that his motion was moot because he "completed his sentence upon his full discharge from probation" and he therefore was "released from all ‘custody’ under the conviction" he sought to challenge.⁶ The Superior Court further concluded that Martin’s "lengthy criminal history," including "numerous prior felony drug convictions," meant that he would not suffer any collateral consequences as a result of the Drug Dealing conviction at issue in this case.⁷

B. The First Appeal

Martin appealed the Superior Court’s order of dismissal, arguing that the Superior Court erred in concluding that he would not suffer any collateral consequences from the Drug Dealing conviction. Martin pointed out that all his previous convictions were pardoned in 2013, several years before his conviction in this case. He therefore asserted that the Superior Court erred in concluding that his amended postconviction motion was moot because the court incorrectly concluded that no collateral consequences arose from his conviction.

Martin relied on Gural v. State, in which this Court held that the completion of a sentence renders a postconviction decision moot unless, "in consequence of the conviction or sentence, the defendant suffers collateral legal disabilities or burdens, in which case the defendant is considered to have a sufficient stake in the conviction or sentence to survive the satisfaction of the sentence and to permit him to obtain a review or institute a challenge."⁸ Martin argued that the gubernatorial pardon he obtained in 2013 erased his criminal record completely, such that he was subjected to all the collateral consequences of a first-time felon when he was convicted in 2018, including the loss of his rights to serve on a jury or possess a deadly weapon, along with the negative effects on his ability to obtain employment or receive federal student loans.⁹

In response, the State denied that the Superior Court abused its discretion in dismissing Martin’s motion, arguing that Martin’s claimed collateral consequences were hypothetical, speculative, and amounted to "generalizations applicable to all convicted felons."¹⁰ The State alternatively argued that Martin’s postconviction motion could be denied on its merits.

After considering the parties’ briefs, we remanded the matter to the Superior Court to consider the collateral consequences issue (the "Remand Order").¹¹ In the Remand Order, we noted that "the standing issue was raised by the court sua sponte; as a result, the Superior Court did not receive submissions regarding, and did not consider in its order, the effect of the pardon on the collateral consequences analysis."¹² We therefore asked the Superior Court to address two issues on remand: (i) "whether a person convicted of a felony for the first time faces collateral consequences under Gural"; and (ii) "whether a person who has received a pardon must be treated the same as a first-time felon for purposes of analyzing the collateral consequences rule in connection with resolving a motion for postconviction relief."¹³ The Remand Order also permitted the Superior Court to make further factual findings and legal rulings that it deemed necessary to enable appellate review.¹⁴ We retained jurisdiction to consider Martin’s appeal after the Superior Court addressed the questions on remand.¹⁵

C. Decision on Remand

Once the case was remanded, the Superior Court convened a status conference and requested briefing from both parties. In his supplemental memorandum to the Superior Court, Martin explained that he was pardoned on June 14, 2013 for all his previous criminal convictions and, as a result, he no longer was a felon.¹⁶ When he was convicted in this case, he therefore "lost the rights that had been restored" by the unconditional pardon, including the right to serve on a jury and to own and possess a firearm, along with significant...