State v. Reukauf

STATE OF WASHINGTON, Respondent, v. ALAN RAY REUKAUF, A/K/A ALLEN REUKAUF, Appellant.

No. 36709-6-III

Court of Appeals of Washington, Division 3

September 22, 2020

UNPUBLISHED OPINION

SIDDOWAY, J.

Alan Reukauf appeals his conviction for failure to register as a sex offender, challenging the sufficiency of the evidence the court's denial of his request to represent himself his offender score, and a community custody condition requiring him to pay supervision costs. While the State does not concede the challenge to the community custody condition it does not object if we remand with directions to strike it which we do. Finding no error or abuse of discretion, and that Mr. Reukauf's pro se statement of additional grounds raises no meritorious issues, we otherwise affirm.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

As a result of Alan Reukauf's 1983 conviction in California for forcible rape, Washington counties have required him to register as a sex offender. He was convicted in 2010 for failure to register as a sex offender in Skamania County, and in 2011 for failure to register in Benton County. In September 2017, Mr. Reukauf registered with Franklin County. As a transient, he was required to check in weekly. When he failed to appear for his weekly check-ins between August 15 and September 20, 2018, he was charged with failure to register as a sex offender (third or subsequent offense).

At the first reported court proceeding following his arrest, Mr Reukauf's court-appointed lawyer, with the prosecutor's support, asked the court to order an evaluation of Mr. Reukauf's competency. The short hearing at which the request was granted was dominated by Mr. Reukauf: he complained about his lawyer, whom he wanted fired (contending "he's working with the prosecution"), he complained that a prior competency evaluation had "delayed my trial for . . . nothing" since he was found competent (interjecting, "Coo coo. Coo coo. I'm crazy"), and he directed argumentative statements at the lawyers (saying, "You're worthless. So is this guy."). Report of Proceedings (RP) (Jan. 29, 2019) at 5-8.

Two weeks later, Jonathan M. Ryan, PsyD, submitted the results of his evaluation of Mr. Reukauf to the trial court. He explained that he had been unable to complete an interview of Mr. Reukauf at the Franklin County Jail because about 45 minutes into the interview, Mr. Reukauf became angry when Dr. Ryan was not receptive to Mr. Reukauf's insistence that the doctor "use the '. . .art of deception' to convince the court to send him to a secure mental health facility." Clerk's Papers (CP) at 34. Dr. Ryan reported that Mr. Reukauf

became highly agitated and stated, "So you are one of them. How much do they pay you? Fuck you, I am done." He then stood up, picked up a chair, and threw it at the window. After throwing a second chair, custody staff entered the room and restrained the defendant.

CP at 34-35.

Dr. Ryan nonetheless formulated an opinion based on the aborted interview, criminal, correctional, and counseling records, and two competency evaluations prepared by others in August 2017 and April 2018. He quoted from the prior evaluations, both of which discussed Mr. Reukauf's belief that he was the target of a "Cabal." Dr. Ryan's reproduction of portions of the prior evaluations included the following clinical observation of Dr. Lisa VanDerley:

"[H]e did endorse a delusional belief system that he referred to as the 'Cabal.' When asked to define this he said, 'It's a secret group of plotters, conspirators that have been out to get me for some time.' Mr. Reukauf expressed that he believes the Cabal is made up of police officers and government officials. He stated they have had a vendetta against him since 2002."

CP at 29-30 (quoting Competency Evaluation by Lisa VanDerley, PsyD, Aug. 7, 2017).

Dr. Ryan concluded,

Mr. Reukauf may have a mental illness consisting of symptoms of depression and anxiety and a personality disorder. However, his symptoms of mental illness do not pose a barrier to competency at this time. . . . Mr. Reukauf has the capacity to understand the nature of the proceedings against him and to assist in his own defense, should he elect to do so. In my opinion, any refusal to assist his counsel i[s] likely due to his maladaptive personality traits and not the result of a mental disease or defect.

CP at 34. Dr. Ryan indicated the maladaptive behavior was related to a diagnosable personality disorder.^[1]

Following receipt of Dr. Ryan's report, the parties stipulated that Mr. Reukauf was competent to stand trial. The trial court agreed and set trial for March 27, 2019.

At a pretrial conference two weeks later and 15 days before the scheduled trial, defense counsel reported that the plan had been to call ready for trial, but Mr. Reukauf was now seeking to represent himself. After hearing briefly from Mr. Reukauf, the trial court told him it would set a hearing for that afternoon so that it could "hear your-what you are facing and go through an extensive colloquy with you." RP (Mar. 12, 2019) at 4.

At the afternoon hearing, Mr. Reukauf explained his desire to represent himself but had trouble sticking to the topics covered in the trial court's Faretta^[2] inquiry. The court asked Mr. Reukauf if he understood his counsel was an experienced criminal defense attorney, but Mr. Reukauf replied, "No, no, no. That's just not going to happen. How about you let me explain why I tried to fire him." RP (Mar. 12, 2019) at 6.

The court asked about Mr. Reukauf's level of education and Mr. Reukauf said he had earned his general education degree, but he had not taken college classes. The court tried to inquire about Mr. Reukauf's familiarity with law, but did not receive helpful answers:

THE COURT: Have you ever taken any type of law classes?

MR. REUKAUF: I think it's irrelevant. I know how to speak the truth. I can speak English; you can speak English. I haven't studied law.

THE COURT: Are you familiar with the rules of evidence?

MR. REUKAUF: I know how to speak the truth.

THE COURT: I will take that-

MR. REUKAUF: And I am going to talk.

THE COURT: I will take that as a no.

MR. REUKAUF: And I am going to exercise my First Amendment rights.

THE COURT: Are you familiar with-

MR. REUKAUF: And I cannot get a fair trial with that man over there in the corner, that woman right there, the guy that just left her, named-Ryan Swinburnson sent me up for 22 months because I was charged for spitting in a cop's face, and I didn't do it. I did not spit in his face and I did 22 months in prison.

THE COURT: Mr. Reukauf. Mr. Reukauf, again, we are talking about things that have no bearing on this court's decision of-

MR. REUKAUF: I am just saying I can't get a fair trial in this court.

THE COURT: Mr. Reukauf.

MR. REUKAUF: And I am going to represent myself, if I have-no, I would love to have Perry Mason on my team. Yeah, I would love to have the dream team on my team, yes. I would love that. But if it's a choice between me being my own lawyer and him, uh-uh. It's me because it's- otherwise it's a total kangaroo court.

RP (Mar. 12, 2019) at 10-12.

The trial court asked Mr. Reukauf's lawyer whether he perceived a conflict, and the lawyer responded, "I believe myself and literally any other attorney who walks into this room is going to have the same conflict." RP (Mar. 12, 2019) at 12. When the court asked the lawyer to clarify, Mr. Reukauf interjected that his lawyer "is right," and "For a court appointed attorney, yeah, of course. Yeah it's probably going to be like that." Id.

With that, the trial court told Mr. Reukauf that based on the colloquy and the report from Dr. Ryan it was finding that he did not have the ability to represent himself. It continued:

THE COURT: The court finds, if I allow you to represent yourself, you would not be able to effectively do that in any way, shape, or sense of the nature of what that requires. In addition, the court believes that based on the situation that you are in, that it would actually be materially harmful to the administration of justice of being able to get through the trial itself if you were allowed to represent yourself on this matter.

Therefore, at this time the court is going to deny your request to discharge [defense counsel]. The court finds there is no conflict. Certainly from what you are saying and what [defense counsel] has said, the court finds there is-

MR. REUKAUF: There is a conflict-there is a conflict.

THE COURT: -a difficulty in communicating-because you are creating that.

MR. REUKAUF: No. I am not creating it. That man in the corner; that man, [identifying a prosecutor who was evidently observing the proceeding]. You don't realize how he has-you don't realize-

THE COURT: Mr. Reukauf, again, you are talking about things that have no bearing on the courts's [sic] decision.

MR. REUKAUF: Oh, it does, man. You don't understand. See that's why I got to talk. That's why I have to talk.

THE COURT: The fact that you are unable to listen to-

MR. REUKAUF: This is my life. I am 71 years old. I don't need to go to prison. You show me a victim. Show me a victim. Who did I hurt? Who did I harm? Some person could come forward.

THE COURT: The court is denying your motion to represent yourself. The court finds you do not have the ability to do that. The court finds-

MR. REUKAUF: I hear you. All right. All right. Yeah, okay. I heard you. Thanks a lot.

THE COURT: -from your conduct that you are not willing to follow the court rules. You are not willing to abide by even standard decorum of what a normal person would be-would abide by.

MR. REUKAUF: Decorum. Standard decorum. That man is a murderer. That man is a murderer.

THE COURT: So the court would find-

MR. REUKAUF: He has got hit men.

THE COURT: The court would

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