United States v. Reeves

690 F.Supp.3d 531

UNITED STATES of America, v. David Kyle REEVES, Defendant.

CRIMINAL ACTION NO. 3:21-CR-00047-KDB-DCK

United States District Court, W.D. North Carolina, Charlotte Division

Signed September 5, 2023

William Thomas Bozin, Assistant U.S. Attorney, U.S. Attorney's Office, Charlotte, NC, for United States of America.

Kevin Tate, Public Defender, Federal Defender's Office, Charlotte, NC, Megan Hoffman, Public Defender, Federal Public Defender, Charlotte, NC, for Defendant.

ORDER

Kenneth D. Bell, United States District Judge

THIS MATTER IS BEFORE THE COURT on Defendant's Motion to Dismiss the Indictment or, in the alternative, order the Defendant be immediately transported to a suitable Bureau of Prisons ("BOP") facility. Doc. No. 51. In response, the United States contends that while the delay in Defendant's hospitalization is regrettable, dismissal is inappropriate. The Court has reviewed the Motion, the parties' briefs and exhibits, and the arguments of counsel at the August 15, 2023, hearing. For the reasons discussed below, the Court will order that if Defendant is not admitted to a suitable facility by September 19, 2023, or the Attorney General has not contracted with a suitable facility to promptly treat and evaluate Defendant as previously ordered, Doc. No. 45, the Indictment is subject to dismissal without further notice.

I. FACTUAL BACKGROUND

On February 5, 2021, the Defendant was arrested via a sealed complaint issued two days earlier for threatening to kill the President of the United States. See Doc. No. 3, 7. Twelve days later, a Federal Grand Jury indicted the Defendant on two counts of Interstate Communications with a Threat to Injure in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 875(c); one count of Threats Against the President in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 871; and one count of Influencing a Federal Official by Threat in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 115(a)(1)(B). See Doc No. 13.

Shortly after the Indictment, Defense counsel moved for a psychiatric exam to determine the Defendant's competency. Doc. No. 14. On February 23, 2021, Magistrate Judge Keesler ordered a psychological examination under 18 U.S.C. § 4241 to determine the Defendant's competency to stand trial. Doc. No. 15. On September 8, 2021, psychologist Lisa Feldman filed a psychiatric report finding that the Defendant was competent to stand trial. Id. A competency hearing was held before Judge Keesler on November 18, 2021, in which the Court found the Defendant competent to stand trial.

Three months later, Defense counsel filed a notice of an insanity defense. Doc. No. 23. The United States filed a motion on April 1, 2022, for a court ordered psychiatric examination of the Defendant seeking an examiner's opinion on the sanity of Defendant at the time of the charged offenses, which was granted. Doc. Nos. 26, 27. A psychiatric report was filed with the Court on September 6, 2022, by Dr. Feldman who found that Defendant was not suffering from insanity at the time of the offense. Id.

On November 15, 2022, Defense counsel filed an unopposed motion to declare the Defendant incompetent to stand trial based on the evaluation of Dr. James Hilkey. Doc. No. 38, 45. On January 9, 2023, Judge Keesler held a competency hearing and issued an order under 18 U.S.C. § 4241(d), declaring the Defendant incompetent to stand trial and ordering the Attorney General to take custody of and hospitalize him for treatment. Id. Judge Keesler ordered that Defendant "is committed to the custody of the Attorney General . . . who shall hospitalize the Defendant for treatment in a suitable facility and for further evaluation to determine whether the Defendant can attain, or has attained, competency to proceed." Id.

As of at least August 29, 2023, the Defendant is housed at the United States Penitentiary in Atlanta, awaiting transfer to a suitable BOP medical facility for competency restoration treatment. BOP has not committed to a date to move Defendant. Rather, the BOP has only provided the Court with an estimated admission date at FMC Butner for a competency restoration evaluation during the week of October 16, 2023. See Doc. No. 52-1. The Defendant has now moved for dismissal arguing that the United States has violated 18 U.S.C. § 4241(d) and the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. Alternatively, the Defendant asks this Court to order his immediate transfer to a suitable BOP facility for a competency restoration evaluation, or that the United States commence the Civil Commitment process. See Doc. No. 51.

II. DISCUSSION

The Fifth Amendment of the United States Constitution declares no person "shall be . . . deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law." U.S. Const. amend. V. This guarantee finds its roots in Article Thirty-Nine of the Magna Carta which proclaimed, "No free man is to be arrested, or imprisoned, or disseised, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any other way ruined, nor will we go against him or send against him, except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land." See A.E. Dick Howard, Magna Carta Text and Commentary 43 (U. Press of Virginia, 1964). Before the Magna Carta, English kings had exercised arbitrary power over their subjects on the theory that a king was above the law. To remedy this abuse, the Magna Carta, and Article Thirty-Nine specifically, prohibited any arbitrary action by the king against certain protected interests.

At the time of the drafting of the Bill of Rights, eight state constitutions contained provisions restraining government from depriving persons of life, liberty, or property except under the law of the land See Forte, David; Meese, Edwin III; and Spalding, Matthew, The Heritage Guide to the Constitution (2014). The Fifth Amendment follows the form of these provisions except for the substitution of "due process of law" for "law of the land." Id. The phrase "due process of law," in usage since 1354, originally meant that judgments could be issued only when a defendant had a chance to appear in court under an appropriate writ but came to be used synonymously with "law of the land." Id. The conflation of these terms is likely the result of the drafters' belief that the terms were equivalent. Id. It has therefore become a common understanding that the drafters of the Fifth Amendment were referring to the broader principle of legality, as enunciated in the Magna Carta, rather than mere pleading technicalities.

When the Fifth Amendment was ratified, the meaning of "liberty" was well-known. Liberty meant the "power of locomotion, the changing of situation, or removing one's person to whatsoever place one's inclination may direct; without imprisonment or restraint." Sir William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765-1769). While this narrow definition may not include many of the "liberties" that have come to be found in the many cases interpreting this provision (and the analogous provision in the Fourteenth Amendment), it plainly encompasses incarceration. In short, the original meaning of the Fifth Amendment's Due Process Clause prohibits the Federal Government from taking one's freedom of movement without prior legal authorization and without following the required judicial procedures.

This bulwark against indefinite and arbitrary detention consequently constrains the United States' ability to restore a person's competency to stand trial. United States v. Tucker, 60 F.4th 879, 883 (4th Cir. 2023); Pate v. Robinson, 383 U.S. 375, 378, 86 S. Ct. 836, 15 L. Ed. 2d 815 (1966). In Jackson v. Indiana, 406 U.S. 715, 720, 92 S.Ct. 1845, 32 L.Ed.2d 435 (1972), the Supreme Court held that the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause¹ prohibits a State from confining a defendant for an indefinite period simply because he is not competent to stand trial . . That case involved a defendant who was committed to Indiana's Department of Mental Health "until such time as that Department should certify . . . that the defendant is sane," despite his attorney's representation that restoration was improbable. Id. at 719, 92 S.Ct. 1845 (internal quotation marks omitted). By the time the case reached the Supreme Court, Jackson had been confined for three-and-a-half years without any indication that he could be restored to competency. Id. at 738-39, 92 S.Ct. 1845. The Court concluded that this indefinite confinement violated the defendant's due process rights, holding: "[a]t the least, due process requires that the nature and duration of commitment bear some reasonable relation to the purpose for which the individual is committed." Id. at 738, 92 S.Ct. 1845. Therefore, a person committed "solely on account of his incapacity to proceed to trial cannot be held more than the reasonable period of time necessary to determine whether there is a substantial probability that he will attain that capacity in the foreseeable future." Id.

In the wake of Jackson and the acquittal of John Hinckley Jr. for his attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan, Congress enacted the Insanity Defense Reform Act ("IDRA") to overhaul the provisions governing pretrial competency determinations. See United States v. Donnelly, 41 F.4th 1102, 1105 (9th Cir. 2022); United States v. Lara, 2023 WL 3316274, 2023 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 74172 (D.N.M. May 5, 2023). Under IDRA, after a defendant is found incompetent, a district court commits the defendant to the custody of the Attorney General; and the Attorney General hospitalizes the defendant for treatment in a suitable facility for such a reasonable time, not to exceed four months, to determine whether he can be restored to competency and if so, for a further period to attempt to restore competency. 18 U.S.C. § 4241(d) and (d)(1). The text of this statute makes clear that the four-month limitation applies only to the period of hospitalization, and therefore begins to run when the defendant has been hospitalized. Donnelly, 41 F.4th at 1105; United States v. Curbow, 16 F.4th 92, 122 (4th Cir. ...