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Plea Withdrawal Case Analysis
By: dmc-admin//September 6, 2006//
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The court’s decision in Goyette is the first in Wisconsin to address “package plea agreements” (several unpublished cases use that term, but in those cases, the defendant was pleading to several unrelated cases; the charges were “packaged,” not the defendants).
However, there is extensive case law concerning package plea agreements in other courts.
One of the earliest is the following statement by the U.S. Supreme Court in Bordenkircher v. Hayes, 434 U.S. 357, 98 S.Ct. 663 (1978), in which the court held it was not unconstitutional for a prosecutor to threaten more serious charges if the defendant refused to plead guilty to the current charges.
The court wrote, “This case does involve the constitutional implications of a prosecutor’s offer during plea bargaining of adverse or lenient treatment for some person other than the accused, which might pose a greater danger of inducing a false guilty plea by skewing the assessment of the risks a defendant must consider (cites omitted)(emphasis in original).” Id., 98 S.Ct. 669, fn.8.
Since this statement, many federal circuit courts have considered package plea agreements, and agree that they are not inherently coercive. U.S. v. Carr, 80 F.3d 413, 416-417 (10th Cir. 1996); U.S. v. Bennett, 332 F.3d 1094, 1100-01 (7th Cir. 2003); U.S. v. Abbott, 241 F.3d 29, 34 (1st Cir.2001).
However, all the courts require that the trial court be aware of the package deal. In Goyette’s case, there was no question that the trial court was aware of the deal, so these cases do not directly apply.
Despite being aware of the deal in the case at bar, however, the court made no special inquiry about the agreement, and this could be considered inconsistent with what the federal courts require. The court of appeals found, “the court asked Goyette whether he had been pressured or coerced, but did not ask more specifically whether he had been pressured or coerced because of the package nature of the agreement.”
The other jurisdictions that have considered this issue suggest that more may be required.
In Abbott, the court wrote, “the disclosure of the existence of a package plea deal is crucial at the Rule 11 hearing so that the district court may probe as deeply as needed into the possibility that one defendant is pleading guilty against his will in order to make it possible for his co-defendant to obtain the benefit of a favorable plea and sentencing recommendation.” Abbott, 241 F.3d at 34.
In Carr, the court stated that package plea agreements require “special care” to ensure the pleas are entered voluntarily. Carr, 80 F.3d at 416-417.
At first blush, then, it could appear that the Wisconsin Court of Appeals may be underestimating the potential of package plea agreements for coercing involuntary guilty pleas.
On closer examination, however, that is not the case. Despite the language of the various federal courts, the concern in each case is only that the trial court be informed of the package plea agreement. All the reversals were because the trial court was unaware of the package deal; no decision has concluded that a package plea agreement actually coerced an involuntary plea.
In a footnote, the court of appeals in the case at bar wrote, “Goyette is not clear about the plea colloquy requirement he contends should be imposed on circuit courts in package plea situations. … Goyette does not present a cogent proposal for the questions courts must pose when accepting pleas as part of a package agreement.”
In truth, the same can be said of the federal court opinions; like Goynette, while they express concern over the potential for coercion, they do not clearly set forth any plea colloquy requirements. Thus, while the court’s opinion seems at odds with the federal cases, there is likely no practical difference.
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