No. 24-5458

Derrick Courchaine v. California

Lower Court: California
Docketed: 2024-09-04
Status: Denied
Type: IFP
IFP
Tags: constitutional-rights ineffective-assistance plea-bargaining procedural-bar sixth-amendment unauthorized-sentence
Latest Conference: 2024-11-01
Question Presented (from Petition)

(1. In California, a pretrial detainee is denied access to the very laws that are the cause of his or her confinement, and must rely upon his or her attorney, who in most cases, have their client plead unknowingly to an unauthorized sentence. It has been 55 years since this Court held the Sixth Amendment required an accused be advised s/he is waiving certain constitutional rights before accepting a plea (Boykin v. Alabama, 395 US 742, 748 (1969)). Should this apply to an unauthorized sentence?

(2. Does the "knowing and intelligent" "eyes wide open" clause of the Sixth Amendment require that an accused be advised that an negociated plea s/he is entering into is unauthorized?

(3. State law prohibits an accused from complaining about a plea s/he entered into is unauthorized (People v. Hester, 22 Cal.4th 290, 295 (2000)), which conflicts with clearly defined law of this Court that holds an attorney's ineffectiveness is conclusively established where that attorney either negociates, or fails to object to, an unlawful unauthorized sentence (United States v. Glover, 531 US 198, 203-04 (2001), also see United States v. Conley, 349 F.3d. 837 (5th Cir. 2003)). Should this Court invalidate Hester and its prodigy?

(4. Lexis-Nexis reveals that most California prisoners forced into federal court to challenge their unauthorized sentences fail due to procedural bars. As an unauthorized sentence is reprehensible to the concept of justice and fair play, should this Court preclude procedural bars for unauthorized sentences? (See e.g. McQuiggin v. Perkins, 569 US 383 (2013(gateway threshhold test for claims of actual "innocence to overcome procedural bars [which California also ignores] )).

(6. In McNeil v. Patuxent, 407 US 245 (1972), this Court overturned State regulations that permitted the over-detention of an inmate beyond his lawful release date, noting that such deliberate over detention at the time only occurred in "Communist China" (Id, at 254 fn.3). If those Justices could only look ahead at 52 years of "progress"; would they be/'shocked" or "appalled" to learn that it no longer occurs in China, but in the Great State of California with acquiescence of the judiciary?

Question Presented (AI Summary)

Whether the Sixth Amendment requires advisement of an unauthorized sentence during plea negotiations and whether procedural bars should be precluded for unauthorized sentences

Docket Entries

2024-11-04
Petition DENIED.
2024-10-17
DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 11/1/2024.
2024-07-24
Petition for a writ of certiorari and motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis filed. (Response due October 4, 2024)

Attorneys

Derrick Courchaine
Derrick Courchaine — Petitioner