Judge gives City Attorney lesson in criminal prosecution

Libby’s new City Attorney, David Tennant of the Kalispell firm  Kaufman Vidale Hileman Ellingson PC, got a crash course in criminal prosecution from District Judge James Wheelis in Montana’s 19th Judicial District Court Thursday afternoon.

Tennant filed a motion in District Court March 24, 2016, asking the judge to compel a defendant in a criminal trial to enter into a plea agreement with the City Attorney’s Office. In his accompanying affidavit, Tennant asserted the defendant authorized a plea agreement with the city and later reneged on the deal.

“On Feb. 12, 2016, Defendant authorized her attorney to enter into a valid, binding plea agreement with the City. See Exhibits 1-2. Defendant then reneged on her agreement. See Exhibit 3,” Tennant wrote. “The reneging occurred about an hour before I left Montana on vacation on a Friday afternoon. I returned to the Missoula airport nine hours before trial started the following Thursday morning. I suspect a main reason the court denied the motion was it was filed after the jury was pooled and everything was ready for trial. I couldn’t get the brief filed prior to that occurring.”

Tennant argued that the email from the defendant’s original attorney indicating her client had agreed to the plea agreement constituted a sufficient confession of guilt to justify the court forcing her to formally enter a guilty plea to the misdemeanor criminal mischief charge.

The defendant’s attorney, Alisha Backus of the Office of the State Public Defender, argued the plea agreement was never signed by her client, a plea was never entered in court and it was never accepted by a judge and hence, there was no valid agreement between the parties.

“In this case, Ms. Felton accepted a proposed plea offer on behalf of the Defendant through email,” Backus wrote in her response. “The terms of this agreement were not finalized or reduced into writing. Ms. Felton drafted an official plea agreement for the City’s review, but this agreement was rejected by her client. The Defendant did not sign a plea agreement and there is no indication that she was fully advised of her rights, or that she validly waived her constitutional and statutory rights in this case. Because a valid, binding plea agreement was never signed or accepted by the Court, the City’s motion to enforce such a plea agreement should be denied.”

Wheelis agreed with Backus, explaining to Tennant that in order for a plea agreement to be valid in a criminal case it must be signed by the defendant and accepted by the court, and that the defendant must be advised of his or her constitutional rights and acknowledge entering the plea willingly, intelligently and voluntarily – none of which was done in this case.

“Ms. Backus is right,” Wheelis ruled. “There’s no agreement until the court goes through the colliquy and determines that it’s voluntary and there’s a factual basis either because the defendant admits to it or agrees the state can prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. So, I’m denying your motion.”