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222 F.2d 175

Docket No. 5074.

Dodd v. United States

Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals

Decided April 9, 1955.

Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals · decided 1955-04-09

2 counsel of record

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

““ [1] By the court’s acceptance of the pleas of guilty in these circumstances, it resolved the issue of the appellants’ mental capacity to. know and understand the nature of the charge against them and to assist in their defense, and its judgments thereon are not subject to collateral attack. Hahn v. United States, 10 Cir., 178 F.2d 11 ; McMahan v. Hunter, 10 Cir., 150 F.2d 498 ; Srygley v. Sanford, 5 Cir., 148 F.2d 264 ; Hall v. Johnston, 9 Cir., 86 F. 2d 820 ; Whitney v. Zerbst, 10 Cir., 62 F.2d 970 . Cf. Frame v. Hudspeth, 10 Cir., 109 F.2d 356 ; Hallowell v. Hunter, 10 Cir., 186 F.2d 873 .””

quoted by 1 later decision, including 196 F. Supp. 386 - Stone v. United States

Applies 18 U.S.C. § 4244 · 28 U.S.C. § 2255 (Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996)

Relies on Davis v. United States · Durham v. United States · Hahn v. United States

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Opinion by (per_curiam) · Decided 1955-04-09

How this case has been cited

Cited by 11 later decisions — most recently March 1972

9 federal appellate ·

50195519601970decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

¶1Herbert M. Weiser, Denver, Colo., for appellant.

¶2Royce D. Sickler, Topeka, Kan. (William C. Farmer, U. S. Atty., Wichita, Kan., Selby S. Soward, Asst. U. S. Atty., Topeka, Kan., were with him on the briefs), for appellee.

¶3Before PHILLIPS, Chief Judge, and MURRAH and PICKETT, Circuit Judges.

¶4*176PER CURIAM.

¶5On two separate occasions, Dodd has previously been before this court questioning the validity of his present confinement. Dodd v. United States, 10 Cir., 213 F.2d 854; Dodd v. United States, 10 Cir., 196 F.2d 190, certiorari denied 343 U.S. 987, 72 S.Ct. 1084, 96 L.Ed. 1374. The circumstances of his conviction and sentence are set forth in the previous cases and need not be repeated here. In each of those cases, consideration was given to the contention that the appellant was not mentally competent when he entered his plea of guilty. The contention was overruled in each case.

¶6Upon oral argument, counsel contended that at the time the plea of guilty was entered, there was reasonable ground to believe that Dodd was not mentally competent, either at the time of the commission of the crime or when the plea of guilty was entered, and that the prosecution could no longer rely upon ,the presumption of sanity but had the burden of proving Dodd’s sanity. This appears to be a correct statement of the law but not applicable in this case. Davis v. United States, 160 U.S. 469, 16 S.Ct. 353, 40 L.Ed. 499; Durham v. United States, D.C.Cir., 214 F.2d 862. The right to consider the defense of insanity in‘ a collateral proceeding was resolved in the first appeal. 196 F.2d 190, 191.1 When the question of insanity arose, the trial court,. acting under 18 U.S.C. A. § 4244, ordered Dodd committed to the Federal Medical Center at Springfield, Missouri, for an examination and report upon his mental condition. The report stated that Dodd was sane and that there was no evidence of psychosis or insanity. This did not preclude the defense of insanity in a trial. Dodd was represented by counsel and chose to enter a plea of guilty.

¶7Generally, insanity at the time of the commission of the crime or at the time of trial is sL defense which must be presented and determined at the time of trial. When that issue is decided and the judgment entered thereon becomes final, it is not thereafter subject to collateral attack by habeas corpus or proceedings under Section 2255. 28 U.S. C.A. § 2255; Dodd v. United States, 10 Cir., 196 F.2d 190, certiorari denied 343 U.S. 987, 72 S.Ct. 1084, 96 L.Ed. 1374; Hahn v. United States, 10 Cir., 178 F.2d 11; Whitney v. Zerbst, 10 Cir., 62 F.2d 970.

¶8The other contentions of the appellant are without merit.

¶9Judgment affirmed.

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