Justia Montana Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Appellant pleaded no contest to arson, a felony. Appellant later moved to withdraw his no contest plea. The district court denied the petition, concluding that Appellant entered a knowing and voluntary plea and could not demonstrate that the offer of proof was insufficient or that his representation was ineffective. The district court's judgment was affirmed on appeal. Appellant subsequently petitioned for postconviction relief, alleging ineffective assistance of counsel and that the district court misinterpreted the arson statute. The district court denied the petition. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the district court did not err in its interpretation of the arson statute; and (2) Appellant was unable to prove that he was afforded ineffective assistance of counsel. View "Ellison v. State" on Justia Law

The State charged Defendant with fourth-offense driving under the influence of alcohol (DUI), a felony. As a basis for the charge, the State cited Defendant's three prior DUI convictions in Nevada. Defendant filed a motion to dismiss the felony charge, asserting that his second and third DUI convictions were premised on a Nevada statute that was not sufficiently similar to Montana's DUI statutes to constitute prior convictions for purposes of supporting a felony charge. The district court denied the motion. Defendant subsequently pled guilty to felony DUI, reserving his right to appeal the denial of his motion to dismiss. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the district court did not err by denying Defendant's motion to dismiss the felony DUI charge because Nevada's statute was sufficiently similar to Montana's DUI and DUI per se statutes to support Defendant's felony conviction under Montana law. View "State v. Calvert" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of vehicular homicide while under the influence, failure to stop immediately at the scene of an accident involving an injured person, and driving without a valid driver's license. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the district court did not err by limiting Defendant's cross-examination of the State's informant; (2) the district court erred when it prevented Defendant's expert forensic pathologist from testifying about matters not disclosed through discovery, but the error was harmless; and (3) the district court's decision to permit an undisclosed expert witness to testify for the State did not constitute reversible error. View "State v. Garding" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of two counts of attempted deliberate homicide. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the district court (1) correctly denied Defendant's motion for a new trial based on juror misconduct; (2) made an adequate inquiry into Defendant's ineffective assistance of counsel claim and took adequate precautions to ensure that Defendant knowingly and voluntarily waived counsel; (3) correctly employed a balancing test to conclude that Defendant was not deprived of his right to a speedy trial; (4) did not err by admitting evidence of Defendant's prior assault of his wife to rebut Defendant's character evidence; (5) did not plainly err in instructing the jury on mitigated deliberate homicide; and (5) did not improperly impose parole conditions. View "State v. MacGregor" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of felony burglary and misdemeanor criminal mischief. Defendant was sentenced to five years incarceration, all suspended. One of the conditions of Defendant's probation was that he not use or possess illegal drugs. The State later filed a petition to revoke Defendant's suspended sentence for, inter alia, driving under the influence of drugs and crushing up his medications and snorting them, rather than taking them as directed by a physician. Defendant moved for a continuance of his revocation hearing, explaining that a "substantial amount of discovery" had not yet been produced. The district court denied the motion. After a hearing, the district court ordered Defendant's sentence revoked. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the district court did not abuse its discretion or violate Defendant's right to due process when it revoked Defendant's probation without requiring full disclosure of all evidence against him. View "State v. Sebastian" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Appellant was convicted of theft and accountability to burglary. The Supreme Court reversed Appellant's conviction for theft and affirmed Appellant's conviction for accountability to burglary, holding (1) the district court did not err by instructing the jury on the theory of accountability when the State had not directly charged an accountability based offense; (2) Appellant's counsel's failure to object to an instruction on accountability that defined "purposely" as a conduct-based mental state rather than a result-based mental state caused no prejudice to Appellant; but (3) Appellant's counsel rendered ineffective assistance by failing to object to her theft conviction on the grounds that it violated Montana's statutory restriction on multiple charges. Remanded. View "State v. Tellegen" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Appellant was convicted of the attempted deliberate homicide of her husband, Mike. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the district court did not err when it (1) excluded Appellant's proposed expert witness testimony from two expert witnesses about the behaviors of individuals in abusive relationships and the experts' diagnoses of Appellant with post-traumatic stress disorder; and (2) admitted Mike's alleged prior inconsistent statement to a volunteer firefighter responding to a medical emergency when Mike could not remember making the statement, as the statement was admissible under Mont. R. Evid. 801(d)(a)(A). View "State v. Lotter" on Justia Law

Appellant was convicted of criminal distribution of dangerous drugs and sentenced to a ten-year term of incarceration. On appeal, Appellant argued that insufficient evidence supported his conviction because the State did not produce sufficient evidence at trial that the substance given to a third party was marijuana, a dangerous drug. The State responded that although the substance was not tested, the third party's testimony and the fact that Appellant had a medical marijuana card were sufficient to prove that the substance was marijuana. The Supreme Court reversed Appellant's conviction, holding that the evidence presented at trial was insufficient to allow a rational trier of fact to conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that the substance in question was a dangerous drug. View "State v. Burwell" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs were covered by the State's employee healthcare benefit program established under Title 2, chapter 18, MCA ("the Plan"). Both Plaintiffs were injured in separate automobile accidents. All of the medical bills of both plaintiffs were paid by either the Plan or by third-party insurers. In both cases, medical care providers returned a claim payment to the Plan because the claim had been paid by other insurers. Plaintiffs asserted that the Plan should not have retained the payments returned by the medical providers but should have paid those amounts to Plaintiffs unless they had been made whole or fully compensated for all losses they incurred as a result of the automobile accidents. The district court concluded that the State's operation of the Plan was subject to the "made-whole" provisions Title 2, and thus, no insurer had a right to subrogation unless the insured was made whole for all losses. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the made-whole requirement of Mont. Code Ann. 2-18-902(4) applied to the Plan insofar as it had withheld payments or had retained payments returned by a healthcare provider because the medical expenses had been paid by a third party. View "Diaz v. State" on Justia Law

Appellant entered Alford pleas to the felony offenses of aggravated kidnapping, aggravated assault, assault with a weapon, intimidation, and aggravated burglary. Appellant later moved to withdraw his Alford pleas, contending that his mental state at the time of the pleas precluded him from knowingly and voluntarily making a plea decision, he was innocent to the changes against him, and the district court's colloquy was insufficient to determine whether the pleas were knowingly and voluntarily made. The district court denied Appellant's motion. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) Appellant failed to establish that there was good cause to allow him to withdraw his prior Alford pleas to the charges against him; and (2) the matter should be remanded to the district court for a determination of the total amount of restitution for the victim's future counseling costs. Remanded. View "State v. Peterson" on Justia Law