Beren Vest v. U.S.
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Notice: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the Atlantic and Maryland Reporter s. Users ar e requeste d to notify the Clerk of the Court of any formal errors so that corrections may be made before the bound volum es go to press. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA COURT OF APPEALS No. 00-CF-205 B EREN V EST, A PPELLANT, v. U NITED S TATES, A PPELLEE. Appeal from the Superior Court of the District of C olumbia (F-4090-99) (Hon. Robert E. Morin, Trial Judge) (Submitted October 23, 2003 Decided November 6, 2003) Kele Onyejekwe, appointed by the cou rt, was on th e brief for app ellant. Roscoe C. Howard, Jr., United States Attorney, and John R. Fisher, Elizabeth Trosman, Elizabeth C. Coombe, and Suzanne Grealy Curt, Assistant United States Attorneys, were on the brief for appellee. Before W AGNER, Chief Judge, F ARRELL, Associate Judge, and K ING, Senior Judge. P ER C URIAM : Appellant pled guilty to contem pt, D.C. Code § 1 1-944 (a) (2001), based on his disobedience of an orde r entered by then-M agistrate Judge Macaluso requiring him, as a condition of pretrial release, to stay away from a specific block of Southeast Washington, D.C. His primary argument on appeal1 is that violation of a condition of 1 The gov ernmen t correctly ack nowled ges that app ellant could b ring this appeal de spite his guilty p lea. See gene rally 1A C HARLES A LAN W RIGHT, F EDERAL P RACTICE AND P ROCEDURE § 175 (3d ed. 1999) ( A defendan t who has pleaded guilty may still contend that the indictment or information failed to state an offense. ); Super. Ct. Crim. R. 12 (b)(2) (claim of failure to charge an offense can be raised at any time during pendency of proceedings). 2 release set by a Superior Court magistrate judge (formerly known as a hearing comm issioner ) is not a crime p unisha ble und er § 11- 944 (a) . We re ject that a rgum ent. Pretrial release (or detention) in criminal cases is governed generally by Title 23 of the District of C olumbia Code. D.C. Code § 23-1321 (a) (2001) permits a jud icial officer to set conditions of pretrial release. Citing § 23-1331 (1), which defines judicia l officer, appellant argues that Superior Court magistrate judges do not fall within that definition. He is mistaken. Although the statute does not expressly include magistrate judges among those authorized . . . to bail or otherwise release a person before trial, it recognizes that the meaning of judicial officer may be otherwise indicated i.e., indicated by another statutory provision. D.C. Code § 11-1732 (j)(2) expressly authorizes magistrate judges to [d]etermine conditions of release pursuant to the provisions of Title 23 . . . . See generally Canada v. Management P ship, Inc., 618 A.2d 715, 717 (D.C. 1993) (§ 11-1732 is a direct statutory grant of jurisdiction to [ma gistrate judges] ). Magistrate judge s are therefore judicial officers within the meaning of § 23-1331 (1). Appellant s reliance on the failure of the statute expressly to mention magistrate judges would, in effect, render § 11-17 32 (j)(2) a nullity by ma king it u nenfor ceable throug h conte mpt. See Veney v. United States, 681 A.2d 428, 433 (D.C. 1996) (en banc) (w here possib le, a statute sho uld be construed to give effect to all of its provisio ns); Carey v. Crane Serv. Co., 457 A.2d 1102, 1108 (D.C. 1983) ( Statutory provisions are to be construed not in isolation, but together with other related provisions ), citing United Mine Workers of Am. v. Andrus, 189 U.S. App. D .C. 110, 114, 581 F .2d 888, 892 (197 8).2 2 As the government points out in footnote 8 of its brief, by virtue of amendments to the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure effective December 1, 2002, magistrate judges in (contin ued...) 3 Appellant s related arguments are equally without m erit. D.C. Code § 11-944 (a) was a proper vehicle for prose cuting him for violation of the magistrate judge s stay away order, even though he might have been prosecuted as well under D.C. C ode § 2 3-132 9. See Caldwe ll v. United States, 595 A.2d 961, 965 (D.C. 1991). Further, since § 11-944 (a) permits a judge [of the Superior Court] to punish for disobedience of a court order, and Judge Morin is a judge of the Superior Court (not a magistrate judge), appellant was properly convicted upon his plea of guilty. Affirmed. 2 (...continued) Superior Court now fit even more unmistakably within § 23-1331 (1) s definition of judicial officer. See Fed. R. Crim. P. 1 (b)(10)(B), 5 (c)(1)(B). That change, however, does not alter the fact that they were reached by the statute in 1999 via the otherwise indicated language when appellant pled guilty.
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