Applying the Doctrine of Abatement in a criminal action
United States v Libous, USCA, 2nd Circuit, Docket#15-3979
Under the Doctrine of Abatement, the government has no right to retain fines imposed pursuant to a criminal conviction that is subsequently vacated.
In this case, the Executrix of the estate of Thomas W. Libous, a former New York State Senator, moved to [1] withdraw his then pending appeal; [2] vacate the underlying judgment of conviction of making false statements to the FBI; and [3] remand the matter to the district court for dismissal of the indictment and a order refunding the fine and special assessment imposed upon Libous' conviction to his estate.
A federal jury had convicted former New York State Senator Thomas W. Libous of making false statements to the FBI in violation of 18 U.S.C. §1001. At sentencing, the district court imposed a two-year term of probation on Libous, whose physicians had determined had less than a year to live, along with a $50,000 fine imposition of the mandatory $100 special assessment.
Although the government consented to the abatement of Libous’ conviction, it opposed the return of the fine and special assessment. Incorrect said the Circuit Court, ruling that the government had no right to retain fines imposed pursuant to a conviction that is subsequently vacated and granted the Executrix's motion in its entirety.
The court explained that "Under the well-established Doctrine of Abatement, ab initio, when a convicted defendant dies pending an appeal as of right, his [or her] conviction abates, the underlying indictment is dismissed. Further, his or her estate is relieved of any obligation to pay a criminal fine imposed at sentence. In effect, all proceedings in the prosecution from its inception are abated."
To comply with this common law rule, said the court, “[T]he appeal does not just disappear, and the case is not merely dismissed. Instead, everything associated with the case is extinguished, leaving the defendant as if he [or she] had never been indicted or convicted.” In other words, “Under the doctrine of abatement ab initio . . . the defendant stands as if he [or she] never had been indicted or convicted.”
This is so because, in the interests of justice, "a defendant does not stand convicted without resolution of the merits of an appeal and to the extent that the judgment of conviction orders incarceration or other sanctions that are designed to punish the defendant, that purpose can no longer be served.”
As the Supreme Court held in Nelson v. Colorado, 137 S. Ct. 124, “[w]hen a criminal conviction is invalidated by a reviewing court and no retrial will occur,” the state is required under the Fourteenth Amendment’s due process guarantee “to refund fees, court costs, and restitution exacted from the defendant upon, and as a consequence of, the conviction.”
Once a defendant’s conviction is “erased, the presumption of [his or her] innocence [is] restored,” and the state “has no interest in withholding from [a defendant] money to which the [s]tate currently has zero claim of right.”
The Supreme Court, however, said "We express no view on how abatement operates, if at all, in the event the defendant commits suicide pending an appeal as of right, suggesting that it may distinguish the impact on the Doctrine in cases of suicide from the impact of the Doctrine in the event of death as the result of natural causes, accident, or events other than suicide while such an appeal is pending.
The Circuit Court then granted the Executrix's motion and vacated Libous' judgment of conviction. It also remanded the matter to the federal district court "for the dismissal of the indictment and the return of the fine and special assessment imposed on Libous pursuant to his now-vacated conviction"
The decision is posted on the Internet at: