Summary
The Arkansas Supreme Court dismissed Robert Lee Williford’s pro se motion for a belated appeal from the denial of his coram-nobis petition. The court held that the petition was moot because Williford had completed the sentence imposed in 1987, and that the motion for reconsideration did not extend the time for filing a notice of appeal.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether the motion for belated appeal could proceed when the underlying coram-nobis petition was moot because Williford had served the challenged sentence.
- Whether the filing of a motion for reconsideration extended the time to appeal from the original order denying coram-nobis relief.
Holdings
- A motion for belated appeal will not be permitted to proceed when the underlying coram-nobis petition is moot because the petitioner had served the sentence imposed in the criminal judgment and could not obtain an appropriate remedy through the proceeding.
- A motion for reconsideration does not extend the time to file a notice of appeal from the original order denying coram-nobis relief.
- An appeal from an order denying a petition for postconviction relief, including a petition for writ of error coram nobis, will not be permitted to proceed when it is clear from the record that the appellant could not prevail.
Key quotations
“Where the petitioner in a coram-nobis proceeding has served the sentence imposed in the criminal judgment, the petition is moot.” (at 2)
“As petitioner had served the sentence by the time he filed the petition, his claim was moot, and a new trial or revocation proceeding, if applicable, would not be an appropriate remedy, even if there were cause to grant the writ.” (at 2)
Factual background
In 1987, Williford pleaded guilty to two counts of burglary and two counts of theft of property and received ten years' probation. Approximately twenty-three years later, he filed a coram-nobis petition challenging the criminal judgment. The record did not show that he was still serving the sentence when he filed the petition in 2010.
Procedural history
In 2010, Williford filed a pro se petition and amended petition for writ of error coram nobis concerning 1987 guilty-plea convictions. The circuit court denied relief on August 29, 2012, and denied reconsideration on June 14, 2013. Williford filed a notice of appeal from the reconsideration order, but the clerk declined to lodge the record because the appeal was untimely. He then moved in the Supreme Court of Arkansas for a belated appeal, which the court dismissed without reaching the merits because the sentence had been served and the coram-nobis petition was moot.