Appellant pleaded guilty to drug possession charges in accordance with a plea bargain which included the dismissal of an arming enhancement. Appellant was referred to probation and spoke with a probation officer. Subsequently, appellant withdrew her guilty plea. The prosecution filed a motion to admit appellant’s statements to the probation officer in the subsequent prosecution. Appellant moved to exclude the statements. The trial court held that the statements were admissible, and a jury convicted appellant of all offenses, though it found the arming enhancement to be not true. On appeal, appellant argued that the statements made to the probation officer were inadmissible, and that statements made to a probation officer after a guilty plea are inadmissible, except possibly for impeachment, once that guilty plea has been withdrawn. The appellate court agreed with the latter argument and reversed. Once an accused withdraws a plea, the status quo must be restored and the parties put back in the same position they were in prior to negotiations. The statements here had to be excluded to restore the status quo and satisfy due process. The error with regard to the drug possession charges was harmless, but the same could not be said for the firearms charges, where reversal was required.
Case Summaries