''Zedner v. United States'', 547 U.S. 489 (2006), was a

United States Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...

case involving the right to a

speedy trial In criminal law, the right to a speedy trial is a human right under which it is asserted that a government prosecutor may not delay the trial of a criminal suspect arbitrarily and indefinitely. Otherwise, the power to impose such delays would ef ...

. Justice

Samuel Alito Samuel Anthony Alito Jr. ( ; born April 1, 1950) is an American lawyer and jurist who serves as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was nominated by President George W. Bush on October 31, 2005, and has served ...

, writing for a unanimous Court, ruled that a defendant cannot prospectively waive the protections of the

Speedy Trial Act The Speedy Trial Act of 1974 (88 Stat. 2080, as amended August 2, 1979, 93 Stat. 328, ), establishes time limits for completing the various stages of a federal criminal prosecution. Procedural time limits The Act establishes time limits for complet ...

. Justice

Antonin Scalia Antonin Gregory Scalia (; March 11, 1936 – February 13, 2016) was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1986 until his death in 2016. He was described as the intellectua ...

filed a partial concurrence, objecting to Alito's use of

legislative history Legislative history includes any of various materials generated in the course of creating legislation, such as committee reports, analysis by legislative counsel, committee hearings, floor debates, and histories of actions taken. Legislative his ...

Background

Jacob Zedner was arrested in 1996 for attempting to open bank accounts with a fake $10 Million bond issued by the fictitious “Ministry of Finance of U.S.A.” He was indicted by a

grand jury A grand jury is a jury—a group of citizens—empowered by law to conduct legal proceedings, investigate potential criminal conduct, and determine whether criminal charges should be brought. A grand jury may subpoena physical evidence or a per ...

in the

Eastern District of New York The United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York (in case citations, E.D.N.Y.) is the federal district court whose territorial jurisdiction spans five counties in New York State: the four Long Island counties of Nassau, S ...

for trying to pass

counterfeit To counterfeit means to imitate something authentic, with the intent to steal, destroy, or replace the original, for use in illegal transactions, or otherwise to deceive individuals into believing that the fake is of equal or greater value tha ...

Treasury securities United States Treasury securities, also called Treasuries or Treasurys, are government debt instruments issued by the United States Department of the Treasury to finance government spending as an alternative to taxation. Since 2012, U.S. gov ...

on April 4, 1996. The District Court granted a continuance until September 6, then granted another continuance until November 8. Due to difficulties in arranging a trial schedule, the judge suggested that the defendant waive his rights under the Speedy Trial Act "for all time." The defendant and his attorney agreed to do so. The case continued to languish for the next four years, during which time the defendant changed lawyers, was examined by a

psychiatrist A psychiatrist is a physician who specializes in psychiatry, the branch of medicine devoted to the diagnosis, prevention, study, and treatment of mental disorders. Psychiatrists are physicians and evaluate patients to determine whether their sy ...

, and ultimately decided to proceed ''

pro se ''Pro se'' legal representation ( or ) comes from Latin ''pro se'', meaning "for oneself" or "on behalf of themselves" which, in modern law, means to argue on one's own behalf in a legal proceeding, as a defendant or plaintiff in civil cases, ...

''. On March 7, 2001, while his competency to stand trial was being examined, the defendant moved to have the case dismissed for failure to comply with the Speedy Trial Act. The District Court denied his motion, and on April 7, 2003, the trial finally began.

Procedural history

On April 7, 2003, after a trial in the District Court, a

jury A jury is a sworn body of people (jurors) convened to hear evidence and render an impartial verdict (a finding of fact on a question) officially submitted to them by a court, or to set a penalty or judgment. Juries developed in England du ...

found Zedner guilty and the judge sentenced him to 63 months

imprisonment Imprisonment is the restraint of a person's liberty, for any cause whatsoever, whether by authority of the government, or by a person acting without such authority. In the latter case it is "false imprisonment". Imprisonment does not necessari ...

. The

United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit (in case citations, 2d Cir.) is one of the thirteen United States Courts of Appeals. Its territory comprises the states of Connecticut, New York and Vermont. The court has appellate juri ...

upheld the verdict, including the waiver of speedy trial rights, and noted that any error was harmless. The Supreme Court granted ''

certiorari In law, ''certiorari'' is a court process to seek judicial review of a decision of a lower court or government agency. ''Certiorari'' comes from the name of an English prerogative writ, issued by a superior court to direct that the record of ...

'' to determine if the waiver was effective.

Issue

The

requires that a trial begin within seventy days of the

indictment An indictment ( ) is a formal accusation that a person has committed a crime. In jurisdictions that use the concept of felonies, the most serious criminal offence is a felony; jurisdictions that do not use the felonies concept often use that of ...

, but provides for a variety of exceptions. If the trial does not begin on time, the defendant may move for dismissal, which the court must (under most circumstances) grant.

Parties' arguments

The government contended that the defendant could waive his rights under the Act. The defendant did so, but then contended that such a waiver was unlawful. The issue had not been addressed in earlier cases.

Opinion of the Court

The Court unanimously held that the defendant was correct; one may not prospectively waive one's rights under the Speedy Trial Act. Justice Alito wrote that the purpose of the Act is not simply to protect the defendant's rights, but to protect the public's interest in a speedy trial. For that reason, the Act excludes certain delays even at the request of the defendant. Alito next discussed the legislative history of the Act; this is the section in which Justice Scalia declined to concur.A discussion of this divergence may be found at

Orin Kerr Orin Samuel Kerr (born June 2, 1971) is an American legal scholar and professor of law at the UC Berkeley School of Law."Faculty , UC Berkeley School of Law"Orin Kerr faculty profile/ref> He is known as a scholar in the subjects of computer crim ...

'
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The history follows the explicit terms of the Act, stating that the public has an interest in quick resolutions to criminal charges. Alito went on to discuss the lack of a provision for prospective waiver in the statute. The Court then rejected the government's alternate theory of the case: that the defendant, having agreed to the waiver, is now

estopped Estoppel is a judicial device in common law legal systems whereby a court may prevent or "estop" a person from making assertions or from going back on his or her word; the person being sanctioned is "estopped". Estoppel may prevent someone from ...

from challenging it. The Court declines to apply estoppel doctrines, stating that it would "entirely swallow the Act's no-waiver policy." Furthermore, the Court found, since the district court requested the waiver, rather than the defendant, estoppel is not applicable. In addition, the

harmless error In United States law, a harmless error is a ruling by a trial judge that, although mistaken, does not meet the burden for a losing party to reverse the original decision of the trier of fact on appeal, or to warrant a new trial. Harmless error i ...

doctrine does not apply to speedy trial violations.

Concurrence

Justice Scalia concurred in everything except Part III-A-2, the section on legislative history.

References

External links

* {{caselaw source , case = ''Zedner v. United States'', {{Ussc, 547, 489, 2006, el=no , cornell =https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/05-5992.ZS.html , justia =https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/547/489/ , oyez =https://www.oyez.org/cases/2005/05-5992 , other_source1 = Supreme Court (slip opinion) , other_url1 =https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/05pdf/05-5992.pdf * Davis, Elliott M. (Summer 2007)
The Newer Textualism: Justice Alito's Statutory Interpretation
''Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy'' United States Supreme Court cases United States Supreme Court cases of the Roberts Court Speedy Trial Clause case law 2006 in United States case law 21st-century American trials