Criminal contempt; Summary contempt of court; A court’s common-law authority to punish contempt; A court’s statutory authority to punish contempt; MCL 600.1701(a); MCL 600.1711; MCL 600.8317; A court’s responsibility to apply the contempt power judiciously; Principle that summary & nonsummary criminal contempt proceedings must be found beyond a reasonable doubt; Porter v Porter; The trial court’s findings of fact & conclusions of law; Whether an appellate court may remand for nonsummary proceedings after vacation of a summary contempt conviction when summary proceedings were initially appropriate; United States v Camil (5th Cir); In re Shafer (GA App)

Addressing an issue of first impression, the court held that the circuit court properly vacated appellant’s contempt conviction on the basis of insufficient findings, but that remand “to give the district court an opportunity to provide adequate evidence to support the conviction would be futile, because the proceedings where the alleged contumacious conduct occurred concluded years ago and the purpose of the contempt proceeding—to preserve order in the courtroom—has been fully served.” Thus, it vacated Parts II(B) and II(C) of the Court of Appeals’ opinion as unnecessary and reversed Part III of that opinion, which affirmed the circuit court’s order remanding for nonsummary contempt proceedings. It also reversed the circuit court’s order to the extent that it remanded this matter to the district court. Appellant, an attorney who was representing a criminal defendant, was summarily convicted of criminal contempt in the district court for purportedly engaging in disrespectful conduct in direct view of the judge. The judge did not describe her “conduct with any particularity on the record.” The circuit court vacated her conviction, finding the district court’s findings were insufficient to support it, and remanded for nonsummary contempt proceedings. Appellant claimed further proceedings on remand would violate double jeopardy. The circuit court and the Court of Appeals disagreed, holding that “the prohibition against double jeopardy does not bar subsequent nonsummary contempt proceedings after vacation of a summary contempt conviction.” On leave, the court declined to reach the constitutional question and instead held that “remand for nonsummary proceedings after a summary contempt conviction has been vacated for insufficient findings is improper because it would be futile and exceed the scope of the judiciary’s inherent contempt powers.” The proceedings “where the alleged contumacious conduct occurred concluded years ago and there is no allegation that [defendant] refused to comply with a lawful order of the court.” Finding the reasoning of its sister courts to be persuasive, it concluded that “remand to the district court for nonsummary proceedings is not appropriate in this instance because the original purpose of the contempt proceedings has been served. Any remand would therefore be nothing more than an exercise in futility.”

Concurring, Justice Welch noted her agreement “with the majority’s well-reasoned determination that a remand for nonsummary proceedings would be futile.” She wrote separately “to explain why the Double Jeopardy Clauses of the state and federal Constitutions also bar remand.”

Dissenting, Justice Bernstein, joined by Justice Zahra, found “the majority’s decision simply to vacate [defendant’s] criminal contempt conviction to be both unsupported and premature. In the end, the majority cannot say with any more certainty than I can that the conviction was unsupported.” He would have “affirmed the lower courts’ decisions to remand this case for nonsummary proceedings, which would have allowed the district court to place the relevant evidence on the written record and facilitated further appellate review, if necessary.”