Polson convict's request for new attorney denied
The Montana Supreme Court has denied a request by a Polson man to have a new attorney appointed to handle an appeal of his conviction for sexually assaulting his ex-girlfriend.
Dennis Jay Hobbs, 58, had asked for a new attorney after his court-appointed public defender Lisa S. Korchinski filed a brief to withdraw as counsel, saying his appeal was “wholly frivolous.”
“Conscientious examination of the record, along with thorough research compels a conclusion that Mr. Hobbs’ appeal has no merit,” Korchinski wrote.
The court has not yet granted her motion to withdraw.
Hobbs simultaneously requested in a March 14 filing that a new attorney be appointed and that he provided Montana legal literature and statutes while he is incarcerated in Idaho so he could represent himself.
Hobbs wrote a letter to Lake County District Judge James Manley in which he stated that he believed his plea agreement had been breached because some of the items that belonged to his father and were seized as evidence in the case had not been returned to his father, a Kalispell man.
“I’m hoping that you will understand why I believe I am forced to seek other counsel or to proceed pro se to withdraw my guilty plea due to a breach of agreement and for the failure of the State to perform,” Hobbs wrote. “I intend to attach a copy of this letter to my affidavit seeking a plea withdrawal.”
The Montana Supreme Court refused to give Hobbs a new attorney and said Hobbs technically is still represented by an attorney.
“While indigent defendants are entitled to counsel at public expense, we have consistently held that ‘the right to assistance of counsel does not grant defendants the right to counsel of their choice,’” Chief Justice Mike McGrath ruled. The court has given Hobbs until June 15 to respond to his attorney’s motion to withdraw.
Hobbs, 58, is in an Idaho prison serving eight more years of a sentence for aggravated battery. Once he is released in 2024 he will be sent back to Montana to begin a 50-year sentence for sexually assaulting his ex-girlfriend in Lake County in 2013, tampering with witnesses and stalking the woman.
Hobbs assaulted the woman after posting bond for the stalking incident, where it was also alleged that he tried to have someone kill her.
As part of a plea agreement, Hobbs was not convicted of attempted murder for hire. According to court documents, he allegedly told a man in fall 2013 that if he killed his wife he would give the killer a map to an “isolated residence filled with guns, coins and other expensive items.”
The killer would then be allowed to help himself to the loot, court records claim.
Reporter Megan Strickland can be reached at 758-4459 or mstrickland@dailyinterlake.com.