« Law - More on: Ohio Supreme Court issues long awaited eminent domain ruling today | Main | Ind. Decisions - Court of Appeals issues two today »

Thursday, July 27, 2006

Ind. Decisions - Supreme Court issues two today

In Jason Hole v. State of Indiana, a 4-page, 5-0 opinion, Justice Rucker writes:

In a recent opinion we disagreed with the view expressed in several Court of Appeals opinions that defendants who enter into certain categories of plea agreements are either barred on appeal from challenging the appropriateness of their sentences under Indiana Appellate Rule 7(B) or have acquiesced to their sentences and therefore cannot now complain. We held instead that Indiana Appellate Rule 7(B)
articulates a standard of review designed as guidance for appellate courts. . . . Of course a defendant must persuade the appellate court that his or her sentence has met this inappropriateness standard of review. But to say that a defendant has acquiesced in his or her sentence or has implicitly agreed that the sentence is appropriate undermines in our view the scope of authority set forth in Article VII, Section 4 of the Indiana Constitution. We thus disapprove of language in Gist, Mann, and their progeny providing otherwise.
Childress v. State, 848 N.E.2d 1073, 1080 (Ind. 2006)

That is not to say however that every sentence that is the product of a plea agreement is subject to Rule 7(B) review. Only if the trial court is exercising discretion in imposing a sentence may a defendant then contest on appeal the merits of that discretion on the grounds that the sentence is inappropriate in light of the nature of the offense and the character of the offender. And whether a defendant pleads guilty under the terms of an agreement that provides for an “open plea” or an agreement that provides for a sentencing cap or range, the trial court still must exercise discretion in determining the sentence it will impose. By contrast where a plea agreement calls for a specific term of years, “if the trial court accepts the parties’ agreement, it has no discretion to impose anything other than the precise sentence upon which they agreed.” * * * The plea agreement in this case falls within the latter category. The parties agreed that Hole would serve a “ten (10) year sentence.” And Hole received the precise sentence for which he bargained. Except for the location where his sentence is to be served, which Hole does not challenge, his sentence is not available for Rule 7(B) review. We affirm the judgment of the trial court.

In Juan Rivera v. State of Indiana, a 4-page, 5-0 opinion, Justice Rucker repeats much of the above Jason Hole language (without referencing the opinion), and then continues:

In this case, the plea agreement is not “open” in the sense that sentencing is left completely to the trial court’s discretion. Nor does the plea agreement contain a sentencing cap or sentencing range. Nonetheless the plea agreement here still affords the trial court some amount of discretion in imposing sentence. More precisely the trial court was left to decide “how said sentence shall be served.” Stated somewhat differently, although the trial court was bound to impose a ten-year sentence, it retained the discretion to determine the amount of the sentence that would be suspended to probation. And precisely because the trial court retained discretion in determining the amount of the sentence that would be executed, Rivera did not waive his right to contest the merits of that discretion on grounds that the sentence is “inappropriate in light of the nature of the offense and the character of the offender.” As indicated earlier in this opinion the Court of Appeals addressed the merits of Rivera’s claim. We decline to address the claim further. The judgment of the trial court is affirmed.

Shepard, C.J., and Sullivan and Boehm, JJ., concur.
Dickson, J., concurs in result without separate opinion.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on July 27, 2006 10:01 AM
Posted to