Collins v. Million

121 F. App'x 628

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
• Decided: January 31, 2005
• Docket: 03-5647
• Status: Unpublished

Opinions

BATCHELDER, Circuit Judge.

Billy Ray Collins (“Collins”) appeals the district court’s denial of his petition for writ of habeas corpus on his claim that the Commonwealth of Kentucky denied him due process when it doubled his sentence by requiring his sentences to be run consecutively. Because Collins failed to exhaust his state court remedies, we find that the district court did not err in denying Collins’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus.

I.

On July 23, 1997, a Letcher County, Kentucky, jury convicted Collins of two counts of incest. According to the first page of the judgment entered by the Letcher Circuit Court on August 1, 1997, the jury recommended consecutive sentences of seven years and six months on each count. The second.page of the judgment states that

it is ADJUDGED BY THE COURT that the defendant is GUILTY of the following charges:

CHARGE 1 — INCEST—SEVEN

YEARS AND SIX MONTHS.

CHARGE 2 — INCEST—SEVEN

YEARS AND SIX MONTHS.

The second page further reflects that Collins was sentenced to “imprisonment for a maximum term of 7 YEARS 6 MONTHS (CT. 1) and 7 YEARS 6 MONTHS (CT. 2) in NEXT AVAILABLE (institution) to run □concurrently □consecutively with a previous sentence imposed.” Neither the “concurrently” nor the “consecutively box is marked, and the judge did not specify during the sentencing hearing whether the sentences were to be consecutive or concurrent. The Kentucky Department of Corrections (“DOC”) originally calculated Collins’s sentence as fifteen years, following the jury’s recommendation that the sentences for incest run consecutively.

Collins filed a notice of appeal from his conviction and sentence on August 8, 1997. On February 2, 1998, the Court of Appeals dismissed the appeal for failure to file a brief or respond to the court’s order to show cause for that failure. On February 3, 1999, through new counsel, Collins filed a motion in the Kentucky Court of Appeals to reinstate his appeal on the ground that his prior attorney had been suspended from the practice of law shortly after the show cause order was issued and had failed to advise Collins timely of his need to secure new counsel. The Court of Appeals granted Collins’s motion to reinstate his appeal on March 9, 1999, but on September 13, 1999, Collins moved to dismiss his appeal because his new counsel had reviewed the record of trial and could not find any issues worthy of appealing. Although Collins explicitly stated in that motion that he would be filing a petition in the Letcher Circuit Court to clarify his sentence, no such petition was filed until May of 2001.

On October 25, 1999, the DOC sent Collins a letter notifying him that the DOC had “recalculated” Collins’s sentences to run concurrently for a total of seven years and six months in compliance with Kentucky Revised Statute (“KRS”) 532.110(2), which provides that when the sentencing judgment does not specify how sentences are to run, sentences are to be concurrent. The DOC based its decision on the fact that neither the “consecutive” nor the “concurrent” box on the recorded judgment had been marked.

In April 2001, the DOC sent Collins a second letter, notifying him that the DOC was reversing its position and again calculating Collins’s sentence to run a total of fifteen years. The DOC based this decision on information from the Commonwealth’s Attorney to the effect that both the prosecuting attorney and the trial judge had intended that the sentences be consecutive. The DOC did not give Collins an opportunity to be heard on the matter.

Collins’s attorney filed a “Motion to Clarify Sentence” on May 10, 2001, in Letcher Circuit Court, asking that “an appropriate order [issue] stating that the Defendant’s sentence is 7]6 years.” The trial court denied the motion on August 2, 2001, stating that Collins’s “Motion challenging the manner in which his sentences were calculated” had been filed after the time in which the court had jurisdiction to consider it. Collins did not appeal from that order.

Collins filed a state petition for writ of habeas corpus in the Morgan Circuit Court on July 3, 2001, arguing that the recalculation of his sentence to 15 years “is contrary to the mandates of KRS 532.110(2), and violative of Defendant’s state and federal rights of due process of law,” and that the recalculation “was apparently motivated by an unconstitutional ex parte conversation between the Circuit Judge and the Commonwealth Attorney.” Collins prayed that his sentence be set at seven and a half years. The Morgan Circuit Court entered an order dismissing Collins’s petition for writ of habeas corpus on July 27, 2001, without stating its reasons. Collins moved to vacate that order and the Morgan Circuit Court denied the motion on October 16, 2001, again without articulating its reasons. Collins appealed the dismissal of his habeas petition to the Kentucky Court of Appeals, which, on December 1, 2001, affirmed. Collins filed this federal habeas petition in August of 2002.

II.

Noting that Collins’s habeas petition did not specify the federal statute under which he sought relief, the district court construed the petition as one challenging the validity of the 15-year sentence resulting from the consecutive running of two 7/6 year sentences, which is properly brought under 28 U.S.C. § 2254. Collins argues that his challenge is rather to the execution of his sentence, a challenge properly brought under 28 U.S.C. § 2241. We decline to decide this question because under either of these sections Collins is required first to exhaust his state court remedies, see Urbina v. Thoms, 270 F.3d 292, 295 n. 1 (6th Cir.2001) (recognizing exhaustion requirement for petitions filed under 28 U.S.C. § 2241); 28 U.S.C. (b)(1)(A), which, as the district court properly concluded, he failed to do. Further, Collins has not stated any claim cognizable under either of these federal habeas corpus statutes because, as the district court properly concluded, and despite Collins’s claim to the contrary, his claim is solely that his sentence was calculated in violation of state law. See 28 U.S.C. § 2241(c)(3); 28 U.S.C. § 2254(a).

The Kentucky Supreme Court has held that “ordinarily the [state] writ [of habeas corpus] will not be granted where there is another adequate remedy.” Commonwealth v. Marcum, 873 S.W.2d 207, 210 (Ky.1994). There is no question that Collins, before petitioning for state habeas relief, did not pursue several possible state court remedies regarding his claim under KRS 532.110. First, Collins could have sought clarification of the judgment from the trial court while the trial court had jurisdiction to amend its judgment. In Kentucky, the trial court loses jurisdiction to alter, amend, or vacate its judgment ten days after the judgment is issued, unless a motion to alter, amend or vacate is filed within that ten day period. Marcum, 873 S.W.2d at 211. Collins failed to request within ten days of the judgment that the court check the appropriate box on the face of the judgment. Collins has not alleged prosecutorial misconduct to excuse that failure.

Even after the trial court lost jurisdiction to alter or amend the judgment, Collins could have sought clarification by filing a motion under Kentucky Rule of Civil Procedure 60.02.¹ In addition to seeking clarification, Collins could have sought an amendment of the judgment by way of a motion under Kentucky Rule of Criminal Procedure 11.42 collaterally attacking the judgment. Marcum, 873 S.W.2d at 210-11. Collins did not pursue either of these options.

Collins did file a motion for clarification on May 10, 2001, after he received the second DOC letter, four years after the judgment was final. The trial court denied the motion, explaining in its order that it lacked jurisdiction because it appeared Collins’s motion “challeng[ed] the manner in which his sentences were calculated,” as opposed to simply requesting clarification. Collins could have appealed that order to the Kentucky Court of Appeals, arguing that his motion in the trial court sought clarification, not alteration, of the judgment. Collins did not file such an appeal.

We therefore conclude that the district court did not err in holding that Collins had failed to exhaust his state court remedies before filing this habeas petition.

Even if Collins properly exhausted his state court remedies, the DOC’s action of re-instating his original 15-year sentence does not rise to the level of a due process violation. For Collins to succeed on his due process claim, he must show both that his reliance on the DOC’s first letter was reasonable and that he suffered some harm from the DOC’s changing its position as reflected in the second letter. Collins cannot demonstrate that his reliance on the first letter was reasonable.

Collins was on notice from the time of the entry of his judgment of conviction and sentence that his sentences were to run consecutively. The first page of the written Judgment and Sentence entered on August 1, 1997, recites the jury’s recommendation that Collins serve his two seven-and-a-half-year sentences consecutively. Under Kentucky Rule of Criminal Procedure 9.84(1) and KRS § 532.055 the jury determines sentence length and recommends whether multiple sentences will run concurrently or consecutively. RCR 9.84(1) (“When the jury returns a verdict of guilty it shall fix the degree of the offense and the penalty except that the court may fix the penalty (a) in cases where the penalty is fixed by law and (b) in cases where the court is otherwise authorized by law to fix the penalty.”); KRS 532.055(2) (“In the hearing the jury will determine the punishment to be imposed within the range provided elsewhere by law. The jury shall recommend whether the sentences shall be served concurrently or consecutively.”); see also Wilson v. Commonwealth, 765 S.W.2d 22, 22 (Ky. 1989) (“when the jury returns a guilty verdict it shall fix the degree of offense and the penalty, except where the penalty is fixed by law”) (emphasis in original). Collins does not claim in this habeas proceeding, nor did he ever claim before the state courts, that he did not receive a copy of that judgment, or that he was not aware of its written contents. Indeed, in his motion to withdraw his reinstated direct appeal, Collins indicated his intention to ask for clarification of the sentence. The written judgment put Collins on notice of the possibility of a 15-year sentence, despite the trial court’s failure to mark the “consecutive” box on the next page of the form.

Because Collins cannot demonstrate reasonable reliance on the DOC’s first letter, he cannot demonstrate that the reinstatement of the DOC’s initial determination that his sentences were to run consecutively denied him due process. Rather, his claim is simply that the trial court, in failing to mark the appropriate box on the judgment form, and the DOC, in reinstating the initial determination that the sentences should be consecutive, violated Kentucky law.

Finally, to the extent that Collins now argues that the denial of due process about which he now complains is the DOC’s alleged reliance on ex parte communications with the prosecutor and the trial judge in reinstating its original determination that the sentences should run consecutively, we hold that the district court did not err in concluding that Collins did not exhaust this claim in the state courts.

For all of the foregoing reasons, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court denying the petition for a writ of habeas corpus.

1 . The Kentucky Rules of Civil Procedure are made applicable in criminal proceedings by Rule 13.04 of the Kentucky Rules of Criminal Procedure, which provides: "The Rules of Civil Procedure shall be applicable in criminal proceedings to the extent not superseded by or inconsistent with these Rules of Criminal Procedure.”