In Re Personal Restraint of Rowland

204 P.3d 953
CourtCourt of Appeals of Washington
DecidedApril 6, 2009
Docket59685-3-I
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 204 P.3d 953 (In Re Personal Restraint of Rowland) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Washington primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
In Re Personal Restraint of Rowland, 204 P.3d 953 (Wash. Ct. App. 2009).

Opinion

204 P.3d 953 (2009)

In re PERSONAL RESTRAINT Petition OF Michael J. ROWLAND, Petitioner.

No. 59685-3-I.

Court of Appeals of Washington, Division 1.

April 6, 2009.

*955 Gregory Link, Washington Appellate Project, Seattle, WA, for Petitioner.

Thomas Curtis, Snohomish County Prosecutor's Office, Everett, WA, for Respondent.

BECKER, J.

¶ 1 Years after the trial court imposed an exceptional sentence of 541 months upon petitioner Michael Rowland, he seeks relief on the basis that an incorrect analysis of the comparability of a prior California burglary conviction produced an error in his offender score. The alleged error is not evident on the face of the judgment and sentence. Thus, the statutory one-year time limit bars his petition unless one of the statutory exceptions applies. Here, Rowland's petition comes within one of the statutory exceptions. There has been a significant change in the law governing the legal comparability of the California burglary statute to Washington's statute and it is material to Rowland's sentence. We conclude he is entitled to relief on that basis. The scope of relief—whether outright elimination of the exceptional sentence or merely resentencing based on a corrected offender score—remains to be decided in the trial court.

FACTS

¶ 2 Petitioner Rowland was convicted in 1991 of first degree murder and taking a motor vehicle without permission. Based on an offender score of three, the standard range was 271-361 months. The trial court imposed an exceptional sentence of 541 months after making a finding of deliberate cruelty. Rowland appealed. He assigned error to the trial court's decisions granting the State a continuance, denying his motion to dismiss, and admitting photographs of the victim. He argued that his offender score was miscalculated because it included a conviction for a California burglary in 1985 that *956 should not have been treated as comparable to a Washington burglary. And he challenged the exceptional sentence on the basis that the finding of deliberate cruelty was neither supported by the record nor legally adequate to justify an exceptional sentence. This court affirmed the judgment and sentence in all respects. State v. Rowland, 76 Wash.App. 1072, No. 28109-7-I, 1995 WL 925646 (1995) (unpublished opinion), rev. denied, State v. Rowland, 126 Wash.2d 1025, 896 P.2d 63 (1995). The case was mandated on June 26, 1995.

¶ 3 Rowland filed the present proceeding in the superior court in January 2007 as a motion to modify his judgment and sentence on the basis that his offender score had been miscalculated. The State moved to transfer the motion to this court under CrR 7.8(c)(2), but argued in the alternative that it could be denied as time-barred. Rowland responded that the motion was not time-barred because the judgment and sentence was invalid on its face, citing In Re Goodwin, 146 Wash.2d 861, 866, 50 P.3d 618 (2002). The trial court granted the motion to transfer, and the matter is before us for consideration as a personal restraint petition.

¶ 4 A petition or motion for collateral attack must normally be filed within one year of final judgment:

No petition or motion for collateral attack on a judgment and sentence in a criminal case may be filed more than one year after the judgment becomes final if the judgment and sentence is valid on its face and was rendered by a court of competent jurisdiction.

RCW 10.73.090(1). Rowland is collaterally attacking his sentence many years after the judgment became final, and his petition is therefore barred unless it falls under a statutory exception listed in RCW 10.73.100 or the judgment and sentence is invalid on its face.

¶ 5 One of the statutory exceptions to the one-year time bar applies where there has been a significant and material change in the law:

(6) There has been a significant change in the law, whether substantive or procedural, which is material to the conviction, sentence, or other order entered in a criminal or civil proceeding instituted by the state or local government, and either the legislature has expressly provided that the change in the law is to be applied retroactively, or a court, in interpreting a change in the law that lacks express legislative intent regarding retroactive application, determines that sufficient reasons exist to require retroactive application of the changed legal standard.

RCW 10.73.100(6).

¶ 6 On direct appeal, Rowland unsuccessfully argued that his offender score was miscalculated because the California "burglary" was for shoplifting a pack of cigarettes and thus was not comparable to a Washington felony. Rowland, No. 28109-7-I, slip op. at 16. This court concluded that the California burglary statute had an unwritten, judicially-implied element of "unlawful entry" and therefore the elements of the Washington and California burglary offenses were legally comparable. Rowland, No. 28109-7-I, slip op. at 17. In 2006, this court decided State v. Thomas, another appeal challenging the comparability of the California burglary statute. State v. Thomas, 135 Wash.App. 474, 144 P.3d 1178 (2006). We held in Thomas that the California statute had elements broader than Washington's. "Unlike Washington's burglary statute, the California crime of burglary encompasses a broader range of property and does not require proof that the defendant entered or remained unlawfully. California's law only requires the defendant enter with intent to commit larceny or any felony." Thomas, 135 Wash.App. at 478, 144 P.3d 1178. After scrutinizing the California charging document, we also concluded Thomas's California burglary was not factually comparable to a Washington burglary. His sentence was vacated and remanded for resentencing.

¶ 7 Where an intervening opinion has effectively overturned a prior appellate decision that was originally determinative of a material issue, the intervening opinion constitutes a significant change in the law for purposes of exemption from procedural bars. In re Pers. Restraint of Greening, 141 Wash.2d 687, 697, 9 P.3d 206 (2000). Rowland's *957 first brief in this court relied on RCW 10.73.100(6) and argued that Thomas effectively overturned this court's decision on the offender score issue in his direct appeal.[1] At this court's direction, the State responded. The State agreed that Rowland was entitled to be resentenced, but did not adopt his argument that RCW 10.73.100(6) applied as an exception to the one-year time bar. The State instead asserted that consideration of the petition was not time-barred because, under RCW

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Bluebook (online)
204 P.3d 953, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-personal-restraint-of-rowland-washctapp-2009.