Ousley v. State

807 N.E.2d 758, 2004 Ind. App. LEXIS 794, 2004 WL 937873
CourtIndiana Court of Appeals
DecidedMay 3, 2004
Docket43A03-0307-CR-277
StatusPublished
Cited by23 cases

This text of 807 N.E.2d 758 (Ousley v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ousley v. State, 807 N.E.2d 758, 2004 Ind. App. LEXIS 794, 2004 WL 937873 (Ind. Ct. App. 2004).

Opinion

OPINION

SULLIVAN, Judge.

Following remand for resentencing after successfully challenging his sentence on post-conviction review, Michael Ousley again challenges his sentence. He presents several issues for our review, which we restate as (1) whether the trial court properly considered aggravating and mitigating circumstances, and (2) whether the sentence is inappropriate.

We affirm.

In 1994, Ousley was found guilty and sentenced for the murder of his wife. At trial, the parties stipulated to the facts which led to the murder; Ousley and his *760 wife, along with their children, were en route to visit her parents when they began to argue. Ousley then returned the family to their home and ordered the children to go to the neighbor's house. After the children left, Ousley and his wife continued to fight, and Ousley called the neighbor to whose home the children had gone and told him to take care of the children because he and his wife would be dead soon. Ousley slit his wife's throat, shot her with a shotgun, and shot himself. After the police arrived at the Ousley home, they found Ousley alive and with a wound to the head and his wife dead.

Following his conviction, Ousley was sentenced to fifty years in the Department of Correction. At the time, the sentencing statute carried a presumptive sentence of forty years for the crime of murder, with not more than twenty years added for aggravating circumstances. Ind.Code § 35-50-2-3 (Burns Code Ed. Repl1985). Upon post-conviction review, the court ordered Ousley to be resentenced because the trial court had failed to set forth aggravating and mitigating circumstances. The post-conviction court then ordered the appointment of a special judge, the very judge who originally sentenced Ousley, to resentence him. The special judge allowed new evidence to be presented for the purpose of resentencing but onee again ordered that the sentence be fifty years. The trial court found one aggravating factor, the particular cireumstances of the crime, and two mitigating factors, that the offense occurred under circumstances not likely to recur and that Ousley has made progress while in rehabilitation.

Before we begin review of Ousley's specific claims, we address a point presented by the State. Specifically, the State challenges the ability of a defendant to present new evidence with regard to his character and rehabilitation subsequent to the original sentencing. Relying upon Ingle v. State, 766 N.E.2d $92 (Ind.Ct.App.2002), trans. denied, and Edwards v. State, 518 N.E.2d 1137 (Ind.Ct.App.1988), trans. denied, the State asserts that only evi-denee reflecting the conditions as they existed as of the date of the original sentencing may be considered.

In those cases, this court was called upon to determine whether a trial court erred in excluding certain evidence at a resentencing hearing. The excluded evidence was to show the defendant's character and rehabilitation after the imposition of the original sentence. Relying upon Ind.Code § 35-38-1-15, this court concluded that only evidence reflecting the conditions as they existed as of the date of the original sentence was admissible. Ingle, 766 N.E.2d at 395; Edwards, 518 N.E.2d at 1141. Consequently, we held that the trial court did not err in excluding the evidence. However, both Edwards and Ingle are inapposite here because I.C. § 35-38-1-15 does not control when a defendant is being resentenced following a successful post-conviction challenge to a sentence; rather, 1.C. § 35-38-1-15 is applicable only when a defendant files a motion. to correct an erroneous sentence. And as recently explained by our Supreme Court, a motion to correct erroneous sentence has a very limited and specific use.

In Robinson v. State, 805 N.E.2d 783 (Ind.2004), our Supreme Court made explicitly clear that a motion to correct erroneous sentence filed under 1.0. § 35-38-1-15 is available only when the sentence is erroneous on its face, ie., the error is clear from the face of the judgment imposing the sentence in light of the statutory authority. Id. at 787. As further explained by the Court, claims not apparent on the face of the judgment may be raised only in a direct appeal and in post-conviction proceedings where appropriate. Id. It logical *761 ly follows that because the error to be corrected when a motion to correct erroneous sentence is filed is an error apparent on the face of the judgment, the trial court need not look outside of the judgment itself and there is no reason to review evidence of subsequent behavior. But while that logic holds true for a motion to correct erroneous sentence, courts may be faced with a different set of concerns when revising a sentence following a successful direct appeal or post-conviction challenge.

Indiana Post-Conviction Rule 1(10)(b) allows a trial court to impose a new sentence which is more severe than that originally imposed when a sentence has been set aside pursuant to a post-conviction challenge if the court's reasons for selecting the sentence include a reliance upon identifiable conduct on the part of the petitioner that occurred after the imposition of the original sentence. Thus, Ousley opines that because a trial court may increase the sentence based upon bad conduct after the original sentencing date, the trial court must be able to consider good behavior which occurred during the same time period. We agree. Post-Conviection Rule 1(10)(b) clearly contemplates that evidence of a defendant's conduct after the original sentencing date may be considered. While the Rule does not specifically state that a defendant may present evidence of subsequent good behavior, such may be read into the Rule considering that evidence of subsequent conduct must be presented in order for the trial court to determine whether a more severe sentence is warranted based upon the petitioner's conduct after the original sentence.

That a defendant may present evidence of subsequent good behavior is not strictly confined to Post-Conviction Rule 1(10)(b). Indiana Code § 35-88-1-17 (Burns Code Ed. Supp.2003) authorizes a trial court to modify a sentence such that the sentence is suspended or reduced after the trial court receives a report from the Department of Correction concerning the defendant's conduct while imprisoned. While the modification of a sentence under I.C. § 835-88-1-17 is in a different procedural posture from that seeking to have sentencing error corrected following a successful post-conviction challenge, our legislature has. made clear the policy decision that conduct of a defendant subsequent to the original sentencing date may be considered in some cireumstances. Given these considerations, the trial court did not err in allowing Ousley to present evidence of his behavior subsequent to the time of the imposition of the original sentence.

Turning to the specific issues presented by Ousley, he asserts that the trial court improperly considered as an aggravating factor the fact that Ousley attempted to kill himself after he killed his wife.

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Bluebook (online)
807 N.E.2d 758, 2004 Ind. App. LEXIS 794, 2004 WL 937873, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ousley-v-state-indctapp-2004.