State Ex Rel. Bartie v. State

501 So. 2d 260, 1986 La. App. LEXIS 8424
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedDecember 23, 1986
DocketCW/86/0941
StatusPublished
Cited by14 cases

This text of 501 So. 2d 260 (State Ex Rel. Bartie v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State Ex Rel. Bartie v. State, 501 So. 2d 260, 1986 La. App. LEXIS 8424 (La. Ct. App. 1986).

Opinion

501 So.2d 260 (1986)

STATE ex rel. John BARTIE
v.
STATE of Louisiana, et al.

No. CW/86/0941.

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, First Circuit.

December 23, 1986.

*261 John Bartie, in pro. per.

Cynthia Eyre, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the State-appellee.

Before LANIER, CRAIN and ALFORD, JJ.

LANIER, Judge.

This is an application for a supervisory writ that was transferred to this court from the Louisiana Supreme Court. In it, the relator contests (1) the dismissal of an application for post-conviction relief filed in the Fourteenth Judicial District Court (JDC), (2) the denial by the Court of Appeal, Third Circuit, of a writ application objecting to the dismissal of the application for post-conviction relief by the Fourteenth JDC, and (3) the dismissal of cumulated actions of a civil suit for damages in tort and a criminal petition for habeas corpus by the Nineteenth JDC.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

A chronological history of these actions is essential to comprehend and adjudicate the issues involved.

On January 14, 1980, John Bartie was charged in the Fourteenth JDC, Parish of Calcasieu, with committing an aggravated battery on Tyrone Lewis by shooting him with a revolver on December 3, 1979. On October 27, 1980, a judgment forfeiting Bartie's surety appearance bond was rendered, which judgment was read and signed on November 18, 1980. Also, at this time, a bench warrant was issued for Bartie's arrest.

On June 21, 1981, Bartie was arrested in Houston, Harris County, Texas, for aggravated robbery. On September 13, 1982, Bartie was returned to Calcasieu Parish from the Texas Department of Corrections (TDOC) to answer the pending aggravated battery charge. On September 24, 1982, Bartied pled guilty to aggravated battery and was sentenced to serve five years at hard labor in the custody of the Louisiana Department of Corrections (LDOC), which sentence was to run concurrently with the Texas sentence he was then serving.[1] On October 19, 1982, Bartie was returned to the TDOC to complete serving his Texas sentence.

On June 11, 1984, Bartie was paroled in Texas. Thereafter, he spent sixty days in a Texas halfway house. Although the LDOC records indicate Bartie's parole was transferred to LDOC on June 11, 1984, apparently Bartie did not return to Louisiana until on or about April 15, 1985. On May 23, 1985,[2] LDOC secured a warrant to *262 arrest Bartie so he could serve the balance of the time due on his Louisiana sentence. Bartie was arrested and taken back into custody that same day.

On or about July 11, 1985, Bartie mailed a pleading entitled application for post conviction relief to the Fourteenth JDC. On July 22, 1985, a judge of the Fourteenth JDC authorized Bartie to file the pleading and proceed in forma pauperis. In this pleading, Bartie contended he was being illegally detained because, among other things, he was not given credit for the time he spent in the Texas halfway house or the time he spent in Louisiana and Texas on parole. On July 23, 1985, the Fourteenth JDC rejected Bartie's claims with the following rationale:

John Bartie petitions the court for post-conviction relief. His claim is based upon a theory that he is illegally detained because he has not received a parole from the state of Louisiana. That is a matter for resolution by the Board of Pardons over which this court has no supervisory power or jurisdiction.
Petitioner complains also that the Department of Corrections refuses to grant credit for time he served on parole from the state of Texas. He is entitled to no such credit. His punishment was incarceration, with the sentence to be served concurrently with a sentence he was then serving in Texas. He has no right to complain that he was released by the state of Texas prior to having served enough time to have either completed serving his Louisiana sentence in accord with applicable Louisiana law or to have actually received a parole in this state. Neither of those matters have subject-matter jurisdiction in this court.

On August 8, 1985, Bartie sought a supervisory writ from the Third Circuit Court of Appeal contending the ruling of the Fourteenth JDC was erroneous. On October 14, 1985, the Third Circuit noted that there was no error in the trial court's ruling and denied the writ.

On July 23, 1985, Bartie filed a pleading in the Nineteenth JDC, Parish of East Baton Rouge, in which he asserted the same claims as those in the Fourteenth JDC pleading. Made defendants in this suit were LDOC, the Chairman of the Parole Board and James E. Morris, an Assistant Secretary of the LDOC who signed the affidavit for the warrant for Bartie's arrest in May of 1985. This pleading had no prayer for relief. At this time, Bartie was confined in the Dixon Correctional Institute at Jackson, East Feliciana Parish, Louisiana. Apparently, on August 1, 1985, Bartie filed an affidavit supporting his claim of being a pauper and a prayer for his petition. In the prayer, he asked for "an immediate order releasing him from further illegal restraint" and for $3,000,000 in damages. This matter went to trial summarily on August 28, 1985, as a hearing on a writ of habeas corpus before a commissioner. On September 23, 1985, the commissioner filed his report to the district court and recommended "that the claims of Mr. Bartie be denied, dismissing his suit with prejudice." The commissioner gave the following reasons for his recommendation:

Mr. Bartie claims he is entitled to credit for a sixty day period served in a half-way house in Texas following his parole of June 11, 1984. Mr. Bartie also claims credit for the time that he was on parole (on the streets) in Louisiana to May 23, 1985. The Department of Corrections for the State of Louisiana denies that Mr. Bartie is entitled to this credit. These matters are before the Court for determination of those issues.
Mr. Bartie does not cite any statutes or jurisprudence of the State of Louisiana which would require or authorize credit against a Louisiana sentence for the period served in a half-way house in Texas following parole, nor does he cite any such authority for credit against the Louisiana sentence for time spent "on the streets" while on parole from the Texas sentence. On the contrary, Louisiana statutes require that the term of parole shall be for the remainder of a prisoner's sentence, without any diminution of sentence for good behavior. (La.R.S. 15:574.6) In addition, if a prisoner is *263 revoked for violation of the conditions of parole, Louisiana statutes require that he be returned to the institution from which he was paroled and serve the remainder of his sentence as of the date of his release on parole. [La.R.S. 15:574.9 (E)] As Mr. Bartie has made no showing to this Court that the time which he spent in a Texas half-way house was credited toward his original Texas sentence, the State of Louisiana is under no obligation or requirement to give Mr. Bartie any credit for his parole spent in Texas or in Louisiana.
Additionally, Mr. Bartie claims that he should be free from restraints by the State of Louisiana since he is on parole from the State of Texas. For reasons that are obvious throughout the file, Mr. Bartie has not been paroled from the State of Louisiana. When paroled from Texas, he was returned to Louisiana at his request. Apparently a division of the Department of Corrections agreed to accept the supervision of the Texas parole.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
501 So. 2d 260, 1986 La. App. LEXIS 8424, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-ex-rel-bartie-v-state-lactapp-1986.