State v. Clark

94 P.3d 335, 123 Wash. App. 515
CourtCourt of Appeals of Washington
DecidedJune 8, 2004
DocketNo. 30206-3-II
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 94 P.3d 335 (State v. Clark) 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
State v. Clark, 94 P.3d 335, 123 Wash. App. 515 (Wash. Ct. App. 2004).

Opinion

Armstrong, J.

Rodney Clark appeals his 240-month sentence for one count of manufacturing methamphetamine and two counts of taking a motor vehicle without permission. The court imposed this sentence on remand for resentencing. Clark argues the trial court erred when it included two Skagit County convictions, entered after his Jefferson County convictions but before his resentencing, in his offender score and when it doubled the standard range for his manufacturing conviction under RCW 69.50.408. Including Clark’s Skagit County convictions in his offender score was proper; we remand for resentencing because the trial court erred when it doubled the standard range.

Facts

In August 2000, a Jefferson County jury convicted Rodney Clark on one count of methamphetamine manufacturing, school zone enhancement, one count of methamphetamine possession and two counts of taking a motor vehicle without permission. In December 2002, we affirmed Clark’s convictions for manufacturing methamphetamine and taking the motor vehicles without permission, but we remanded the case for dismissal of the methamphetamine possession charge and the school zone enhancement. Clark committed the three affirmed offenses between January 1999 and February 2000.

On remand, the State introduced evidence that after his convictions on the Jefferson County charges, but before we issued our decision on his appeal, Clark pleaded guilty to one count of manufacturing methamphetamine and one count of second degree possession of stolen property in Skagit County Superior Court. These crimes were commit[518]*518ted on November 25,1999, and Clark pleaded guilty on May 17, 2001. The Skagit County court included Clark’s Jefferson County convictions to determine his offender score and sentenced Clark to 149 months to run concurrently with his Jefferson County sentence.

At his Jefferson County resentencing, Clark argued that his Skagit County convictions should not count toward his offender score. The court disagreed, calculating Clark’s offender score for the manufacturing count as “11,” and as “8” on both of the taking motor vehicle without permission charges. Clark also argued that his maximum sentence for the manufacturing count was 120 months. But the court doubled his maximum sentence to 240 months and the standard range of 149 to 198 months under RCW 69-.50.408(b). The court sentenced Clark to 240 months on the manufacturing count and 22 concurrent months on the taking motor vehicle without permission counts.

Analysis

Clark argues that the sentencing court erred when it included his Skagit County convictions in its calculation of his offender score and when it doubled the standard range for the manufacturing count under RCW 69.50.408.

I. Inclusion of Clark’s Skagit County Convictions

Clark analogizes to State v. Whitaker, 112 Wn.2d 341, 771 P.2d 332 (1989), and attempts to distinguish the State’s primary cases, State v. Collicott, 118 Wn.2d 649, 827 P.2d 263 (1992), and State v. Shilling, 77 Wn. App. 166, 889 P.2d 948 (1995). But Collicott and Shilling control.

Under former RCW 9.94A.360(1) (2000), a “prior conviction” is “a conviction which exists before the date of sentencing for the offense for which the offender score is being computed.”

In Whitaker, the defendant was found guilty of negligent homicide in 1981 before the legislature enacted the Sen[519]*519tencing Reform Act of 1981 (SRA), chapter 9.94A RCW. Instead of sentencing Whitaker, the court placed him on probation and gave him a deferred sentence. In 1986, after various probation violations, the court revoked Whitaker’s probation and imposed the 10-year deferred sentence. When it set the minimum term, the court counted a 1986 reckless driving conviction as a prior offense. The analysis turned on whether Whitaker’s “date of sentencing” was the 1981 probation hearing or the 1986 revocation hearing. The court reasoned that although the SRA eliminated the concept of probation, community supervision under the SRA was similar. Thus, had Whitaker received community supervision under the SRA instead of pre-SRA probation, his “date of sentencing” would have been in 1981 and his 1986 conviction could not have been counted as a prior conviction. Accordingly, the court held that a deferred sentence is a “sentence” for purposes of determining a minimum term under the SRA, explaining that a contrary result would be illogical because the 1981 and 1986 offenses would each be treated as a prior conviction of the other. Whitaker, 112 Wn.2d at 344-46.

In Collicott, the court held that a conviction entered after the original sentencing but before resentencing on remand was a prior conviction for purposes of determining the defendant’s offender score at resentencing. Collicott, 118 Wn.2d at 665. Clark’s appeal presents the same issue.

As Division One recently stated in Shilling, “[t]he offender score includes all prior convictions (as defined by [former] RCW 9.94A.030(9)) existing at the time of that particular sentencing, without regard to when the underlying incidents occurred, the chronological relationship among the convictions, or the sentencing or resentencing chronology.” Shilling, 77 Wn. App. at 175. Accordingly, the trial court properly included Clark’s Skagit County convictions when it determined his offender score at his resen-tencing.

Clark also argues that including his Skagit County convictions violates double jeopardy. But the case Clark [520]*520relies on, State v. Hardesty, 78 Wn. App. 593, 897 P.2d 1282 (1995), aff’d in part, rev’d in part, 129 Wn.2d 303, 915 P.2d 1080 (1996), is inapposite. Hardesty addressed whether double jeopardy barred the resentencing of a defendant who had fully served an original sentence obtained by fraud. Hardesty, 78 Wn. App. at 595. Clark relies primarily on the proposition that a defendant has a double jeopardy right whenever he has a reasonable expectation of finality in the judgment. But the Supreme Court expressly identified “the pendency of an appeal or review of the sentencing determination” as factors bearing on whether a defendant has a reasonable expectation of finality. Hardesty, 129 Wn.2d at 311. Here, Clark appealed his sentence. Because of this, he had no reasonable expectation of finality and his double jeopardy argument fails.

II. Application of RCW 69.50.408

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94 P.3d 335, 123 Wash. App. 515, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-clark-washctapp-2004.