State v. Porrata

CourtCourt of Appeals of Kansas
DecidedMarch 17, 2017
Docket115180
StatusUnpublished

This text of State v. Porrata (State v. Porrata) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Kansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Porrata, (kanctapp 2017).

Opinion

NOT DESIGNATED FOR PUBLICATION

No. 115,180

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF KANSAS

STATE OF KANSAS, Appellee,

v.

ISHMAEL PORRATA, Appellant.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

Appeal from Sedgwick District Court; WARREN M. WILBERT, judge. Opinion filed March 17, 2017. Affirmed

Sam Schirer, of Kansas Appellate Defender Office, for appellant.

Julie A. Koon, assistant district attorney, Marc Bennett, district attorney, and Derek Schmidt, attorney general, for appellee.

Before GARDNER, P.J., ATCHESON, J., and STUTZMAN, S.J.

STUTZMAN, J.: Ishmael Porrata contends that the journal entry from his third probation violation hearing, when the district judge revoked his probation and ordered him to serve his sentence, improperly failed to include 43 days of jail credit referred to by the district judge at his second violation hearing. For the reasons explained below, we find the journal entry was correct, and we affirm.

1 FACTS AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

Porrata entered a guilty plea to possession of methamphetamine on May 14, 2014. In July of that year, the district court imposed the mid-range presumptive sentence of 24 months in prison but granted Porrata probation for 12 months, supervised by community corrections.

One year after his plea, on May 14, 2015, the district court found that Porrata had violated the terms of his probation. The district judge continued him under the supervision of community corrections, reaffirmed the court's previous order for drug treatment, extended the term of his probation for 18 months from the date of the hearing, and imposed no jail sanction. Three months later, Porrata again was found to be in violation of his probation terms. The district court again modified the term of probation to run for 18 months from the date of that hearing, August 12, 2015, and ordered 2 days in jail as an intermediate sanction.

A comment by the district judge at that second probation violation hearing is the basis for Porrata's argument on this appeal. The discussion at that hearing about the appropriate disposition for Porrata's violations centered on his entry into the residential community corrections program. The judge was told a 2-week wait for a bed was likely, and the State asked for the 2-day intermediate sanction pending Porrata's admission to the program. It was then that the judge commented:

"Your time served up to today will be credited against your ultimate sentence. I can't credit it against the quick dip. You are ordered to serve a 2-day quick dip commencing today. So Friday you will get out of jail. Monday morning you report to Ms. Mueller and you continue to report until your bed is available in [r]esidential."

There was no other mention of jail credit at this hearing.

2 Finally, on October 20, 2015, Porrata came before the court on another probation violation warrant. The record shows the court applied the exception in K.S.A. 2015 Supp. 22-3716(c)(9) to revoke Porrata's probation, based on findings that Porrata was no longer amenable to probation, that further probation would not serve his interests, and that "[o]ffender reformation is not served by reinstating [sic] defendant's probation." No mention of jail credit was made at this hearing.

The journal entry for the October hearing detailed the jail time to be credited against Porrata's sentence as well as periods of incarceration that would not be applied to this case. That accounting specifically noted that Porrata would not be given credit for 43 days of incarceration between July 2, 2015, and August 13, 2015, because "defendant was in custody for Wichita Municipal case no: 13CM3075, therefore is not eligible for duplicate credit in the instant case." In this appeal, Porrata challenges the failure to apply those 43 days against his sentence in this case.

ANALYSIS

"The right to jail credit is statutory. State v. Fowler, 238 Kan. 326, 336, 710 P.2d 1268 (1985)," State v. Parks, 27 Kan. App. 2d 544, 544, 6 P.3d 444 (2000); see State v. Brown, 38 Kan. App. 2d 490, 491, 167 P.3d 367 (2007) (right to jail time credit upon revocation of probation is statutory). As a preliminary matter Porrata failed to raise this issue below when the district court revoked his probation and ordered him to serve his underlying sentence. Generally, issues not raised before the trial court cannot be raised on appeal. See State v. Kelly, 298 Kan. 965, 971, 318 P.3d 987 (2014). Supreme Court Rule 6.02(a)(5) (2017 Kan. S. Ct. R. Annot. 34) requires an appellant to explain why an issue that was not raised below should be considered for the first time on appeal. Those who fail to comply with this rule risk the issue will be deemed waived or abandoned. State v. Godfrey, 301 Kan. 1041, 1043-44, 350 P.3d 1068 (2015) (Rule 6.02[a][5] will henceforth

3 be strictly enforced); State v. Williams, 298 Kan. 1075, 1085, 319 P.3d 528 (2014) (cautioning future litigants to comply with Rule).

Porrata argues that his jail credit issue is preserved as it requires only an order nunc pro tunc to correct the journal entry, which may be done at any time as allowed by K.S.A. 22-3504(2), which states: "Clerical mistakes in judgments, orders or other parts of the record and errors in the record arising from oversight or omission may be corrected by the court at any time and after such notice, if any, as the court orders."

Having adopted that stance on preservation, however, Porrata fails to direct us to anything in the record to show he sought an order nunc pro tunc from the district court to correct the "clerical mistake" or "oversight" he alleges. Neither does he comply with Supreme Court Rule 6.02(a)(5), despite the Supreme Court's explicit admonitions. Since the issue raised, however, is not complex, we nevertheless will consider the merits of Porrata's argument, as it presents only a question of law based on admitted facts and is determinative of the case. State v. Phillips, 299 Kan. 479, 493, 325 P.3d 1095 (2014).

Porrata contends the holding in Abasolo v. State, 284 Kan. 299, 160 P.3d 471 (2007), binds the district court to the statement the judge made at the second probation violation hearing. Abasolo had been sentenced to a controlling 52-month sentence but was granted a departure and was placed on probation. At a probation violation hearing, the district court decided to revoke Abasolo's probation, and announced: "'I'm going to order her to serve her sentence. It is 36 months, minus 15 percent for good time credit, presuming she earns that while in custody.'" 284 Kan. at 301.

In response to the conflict between the duration of Abasolo's original sentence and the judge's pronouncement on revocation, the State acknowledged that the Supreme Court had held that any discrepancy between a court's statement imposing sentence from the bench, and the recorded sentence in a journal entry, is controlled by the statement

4 made from the bench.

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Related

State v. Fowler
710 P.2d 1268 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1985)
State v. Denney
101 P.3d 1257 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 2004)
Abasolo v. State
160 P.3d 471 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 2007)
State v. Parks
6 P.3d 444 (Court of Appeals of Kansas, 2000)
State v. Brown
167 P.3d 367 (Court of Appeals of Kansas, 2007)
State v. Kelly
318 P.3d 987 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 2014)
State v. Williams
319 P.3d 528 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 2014)
State v. Phillips
325 P.3d 1095 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 2014)
State v. Godfrey
350 P.3d 1068 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 2015)

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State v. Porrata, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-porrata-kanctapp-2017.