State v. Sigue

940 So. 2d 812, 2006 WL 2775538
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedSeptember 27, 2006
Docket2006-527
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 940 So. 2d 812 (State v. Sigue) 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 v. Sigue, 940 So. 2d 812, 2006 WL 2775538 (La. Ct. App. 2006).

Opinion

940 So.2d 812 (2006)

STATE of Louisiana
v.
Melvin SIGUE.

No. 2006-527.

Court of Appeal of Louisiana, Third Circuit.

September 27, 2006.
Rehearing Denied November 15, 2006.

*813 W. Jarred Franklin, Louisiana Appellate Project, Bossier City, Louisiana, for Defendant/Appellant, Melvin Sigue.

J. Phil Haney, District Attorney-Sixteenth Judicial District, ADA Robert C. Vines, ADA Jeffrey J. Trosclair, New Iberia, Louisiana, for Plaintiff/Appellee, State of Louisiana.

Court composed of JOHN D. SAUNDERS, ELIZABETH A. PICKETT, and JAMES T. GENOVESE, Judges.

GENOVESE, Judge.

On March 3, 2004, Melvin Sigue was charged by bill of information with one count of possession of cocaine with intent to distribute, a violation of La.R.S. 40:967, and with one count of possession of dihydrocodeinone, a schedule II narcotic, a violation of La.R.S. 40:968.

On March 10, 2004, the Defendant entered a plea of not guilty to all charges, and the matter was fixed for trial. After jury selection, the Defendant withdrew his plea of not guilty and entered a best interest no contest plea to the charge of possession of cocaine, with intent to distribute, in accordance with a plea agreement. Pursuant to the Defendant's plea, the State agreed to dismiss the remaining charge.

On November 3, 2005, the trial court held a sentencing hearing at which time the Defendant orally moved to withdraw his plea of no contest, but the trial court denied the motion. The trial court then sentenced the Defendant to imprisonment at hard labor for a term of ten years, with credit given for time served. On November 22, 2005, the Defendant filed a motion to reconsider sentence. The trial court denied the motion without providing written reasons. The Defendant is now before this court on appeal, asserting (1) that the trial court erred by denying his motion to withdraw his no contest plea; and (2) that the trial court imposed an excessive sentence. We disagree and affirm the Defendant's sentence.

FACTS

Because the Defendant entered a best interest no contest plea to the charge of possession of cocaine, with intent to distribute, the facts are taken from the transcript of the plea proceedings, as follows:

BY MR. VINES (Assistant District Attorney): The evidence in this case, Your Honor, would indicate that on the date alleged in the Bill of Information, in Iberia Parish, agents with the Narcotics Division of Iberia Parish Sheriff's Office received information from an informant that she could purchase cocaine or get cocaine from [the Defendant]; they set up at a local hotel, the Southland Inn. They set up the room with a video camera. They monitored a telephone conversation between the confidential informant and [the Defendant]. [The Defendant] traveled in his vehicle to the Southland Inn, entered the hotel room; the officers entered the hotel room from an adjacent room next door after [the Defendant] was captured on tape inside the hotel room with the confidential informant. The officers detained [the Defendant], found him to be *814 in possession of cocaine. They arrested him; they ran a dog on the vehicle that he traveled to the hotel in; the dog alerted for the presence of illegal narcotics; they searched the vehicle and found a packet of cocaine in the vehicle. The evidence would indicate that [the Defendant] possessed that cocaine with the intent to distribute.

ERRORS PATENT

In accordance with La.Code Crim.P. art. 920, all appeals are reviewed for errors patent on the face of the record. After reviewing the record, we find that there are no errors patent.

ASSIGNMENT OF ERROR NO. 1

In his first assignment of error, the Defendant asserts that the trial court erred by failing to allow the Defendant to withdraw his plea of no contest. In his brief to this court, the Defendant asserts that, consistent with allegations he made in his post-plea motions, the Defendant understood the plea agreement to include a maximum five year sentence, and without that five year sentencing cap, he would not have entered the no contest plea.

During the sentencing hearing, the Defendant orally moved to withdraw his plea. During that hearing, the Defendant asserted that his plea was "coerced by psychological persuasion." The trial judge then asked the Defendant, "Who coerced you?" The Defendant eventually replied that the coercion was committed by the trial judge and his own attorney at the pre-trial conference in the judge's chambers. The record indicates that the Defendant did not specify any statements made by the trial judge, by the State, or by his own attorney that were coercive. The trial court denied the Defendant's motion:

BY THE COURT: If I am hearing you right, you want a motion to withdraw your plea, which I am going to deny. Based on my memory of this case, nothing in your case was done any differently than the other hundreds of cases we handle.
We have pre-trial conferences. You had your day before the jury.
I strongly suggested you go to the jury.

The trial court then suggested to the Defendant that, "[i]f you are do [sic] a motion to withdraw your plea, written and formal, you are going to have to have a little more than you started with today." On January 10, 2005, the Defendant filed a written motion to withdraw his no contest plea, in which he asserted that the Boykin colloquy clearly indicated his "disinclination" to accept a no contest plea, or any other type of plea. However, the record indicates that this allegation is directly refuted by the Defendant's own statements during the Boykin hearing. When the trial court asked him if he understood that his no contest plea would have the same effect as a guilty plea, he answered in the affirmative. The trial court then asked him whether he was sure that is what he wanted to do. The Defendant again answered in the affirmative. The trial court denied the written motion on January 17, 2005, with no written reasons.

The Defendant also raises a claim about the plea in his "motion for reconsideration" filed on November 22, 2005. In that motion, the Defendant asserted that "dilatory tactics [were] employed to impede his desire to proceed to trial by the State and Defense Attorney." However, the record indicates that the Defendant does not specify what actions, taken either by the State or by his own attorney, constituted tactics designed to impede the proceedings. The record also indicates that though the Defendant described the motion as a "motion to reconsider his motion *815 to withdraw," the remaining claims in that motion involve the sentence. Therefore, we will discuss those remaining claims below.

On December 2, 2005, the Defendant filed an application for post-conviction relief in the trial court, wherein he asserted again that the trial court and his own attorney employed coercion in order to persuade him to enter the no-contest plea. As in the previous motions, the Defendant did not specify any of the alleged coercive actions. On December 7, 2005, the Defendant filed a "motion of supplemental brief" wherein he also claimed that he pled no contest in return for an agreement whereby he would be sentenced to no more than five years imprisonment.

This court has determined when a defendant should be allowed to withdraw his plea based on a mistaken belief regarding his sentence:

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
940 So. 2d 812, 2006 WL 2775538, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-sigue-lactapp-2006.