Davis v. State

• Decision Date: 14 September 2016
• Docket Number: No. 4D15–3277.,4D15–3277.
• Parties: Robert Lee DAVIS, Jr., Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

199 So.3d 546

Robert Lee DAVIS, Jr., Appellant,

v.STATE of Florida, Appellee.

No. 4D15–3277.

District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fourth District.

Sept. 14, 2016.

Ashley N. Minton of Minton Law, P.A., Fort Pierce, for appellant.

Pamela Jo Bondi, Attorney General, Tallahassee, and Mitchell A. Egber, Assistant Attorney General, West Palm Beach, for appellee.

FORST

, J.

This case brings to the fore a number of still unanswered questions regarding the boundaries in juvenile sentencing in the wake of Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48, 130 S.Ct. 2011, 176 L.Ed.2d 825 (2010)

. In that case, the Supreme Court of the United States held that a life sentence without parole for a juvenile who did not commit homicide is cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment. Id. at 74

. The Florida Supreme Court later concluded that, in Florida, a lengthy term-of-years sentence can constitute cruel and unusual punishment under the reasoning of Graham.

Henry v. State, 175 So.3d 675, 680 (Fla.2015) ; Gridine v. State, 175 So.3d 672, 674–75 (Fla.2015).

In the case before us, we affirm Appellant Robert Lee Davis Jr.'s sentence because he has not shown that his 75–year sentence fails to afford him a meaningful opportunity for release within his natural life. This is because the record shows that, despite the lengthy term of years, Appellant has been given the opportunity to receive substantial amounts of gain-time and, in fact, is expected to be released when he is in his mid–50s.

We recognize continuing conflict among the district courts of this state on this issue. We thus certify several questions of great public importance with the hope that the Florida Supreme Court or the Legislature will act to bring more clarity and uniformity in this area of the law.

Background

In 1991, Appellant entered a plea to attempted first degree murder with a firearm, attempted second degree murder with a firearm, and aggravated assault with a firearm. Appellant committed the offenses on February 4, 1991, when he was 16 years old. The trial court sentenced Appellant to consecutive terms of 40 years for the attempted first degree murder, 30 years for the attempted second degree murder, and 5 years for the aggravated assault. As a result, Appellant received an aggregate sentence of 75 years in prison.

In April 2015, Appellant filed a motion for postconviction relief under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.850

. He claimed that his 75–year aggregate sentence was a de facto life sentence that did not provide him a meaningful opportunity for release within his natural life. The sworn motion recognized that Appellant's current release date was set at April 13, 2030 and alleged that, if he received the maximum amount of gain-time and the earliest possible release date, he would be approximately 68 or 69 years of age when released. Of note, Appellant was born April 1, 1974. Thus, on April 13, 2030, he would be 56 years old, not 68 or 69.

The trial court denied the motion with a well-reasoned explanatory order. The court explained that the facts of the crime were horrific: “On February 4, 1991 the defendant fired 3 rounds from a .45 caliber handgun, striking [the victim] in the throat. She was given a 20% chance to live. She did survive, but as a result, she was permanently paralyzed from the chest down.” The court noted that Appellant was almost 17 years old when he attempted to kill and paralyzed the victim. The trial court explained that Appellant would be 56 years old if released in April 2030 and that he did not receive a de facto life sentence.

The trial court distinguished the Florida Supreme Court's decisions in Gridine (involving a 70–year aggregate sentence) and Henry (involving a 90–year aggregate sentence). The defendant in Gridine would have been 84 years old on his release date, and the defendant in Henry would have been imprisoned until he was at least 95 years old. The sentences in both cases required the defendants to be incarcerated well beyond the average life expectancy of 78.8 years.

In contrast, the trial court found that Appellant's scheduled release at the age of 56 meant that his sentence afforded him a meaningful opportunity for release during his natural life. This appeal followed.

Analysis

In Graham, the United States Supreme Court held that “for a juvenile offender who did not commit homicide the Eighth Amendment forbids the sentence of life without parole.” 560 U.S. at 74, 130 S.Ct. 2011

. Graham applies retroactively to cases that were final on direct appeal, such as Appellant's case. St. Val v. State, 107 So.3d 553, 554 (Fla. 4th DCA 2013).

In Henry, the Florida Supreme Court held “that the constitutional prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment under Graham is implicated when a juvenile nonhomicide offender's sentence does not afford any ‘meaningful opportunity to obtain release based on demonstrated maturity and rehabilitation.’ ” 175 So.3d at 679

(quoting Graham, 560 U.S. at 75, 130 S.Ct. 2011 ). The court concluded that, because Henry's aggregate sentence of 90 years in prison “require[d] him to be imprisoned until he is at least nearly ninety-five years old, [it] d[id] not afford him this opportunity, [and] that sentence is unconstitutional under Graham. ” Henry, 175 So.3d at 680. The court explained:

We conclude that Graham prohibits the state trial courts from sentencing juvenile nonhomicide offenders to prison terms that ensure these offenders will be imprisoned without obtaining a meaningful opportunity to obtain future early release during their natural lives based on their demonstrated maturity and rehabilitation.

Id.

In Gridine, the Florida Supreme Court similarly held that Gridine's 70–year prison sentence was unconstitutional because it “d[id] not provide a meaningful opportunity for future release.” 175 So.3d at 673

.

In both Henry and Gridine, the Florida Supreme Court held that the defendants should be resentenced under the sentencing provisions enacted in Chapter 2014–220, Laws of Florida, and codified in sections 775.082

, 921.1401, and 921.1402 of the Florida Statutes. Henry, 175 So.3d at 680 ; Gridine, 175 So.3d at 675.

Florida courts both before and after Henry and Gridine have reached differing conclusions as to when a term of years constitutes cruel and unusual punishment or amounts to a “de facto life sentence” that violates Graham. Several cases are currently pending before the Florida Supreme Court that raise the issue.

Recently, the First District Court of Appeal affirmed a trial court's “aggregate sentence of 55 years,” holding that this sentence “does not amount to a de facto life sentence.” Collins v. State, 189 So.3d 342, 343 (Fla. 1st DCA 2016)

, petition for discretionary review pending, No. SC16–716 (Fla.2016). The trial court in that case found:

[The defendant's] new aggregate sentence would require him to serve at least 52 years in prison, and his earliest eligibility for release would be at age 66 years 8 months; if serving his full 55–year sentence, he would be released at age 69 years 8 months. The court noted a life expectancy between 73 and 84.4 years, concluding that because his age upon release did not exceed his life expectancy, his aggregate sentences did not constitute a de facto life sentence.

Id.; see also Kelsey v. State, 183 So.3d 439, 440 (Fla. 1st DCA 2015)

(declining to vacate, under Graham and Henry, a 45–year sentence imposed on a juvenile), rev. granted, No. SC15–2079, 2015 WL 7720518 (Fla. Nov. 19, 2015).

In Abrakata v. State, 168 So.3d 251 (Fla. 1st DCA 2015)

, petition for discretionary review pending, No. SC15–1325 (Fla.2015), the court held that a 25–year mandatory minimum sentence was not a de facto life sentence without parole in violation of Graham. Id. at 251–52

. Further, the Abrakata court refused to retroactively apply section 921.1402, which by its terms applies to offenses committed on or after July 1, 2014. Id. at 252 (“[A]bsent a violation of Graham, there is no legal basis to retroactively apply section 921.1402 (or any other provision of the juvenile sentencing legislation enacted in 2014) to the 2011 offense in this case.”).

Notwithstanding the Florida Supreme Court's recent decisions in Henry and Gridine, important questions as to how courts are to determine whether a prison term fails to afford a meaningful opportunity for early release during the offender's natural life remain unanswered, such as:

• Should a court considering such a claim look solely to the term of the sentence or must it also consider the defendant's actual/expected release date?

• Should courts consider life expectancy in making the determination and, if so, what measure of life expectancy should be used?

• If a defendant will be released at or near life expectancy, is this a “meaningful” opportunity for release?

Courts have struggled in determining where to draw the line. For example, a 60–year sentence with a 50–year minimum mandatory has been found to be a de facto life sentence.

Appellant's sentence [60 years with 50–year minimum mandatory] will require him to serve at least 58.5 years in prison, which means he will not be released until he is nearly 76 years old. This exceeds his life expectancy, as reflected in the National Vital Statistics Reports from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention cited by Appellant in his rule 3.800(b)(2) motion. Thus, applying the rule of law set forth above, we hold that Appellant's sentence is a de facto life sentence that is unconstitutional under Graham.

Adams v. State, 188 So.3d 849, 851–52 (Fla. 1st DCA 2012)

(footnotes omitted), rev. denied, No. SC12–1795, 2016 WL 234892 (Fla. Jan. 20, 2016) ; see also

Brooks v. State, 186 So.3d 564, 567 (Fla. 5th DCA 2015) (concluding that a 65–year sentence violated Graham ); Barnes v. State, 175 So.3d 380, 381 (Fla. 5th DCA 2015) (concluding that a 60–year sentence was unconstitutional); Morris v. State, 198 So.3d 31 (Fla. 2d DCA 2015) (reversing a 65–year sentence under Henry and Gridine because it did not...