Hernandez v. State, 885

• Decision Date: 11 August 2017
• Docket Number: No. 885,885
• Parties: JAFET L. HERNANDEZ v. STATE OF MARYLAND
• Court: Court of Special Appeals of Maryland

JAFET L. HERNANDEZ v. STATE OF MARYLAND

No. 885

COURT OF SPECIAL APPEALS OF MARYLAND

September Term, 2016

August 11, 2017

Circuit Court for Prince George's County

Case No. CT06-1010X

UNREPORTED

Eyler, Deborah S., Beachley, Shaw Geter, JJ.

Opinion by Beachley, J.

*This is an unreported opinion, and it may not be cited in any paper, brief, motion, or other document filed in this Court or any other Maryland Court as either precedent within the rule of stare decisis or as persuasive authority. Md. Rule 1-104.

Following a four-day trial in March 2007, a jury in the Circuit Court for Prince George's County convicted appellant, Jafet Hernandez, of first-degree rape, first-degree sexual offense, kidnapping, and robbery. In September 2007, the trial court sentenced appellant to life imprisonment for first-degree rape, and life for first-degree sexual offense, to run concurrent.¹ Almost nine years later, in May 2016, appellant filed a motion to correct illegal sentence in the circuit court, arguing that recent United States Supreme Court precedent rendered his sentence unconstitutional. The circuit court denied appellant's motion without a hearing. Appellant timely appealed, and presents the following issue for our review: Did the trial court err in denying appellant's motion to correct illegal sentence? The State moved to dismiss, arguing that appellant's appeal is not ripe for review. We agree with the State.

BACKGROUND

A panel of this Court previously established the lurid nature of the events that led to appellant's convictions in Hernandez v. State, No. 2119, Sept. Term, 2007. There, the panel noted that appellant committed the abovementioned offenses as a juvenile at the age of seventeen years and nine months. Id., slip op. at 2. Nearly three years after appellant received his life sentence, the United States Supreme Court held it unconstitutional for a state to sentence a juvenile nonhomicide offender to life without the possibility of parole, depriving that juvenile of a "meaningful opportunity to obtain release based ondemonstrated maturity and rehabilitation." Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48, 75 (2010). The Supreme Court made clear, however, that a state need not guarantee eventual freedom to such an offender. Id.

DISCUSSION

Appellant argues that Maryland's parole system functions merely as a form of ad hoc executive clemency and fails to provide the constitutionally required meaningful opportunity to obtain release. This is so, appellant contends, because of the nature of parole eligibility for those sentenced to life in Maryland. According to appellant, by vesting the Governor with unfettered discretion in deciding whether to grant parole to juvenile nonhomicide offenders, Maryland's parole system is unconstitutional as applied to him.

Maryland's Parole System

We begin our analysis with a brief overview of the parole process for nonhomicide offenders sentenced to life. In Maryland, the Maryland Parole Commission (the "Commission") "has the exclusive power to . . . authorize the parole of an individual sentenced under the laws of the State to any correctional facility in the State" as well as to "hear cases for parole or administrative release in which . . . the inmate is serving a sentence of life imprisonment[.]" Md. Code (1999, 2008 Repl. Vol., 2016 Supp.), § 7-205(a)(1), (3)(iii) of the Correctional Services Article ("CS"). "[A]n inmate who has been sentenced to life imprisonment is not eligible for parole consideration until the inmate has served 15 years or the equivalent of 15 years considering the allowances for diminution of theinmate's term of confinement."² CS § 7-301(d)(1). Parole for such an inmate is governed by CS § 7-301(d)(4), which provides that, "if eligible for parole under this subsection, an inmate serving a term of life imprisonment may only be paroled with the approval of the Governor." For those serving life sentences, the Commission can only review and make recommendations to the Governor. CS § 7-206(3)(i).

Put simply, once a nonhomicide offender sentenced to life has served fifteen years (or the equivalent period with applicable diminution credits), that offender becomes eligible for parole.³ If the Commission recommends parole for such an offender, the Governor has the exclusive power to decide whether to grant or deny parole.⁴

Appellant's Claim

Appellant argues that CS § 7-301(d)(4) does not require the Governor to consider demonstrated maturity, rehabilitation, and the distinctive attributes of youth—standards the Supreme Court in Graham required the States to explore when considering parole for juvenile nonhomicide offenders. Appellant correctly notes that there is no statutoryprovision that requires the Governor to consider any particular factors in deciding whether to grant parole. This unfettered discretion to deny parole, appellant argues, renders CS § 7-301(d)(4) unconstitutional as applied to him.

In Graham, the State of Florida sentenced Graham, a juvenile nonhomicide offender, to life in prison. 560 U.S. at 52-53, 57. Because Florida had abolished its parole system, Graham's life sentence effectively became life without the possibility of parole—his only opportunity for release was through executive clemency. Id. at 57. In holding that sentence unconstitutional, the Supreme Court stated,

A State is not required to guarantee eventual freedom to a juvenile offender convicted of a nonhomicide crime. What the State must do, however, is give defendants like Graham some meaningful opportunity to obtain release based on demonstrated maturity and rehabilitation. It is for the State, in the first instance, to explore the means and mechanisms for compliance. It bears emphasis, however, that while the Eighth Amendment prohibits a State from imposing a life without parole sentence on a juvenile nonhomicide offender, it does not require the State to release that offender during his natural life. Those who commit truly horrifying crimes as juveniles may turn out to be irredeemable, and thus deserving of incarceration for the duration of their lives. The Eighth Amendment does not foreclose the possibility that persons convicted of nonhomicide crimes committed before adulthood will remain behind bars for life. It does prohibit States from making the judgment at the outset that those offenders never will be fit to reenter society.

560 U.S. at 75.

In the wake of Graham and its progeny, the Commission, in an apparent attempt to comply with Graham's mandate, amended COMAR 12.08.01.18A(3) (amended October 24, 2016).⁵ COMAR 12.08.01.18A(3) now provides the following:

In addition to the factors contained under §A(1)-(2) of this regulation, the Commission considers the following factors in determining whether a prisoner who committed a crime as a juvenile is suitable for release on parole:

(a) Age at the time the crime was committed;

(b) The individual's level of maturity and sense of responsibility at the time of [sic] the crime was committed;

(c) Whether influence or pressure from other individuals contributed to the commission of the crime;

(d) Whether the prisoner's character developed since the time of the crime in a manner that indicates the prisoner will comply with the conditions of release;

(e) The home environment and family relationships at the time the crime was committed;

(f) The individual's educational background and achievement at the time the crime was committed; and

(g) Other factors or circumstances unique to prisoners who committed crimes at the time the individual was a juvenile that the Commissioner determines to be relevant.

Although the Commission must consider these factors in determining whether to recommend parole, no existing statute or regulation confines the Governor to the sameanalysis. Appellant claims that his life sentence is unconstitutional under Graham because the Governor could hypothetically choose not to consider Graham's standards in denying parole. According to appellant, the Governor's unfettered discretion resembles executive clemency, and renders his sentence the equivalent to life without parole.⁶

Appellant's Claim is Premature

Because appellant cannot show that he has suffered any legally cognizable harm, his complaint is premature. Pursuant to Maryland's parole procedures, the Commission must first recommend appellant for parole before the Governor can consider whether to ultimately grant parole. Appellant does not claim that the Commission has recommended him for parole, nor can he claim that his parole status now depends exclusively on the actions of the Governor. In short, the Governor has no duty, at this juncture, to consider appellant's parole status.

The Court of Appeals "has emphasized, time after time, that [its] strong and established policy is to decide constitutional issues only when necessary." VNA Hospice of Md. v. Dep't of Health and Mental Hygiene, 406 Md. 584, 604 (2008) (internal quotation marks omitted) (quoting Burch v. United Cable, 391 Md. 687, 695-96 (2006)). The UnitedStates Supreme Court has stated that, "As a general rule, if there is no constitutional defect in the application of the statute to a litigant, he does not have standing to argue that it would be unconstitutional if applied to third parties in hypothetical situations." Cty. Court of Ulster Cty. v. Allen, 442 U.S. 140, 155 (1979). The Supreme Court has explained that, to have constitutional standing, a party "must have suffered an 'injury in fact'—an invasion of a legally protected interest which is . . . actual or imminent, not 'conjectural' or 'hypothetical[.]'" Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560 (1992) (internal citations and quotation marks omitted). Here, in the absence of a recommendation for parole by the Commission, there is no need to decide a constitutional issue regarding the Governor's alleged unfettered discretion in the parole process. Appellant's claim, in the parlance of Lujan, is "conjectural" or "hypothetical."

We find support for our conclusion...