King v. Commissioner of Correction, (AC 23734).
| Decision Date | 23 December 2003 |
| Docket Number | (AC 23734). |
| Parties | ERIC KING v. COMMISSIONER OF CORRECTION |
| Court | Connecticut Court of Appeals |
Foti, Schaller and Dranginis, Js. Judith M. Wildfeuer, assistant public defender, with whom was Temmy Ann Pieszak, chief of habeas corpus services, for the appellant (petitioner).
Steven R. Strom, assistant attorney general, with whom, on the brief, were, Richard Blumenthal, attorney general, and Henri Alexandre, assistant attorney general, for the appellee (respondent).
The petitioner, Eric King, appeals from the judgment of the habeas court dismissing his petition for a writ of habeas corpus. On appeal, the petitioner claims that the court improperly concluded that the respondent commissioner of correction correctly applied the petitioner's credit for presentence confinement in calculating his discharge date, and that the court thereby violated the equal protection rights afforded him under the federal and state constitutions. We affirm the judgment of the habeas court.
The facts underlying this appeal are not in dispute, and relate to the petitioner's arrest and presentence confinement under two separate informations. On May 18, 1995, the petitioner was arrested and, unable to post bond, held in lieu of bond under the first information in Docket No. CR 95-97012. On February 6, 1996, the court, Graham, J., sentenced the petitioner to nine months imprisonment in that case for failure to appear in the second degree. The respondent applied 264 days of presentence confinement credit to the petitioner's sentence. That credit reflected the period between May 18, 1995, and February 6, 1996. As a result, the petitioner completed his sentence on February 15, 1996, just nine days after the court imposed it.
On June 15, 1995, during the period of time in which the petitioner was being held in presentence confinement under the first information, he was arrested and, unable to post bond, held in lieu of bond under an information with Docket No. CR 95-98207. The petitioner was held in presentence confinement simultaneously under both of those informations for 236 days, between June 15, 1995, the date of the petitioner's arrest under the second information, and February 6, 1996, the date on which the petitioner began serving his sentence for the failure to appear conviction under the first information. When the petitioner finished serving his sentence for the failure to appear conviction on February 15, 1996, he remained in presentence confinement under the second information for the time period beginning on February 16, 1996, and ending on May 5, 2000, when he was sentenced by the court, Clifford, J., to an eighteen year term of imprisonment on the manslaughter charge in that case. In calculating the petitioner's sentence for the manslaughter conviction, the respondent applied 1546 days of presentence confinement credit to the sentence, reflecting the period of time between February 16, 1996, when the petitioner had concluded serving his sentence for the failure to appear conviction under the first information, until May 5, 2000, when the court sentenced the petitioner on the manslaughter conviction under the second information.
On December 28, 2001, the petitioner filed an amended petition for a writ of habeas corpus. Relevant to the issues he raises on appeal, he argued that the respondent improperly had failed to apply an additional presentence credit of 236 days to reduce the manslaughter sentence. He also argued that the respondent's misapplication of the credit had the effect of "causing an indigent person unable to post pretrial bond to serve a longer period of incarceration to satisfy a sentence than a nonindigent person who is able to post bond would be required to serve in order to satisfy a sentence of the same length." Specifically, the petitioner argued that the respondent improperly failed to apply a credit on the manslaughter sentence for the 236 days in which the petitioner was held in presentence confinement simultaneously under both informations. The petitioner argued that the respondent's failure to so credit his sentence resulted in his being held unlawfully beyond his proper release date. The court dismissed the petition, and the petitioner brought the present appeal.1 There are no factual issues in dispute; at issue is whether the respondent properly calculated the petitioner's sentence for manslaughter. Accordingly, (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Fuller v. Commissioner of Correction, 75 Conn. App. 133, 135, 815 A.2d 208 (2003).
General Statutes § 18-98d (a)(1) provides in relevant part that "[a]ny person who is confined to a community correctional center or a correctional institution for an offense on or after July 1, 1981, under a mittimus or because such person is unable to obtain bail or is denied bail shall, if subsequently imprisoned, earn a reduction of such person's sentence equal to the number of days which such person spent in such facility from the time such person was placed in presentence confinement to the time such person began serving the term of imprisonment imposed; provided (A) each day of presentence confinement shall be counted only once for the purpose of reducing all sentences imposed after such presentence confinement . . . ."
Affording sentenced inmates credit for time they have spent in presentence confinement does not reduce the sentence imposed; rather, it gives "recognition to the period of presentence time served and to permit the prisoner, in effect, to commence serving his sentence from the time he was compelled to remain in custody due to a mittimus . . . or because of the court's refusal to allow bail or the defendant's inability to raise bail. . . ." Holmquist v. Manson, 168 Conn. 389, 393-94, 362 A.2d 971 (1975). In Payton v. Albert, 209 Conn. 23, 547 A.2d 1 (1988) (en banc), overruled in part on other grounds, Rivera v. Commissioner of Correction, 254 Conn. 214, 255 n. 44, 756 A.2d 1264 (2000), our Supreme Court addressed an issue concerning the effect of a jail time credit on a concurrent sentence. Although Payton is factually dissimilar from the present case because the present case does not involve the application of a credit on a sentence imposed concurrently on the same day, our Supreme Court's discussion of § 18-98d nonetheless affords us some guidance on how to apply the statute. The Supreme Court in Payton stated that the legislature "has not intended to authorize the transfer of jail time credits accrued while in pretrial confinement under one offense to the sentence thereafter imposed upon conviction for another offense." Id., 31-32. The court further stated that under § 18-98d, "there is now only a single jail time credit applicable to presentence confinements." Id., 31.2
Torrice v. Commissioner of Correction, 55 Conn. App. 1, 739 A.2d 270 (1999), is directly on point with the issue before us. In Torrice, this court, in a per curiam opinion, adopted as a proper statement of the facts and applicable law a habeas court's memorandum of decision concerning the application of pretrial confinement credits in several cases. See Torrice v. Commissioner of Correction, 46 Conn. Sup. 77, 738 A.2d 1164 (1999). The petitioner in Torrice, unable to post bond, was held in presentence confinement simultaneously under two separate informations between July 21 and October 28, 1986. Id., 78. On October 28, 1986, the court sentenced the petitioner under one of the informations. Id. The respondent commissioner of correction applied a presentence confinement credit for the time the petitioner was in custody, from July 21 through October 28, 1986, to the petitioner's sentence on that information. Id., 79. On May 15, 1987, the court sentenced the petitioner on the other information, and the respondent commissioner of correction did not apply a presentence confinement credit to that sentence. The habeas court determined that the respondent properly had declined to apply the credit to each separate sentence. Id., 81-82. The court stated that once the credit had been "fully utilized" as to one of the sentences, it was "not available for application" to the other sentence. Id., 82. The court further explained that "[p]retrial confinement credit applied to one sentence in one docket is not thereafter available for application to another...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Harris v. Commissioner of Correction
... ... to reduce term of confinement under one information cannot be credited again to reduce term of confinement under another information); see also King v. Commissioner of Correction, 80 Conn.App. 580, 587, 836 A.2d 466 (2003), cert. denied, 267 Conn. 919, 841 A.2d 1191 (2004) ; Johnson v ... ...
-
Washington v. Commissioner of Correction
...55 Conn.App. 1, 2, 739 A.2d 270 (1999), aff'g 46 Conn.Supp. 77, 738 A.2d 1164 (1999); see also King v. Commissioner of Correction, 80 Conn.App. 580, 585-86, 836 A.2d 466 (2003), cert. denied, 267 Conn. 919, 841 A.2d 1191 (2004). In Torrice v. of Correction, supra, 46 Conn.Supp. at 77, 738 A......
-
Martinez v. Commissioner of Correction
...of Correction, 94 Conn.App. 283, 287, 893 A.2d 451, cert. denied, 278 Conn. 916, 899 A.2d 621 (2006); King v. Commissioner of Correction, 80 Conn. App. 580, 587, 836 A.2d 466 (2003), cert. denied, 267 Conn. 919, 841 A.2d 1191 (2004). The maximum amount of presentence credit is limited when ......
-
Anderson v. Comm'r of Corr.
...marks omitted.) Bernstein v. Commissioner of Correction , 83 Conn. App. 77, 81–82, 847 A.2d 1090 (2004).In King v. Commissioner of Correction , 80 Conn. App. 580, 836 A.2d 466 (2003), cert. denied, 267 Conn. 919, 841 A.2d 1191 (2004), the petitioner, Eric King, had been charged by informati......