Miles v. Hogan

Decision Date12 February 2018
Docket NumberNo. 2167,2167
PartiesJODY LEE MILES v. LAWRENCE JOSEPH HOGAN, ET AL.
CourtCourt of Special Appeals of Maryland

Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County

Case No. C-02-CV-15-002710

UNREPORTED

Meredith, Arthur, Rodowsky, Lawrence F. (Senior Judge, Specially Assigned), JJ.

Opinion by Arthur, 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.

In 2013 Maryland abolished the death penalty. As a consequence, it became impossible to carry out the sentences that had been imposed on the four men who remained on death row. One of those four was appellant Jody Miles.

In the legislation that abolished the death penalty, the General Assembly amended Md. Code (1999, 2008 Repl. Vol.), § 7-601(a) of the Correctional Services Article to authorize the Governor to change a sentence of death into a sentence of life without the possibility of parole. See Miles v. State, 435 Md. 540, 543 n.2 (2013). Miles challenged that amendment, contending that it restricted the Governor's constitutional power to grant pardons and reprieves (see Md. Const., art. II, § 20) by limiting his or her discretion to commute a death sentence into anything other than a sentence of life without parole.

The Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County rejected Miles's contention, and he appealed. Although the circuit court reached the correct conclusion on the merits, we vacate the judgment with directions to embody that conclusion in a declaratory judgment.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

On March 19, 1998, Miles was sentenced to death in the Circuit Court for Queen Anne's County following his convictions for felony murder, robbery with a deadly weapon, robbery, and the use of a handgun in the commission of a crime of violence. The Court of Appeals, on direct appeal, affirmed the conviction and death sentence. See Miles v. State, 365 Md. 488 (2001), cert. denied, 534 U.S. 1163 (2002). Since then, Miles has unsuccessfully pursued a number of post-conviction remedies. Miles v. State, 397 Md. 352 (denying leave to appeal from denial of petition for post-conviction relief),cert. denied, 552 U.S. 883 (2007); Miles v. State, 421 Md. 596, 597 (2011) (affirming denial of first motion to correct illegal sentence), cert. denied, 565 U.S. 1263 (2012); Miles v. State, 435 Md. 540, 545 (2013) (affirming denial of second motion to correct illegal sentence).1

In 2013, while Miles was appealing the denial of his second motion to correct an illegal sentence, Maryland abolished the death penalty. 2013 Md. Laws ch. 156, § 3. At the same time, the General Assembly amended § 7-601(a)(1) of the Correctional Services Article to state that the Governor "may . . . change a sentence of death into a sentence of life without the possibility of parole." That statute had previously said that the Governor may "commute or change a sentence of death into a period of confinement that the Governor considers expedient." http://mgaleg.maryland.gov/2013RS/Chapters_noln/CH_156_sb0276t.pdf.

On September 30, 2013, the day before the effective date of the legislation abolishing the death penalty, Miles filed a third motion to correct illegal sentence in the Circuit Court for Queen Anne's County. In his motion he argued that his death sentence was illegal because it could no longer be carried out. The circuit court denied the motion on October 18, 2013, and Miles noted a timely appeal from that ruling.

While that appeal was pending in this Court, Miles received word that Governor O'Malley was considering commuting his sentence of death to a sentence of life without the possibility of parole. On November 25, 2014, Miles sent a letter to the Governor, requesting that his sentence not be commuted.

On December 8, 2014, this Court heard argument in Miles's appeal from the denial of his third motion to correct an illegal sentence. Miles and the State stipulated that the circuit court had erred in denying the motion, but they disagreed about the consequences of the error: Miles contended that he was entitled to be resentenced (and to argue for a sentence of something less than life without parole), while the State contended that his death sentence automatically became a sentence of life without parole. Before this Court decided the appeal, however, the Governor announced his intention to commute Miles's death sentence to a sentence of life without parole.

On January 20, 2015, the Governor formally commuted Miles's sentence to a sentence of life without parole by issuing Executive Order 01.01.2015.06.2 In light of the executive order, this Court dismissed Miles's appeal as moot. Miles v. State, No. 2155, Sept. Term, 2013. The Court of Appeals denied Miles's petition for a writ of certiorari. Miles v. State, 443 Md. 236 (2015).

On September 16, 2015, Miles attacked the commutation of his death sentence by filing this declaratory judgment action in the Circuit Court for Anne Arundel County.Among other things, Miles contended that the General Assembly had violated the doctrine of separation of powers, because, he said, it had limited the Governor's discretion to transform his death sentence into anything other than a sentence of life without parole.3

After some procedural skirmishing,4 the State moved to dismiss Miles's pleading. In its motion the State argued that Miles could present his contentions only in a motion to correct an illegal sentence in Queen Anne's County (where he had been sentenced), and not in a complaint for a declaratory judgment in Anne Arundel County.

On November 29, 2016, the circuit court signed an order that purported to dismiss the complaint for a declaratory judgment. In explaining the reason for its decision, however, the circuit court wrote that "Governor O'Malley's commutation of Plaintiff's sentence of death to life without the possibility of parole was lawful." Hence, it appears that the court did not accept the State's contention that it should dismiss the case becauseMiles had used the wrong procedural tool; rather it reached the merits and rejected Miles's contentions.

Miles noted his appeal.

QUESTIONS PRESENTED

Miles presents three questions for review:

1. Did the Circuit Court properly dismiss Mr. Miles' Second Amended Petition on the merits?
2. Since the Circuit Court ruled on the merits of Mr. Miles' Petition, is the State's claim that a declaratory judgment action, pursuant to Md. Code Ann., Cts. & Jud. Proc. § 3-401 et seq., does not lie against the Governor for changing Mr. Miles' sentence to [life without parole] pursuant to an unconstitutional statute now moot?
3. If the procedural challenge is not moot, is a declaratory judgment action, pursuant to Md. Code Ann., Cts. & Jud. Proc. § 3-401 et seq., against the Governor for changing Mr. Miles' sentence to [life without parole] the proper procedural vehicle to bring this action, rather than a motion to correct illegal sentence pursuant to Rule 4-345(a)?

We need not reach the second and third questions, because the State no longer contends that Miles was required to assert his challenges in a motion to correct an illegal sentence. In response to the first question, we conclude that the circuit court properly rejected Miles's contentions on the merits, but that it should have embodied its ruling in a formal declaratory judgment and should not have purported to dismiss the complaint. Accordingly, we shall vacate the judgment of dismissal and remand for the entry of a declaratory judgment consistent with this opinion.

DECLARATORY JUDGMENTS

"[A] court may grant a declaratory judgment . . . if it will serve to terminate the uncertainty or controversy giving rise to the proceeding," and if the assertion of a "legal relation, status, right, or privilege . . . is challenged or denied by an adversary party . . . ." Md. Code (1957, 2013 Repl. Vol.), § 3-409 of the Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article. "In an action properly brought under the Declaratory Judgments Act, the court ordinarily must declare the rights of the parties in light of the issues raised." Jennings v. Gov't Emps. Ins. Co., 302 Md. 352, 355 (1985).

"'[D]ismissal is rarely appropriate in a declaratory judgment action.'" Hanover Invs., Inc. v. Volkman, 455 Md. 1, 17 (2017) (quoting Christ ex rel. Christ v. Md. Dep't of Nat. Res., 335 Md. 427, 435 (1994)); accord Glover v. Glendening, 376 Md. 142, 154-55 (2003); see also Allied Inv. Corp. v. Jasen, 354 Md. 547, 556 (1999) ("[g]ranting a motion to dismiss a declaratory judgment action without declaring the rights of the parties rarely is appropriate"); Broadwater v. State, 303 Md. 461, 465-66 (1985) ("[l]egions of our cases hold that a demurrer, the type of motion to dismiss here involved, is rarely appropriate in a declaratory judgment action").

In general, a circuit court may dismiss a complaint for declaratory judgment only if the plaintiffs are not entitled to a declaration of their rights. For example, "if there were no justiciable controversy a motion to dismiss would lie." Broadwater v. State, 303 Md. at 467. A motion to dismiss may also lie when the case is moot (see, e.g., id. at 468), when the plaintiffs lack standing (Christ ex rel. Christ v. Md. Dep't of Nat. Res., 335 Md.at 435), when the plaintiffs have failed to join a necessary party (Broadwater v. State, 303 Md. at 469), or when the same issues are awaiting decision in another common-law proceeding. See, e.g., Haynie v. Gold Bond Bldg. Prods., 306 Md. 644, 650-54 (1986).

In short, a court ordinarily may dismiss a complaint for a declaratory judgment only when the plaintiffs have no right to a declaration at all - even a declaration that they are wrong. Allied Inv. Corp. v. Jasen, 354 Md. at 556 ("'[t]he test of the sufficiency of the [complaint for declaratory judgment] is not whether it shows that the plaintiff is entitled to the declaration of...

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