Morris v. State, 85-474
| Decision Date | 20 February 1986 |
| Docket Number | No. 85-474,85-474 |
| Parties | 11 Fla. L. Weekly 471 William Henry MORRIS, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
James B. Gibson, Public Defender, and Michael O'Neill, Asst. Public Defender, Daytona Beach, for appellant.
Jim Smith, Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, and Ellen D. Phillips, Asst. Atty. Gen., Daytona Beach, for appellee.
The defendant appeals from a departure sentence of 5 years' imprisonment imposed after he was convicted of uttering a forged instrument, a third degree felony. We vacate the sentence and remand for resentencing.
At the sentencing hearing, the defendant disputed the accuracy of his prior criminal record as disclosed in the presentence investigation report (P.S.I.). Specifically, he contended that certain of the felony offenses should not have been considered, either because they were duplications of another offense or because no clear disposition was demonstrated. If the court had resolved the dispute is defendant's favor, the recommended guideline sentence would be 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 years, instead of the recommended 3 1/2 to 4 1/2 years as shown by the scoresheet prepared by the State. The trial court did not resolve this dispute, but instead imposed a departure sentence.
The written reasons for departure were:
The Defendant, WILLIAM HENRY MORRIS, is a career criminal. His criminal involvement dates back almost 15 years to when he was convicted of the offense of uttering a forged instrument in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He has been in and out of prisons ever since with convictions for burglary, larceny, bail jumping motor vehicle theft, and driving while intoxicated. In addition, he absconded on the present charge. The pattern of his course of criminal conduct is such that the recommended guidelines range is simply insufficient for society and this individual. Therefore, this Court finds and determines that it is necessary to go outside the guidelines and impose a sentence accordingly.
If the departure sentence could be sustained, the court's failure to resolve the scoresheet dispute would be harmless, but because we cannot sustain the departure sentence, it is necessary that those differences be resolved. Committee Note to Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.701(d)(5) provides: "Any uncertainty in the scoring of the defendant's prior record shall be resolved in favor of the defendant, and disagreement as to the propriety of scoring specific entries in the prior record should be...
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