People v. Dean

Decision Date21 June 2012
Docket NumberNo. 09CA1747.,09CA1747.
Citation292 P.3d 1066
PartiesThe PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff–Appellee, v. Charles E. DEAN, Defendant–Appellant.
CourtColorado Court of Appeals

OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE

John W. Suthers, Attorney General, Ryan A. Crane, Assistant Attorney General, Denver, Colorado, for PlaintiffAppellee.

Alison Ruttenberg, Boulder, Colorado, for DefendantAppellant.

Opinion by Judge LOEB.

¶ 1 Defendant, Charles E. Dean, appeals the judgment of conviction entered and sentence imposed on a jury verdict finding him guilty of second degree murder. We affirm and remand for correction of the mittimus.

I. Background

¶ 2 According to evidence presented by the prosecution at trial, defendant and the victim had been friends for nearly thirty years. Despite this friendship, in 2001, defendant assaulted and beat the victim by continuously kicking him in the head, even after the victim had lost consciousness, over the perceived theft of a small amount of crack cocaine. After this incident, defendant and the victim remained friends and, in the months before the victim's death, had been essentially living together in the victim's duplex apartment. Evidence at trial established that they also smoked crack cocaine together.

¶ 3 In October 2004, defendant again severely beat the victim. Following the beating, defendant placed the victim in a closet and shut the door. Throughout the night, in response to the victim's cries and moans, defendant returned to the closet and beat the victim several more times. In the morning, when defendant checked on the victim, he was dead.

¶ 4 Defendant then called two friends to help dispose of the body. His friends arrived at the apartment with a chainsaw, and together they dragged the victim's body into the bathroom and put it in the bathtub. Using the chainsaw, defendant then dismembered the body and placed the body parts into plastic trash bags. After loading defendant's pick-up truck with the trash bags, they drove around Denver and threw the trash bags in various dumpsters throughout the city. Neither the body parts nor the chainsaw was ever recovered.

¶ 5 Later, defendant set fire to the victim's apartment in an effort to cover up any remaining evidence of the murder. The fire department arrived at the apartment and, after taming the blaze, discovered biological material in the bathroom. The police arrived and recovered the biological material, which included blood, tissue, cartilage, and bone fragments. Through DNA testing, this biological material was later determined to belong to the victim. In their search of the apartment, the police also found drug paraphernalia, including two crack cocaine pipes.

¶ 6 In connection with these events, defendant was charged with first degree murder. At trial, defendant's theory of defense was that he did not kill his “best friend” or set fire to the apartment, had not been in the apartment when the incidents took place, and did not know who committed the crimes. Defendant argued consistently with this theory at trial and sought to expose weaknesses in the prosecution's evidence linking him to the crime.

¶ 7 The prosecution's theory was that defendant “snapped” and beat the victim to death, possibly over a dispute involving crack cocaine. To establish defendant's motive for killing his “best friend” and to establish defendant's identity as the perpetrator, the prosecution introduced other acts evidence under CRE 404(b), including the 2001 incident discussed above in which defendant beat the victim over the perceived theft of a small amount of crack, and other instances in which witnesses testified to defendant's prior use of crack cocaine.

¶ 8 The jury convicted defendant of the lesser included offense of second degree murder, a class 2 felony, which has a maximum presumptive sentence of twenty-four years. See§ 18–1.3–401(1)(a)(V)(A), C.R.S.2011. Following his conviction, defendant was also adjudicated by the trial court as a habitual criminal for committing a felony (second degree murder) after having sustained three previous felony convictions. See§ 18–1.3–801(2), C.R.S.2011. In accordance with the applicable habitual offender and parole eligibility statutes, defendant was sentenced to four times the presumptive maximum sentence for second degree murder, or ninety-six years, and will be eligible for parole after completing seventy-five percent of his prison sentence (seventy-two years). See id.;§ 17–22.5–403(2.5)(a), C.R.S.2011.

¶ 9 This appeal followed.

II. Equal Protection

¶ 10 Defendant first contends that the trial court erred by ruling that he could be constitutionally sentenced as a habitual offender under section 18–1.3–801, C.R.S.2011, because that statute (in connection with section 17–22.5–403(2.5)(a)), as applied to him, denied him equal protection of the laws as to his parole eligibility. We disagree.

A. Standard of Review and Applicable Law

¶ 11 We review the constitutionality of statutes de novo. Hinojos–Mendoza v. People, 169 P.3d 662, 668 (Colo.2007). Statutes are presumed to be constitutional, and the party attacking the validity of a statute bears the burden of establishing unconstitutionality beyond a reasonable doubt. Id.;People v. Dash, 104 P.3d 286, 290 (Colo.App.2004).

¶ 12 Equal protection of the laws is guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution and article II, section 25 of the Colorado Constitution. People v. Oliver, 745 P.2d 222, 227 (Colo.1987). Equal protection guarantees that similarly situated persons receive similar treatment. People v. Mozee, 723 P.2d 117, 126 (Colo.1986). Because equal protection requires equal treatment, “the threshold question in an equal protection challenge is whether the person alleging disparate treatment is in fact similarly situated.” People v. Friesen, 45 P.3d 784, 785 (Colo.App.2001). Accordingly, “equal protection is offended ... when two statutes forbid identical conduct.” People v. Stewart, 55 P.3d 107, 114 (Colo.2002) (emphasis in original). However, if, as a result of a particular statutory scheme, an offender who acts with less culpable intent and causes a less grievous result is afforded a greater penalty, then the statute involved may nonetheless violate equal protection. This is so despite the fact that persons charged under different offenses may not be “similarly situated.” People v. Suazo, 867 P.2d 161, 164 (Colo.App.1993); see also Smith v. People, 852 P.2d 420, 421–22 (Colo.1993); People v. Harper, 111 P.3d 482, 484 (Colo.App.2004) ([A] statute may be constitutionally infirm if it imposes a harsher penalty on less serious conduct.”).

¶ 13 On appeal, the parties do not dispute, and we agree, that a rational basis standard of review applies here because no fundamental right is at stake, and the habitual offender act does not create a suspect or quasi-suspect class. See Greenholtz v. Inmates of Nebraska Penal & Corr. Complex, 442 U.S. 1, 7, 99 S.Ct. 2100, 60 L.Ed.2d 668 (1979) (“There is no constitutional or inherent right of a convicted person to be conditionally released before the expiration of a valid sentence.”); Andretti v. Johnson, 779 P.2d 382, 384 (Colo.1989) (holding that Colorado's parole eligibility statutes “do not create an expectation of release before the expiration of a valid sentence so as to entitle prisoners to constitutional protections”). Under rational basis review, the challenging party must demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt that the classification bears no rational relationship to a legitimate legislative interest or government objective, or that the classification is unreasonable, arbitrary, or capricious. People v. Blankenship, 119 P.3d 552, 555 (Colo.App.2005).

B. Analysis

¶ 14 Defendant was charged with first degree murder and six habitual criminal counts. Following his conviction for second degree murder and before the sentencing phase of his trial, defendant filed a motion arguing, among other things, that he could not be constitutionally sentenced as a habitual offender under section 18–1.3–801 because that statute, as applied to him, violated his right to equal protection of the laws. At the sentencing hearing, the trial court rejected defendant's equal protection argument, found he had committed five of the six charged habitual offender counts, and sentenced him accordingly under section 18–1.3–801(2) to four times the presumptive maximum sentence for second degree murder, or ninety-six years.

1. Defendant's Contention

¶ 15 On appeal, defendant's equal protection argument, which is the same argument that he made in the trial court, can be summarized as follows.

¶ 16 Under section 18–1.3–801(1), a defendant convicted of a class 1 or class 2 felony, or a class 3 felony that is a crime of violence, shall be sentenced to “life imprisonment” if he or she has previously sustained two such convictions. “No person sentenced pursuant to [section 18–1.3–801(1) ] shall be eligible for parole until such person has served at least forty calendar years.” § 18–1.3–801(1)(c). A defendant eligible for sentencing under section 18–1.3–801(1) cannot be sentenced pursuant to another subsection of the habitual offender act. § 18–1.3–801(4).

¶ 17 Under section 18–1.3–801(2), the subsection under which defendant was sentenced here, a defendant convicted of any felony shall be sentenced to four times the maximum of the presumptive range for such felony if he or she has previously sustained three convictions for any felony. Under Colorado's parole eligibility statute, a defendant who, as here, is convicted of second degree murder “shall be eligible for parole after such person has served seventy-five percent of the sentence imposed upon such person.” § 17–22.5–403(2.5)(a).

¶ 18 Defendant was convicted of second degree murder, a class 2 felony, which carries a presumptive maximum sentence of twenty-four years. See§ 18–1.3–401(1)(a)(V)(A). Because none of defendant's previous felony convictions were for class 1 or class 2 felonies,...

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4 cases
  • People v. Davis
    • United States
    • Colorado Court of Appeals
    • August 9, 2018
    ...or deny parole are wholly within the board’s discretion and not subject to judicial review. See People v. Dean , 2012 COA 106, ¶ 34, 292 P.3d 1066, 1074, aff’d , 2016 CO 14, 366 P.3d 593. However, an inmate can seek judicial review of a parole board decision on the basis of the board’s fail......
  • Dean v. People
    • United States
    • Colorado Supreme Court
    • February 29, 2016
    ...of appeals rejected Dean's as-applied equal protection challenge and affirmed his sentence. People v. Dean, 2012 COA 106, ¶¶ 30–32, 292 P.3d 1066, 1073.¶ 3 We granted Dean's petition for a writ of certiorari1 and now affirm the court of appeals. We hold that the sentencing and parole eligib......
  • People v. Lovato
    • United States
    • Colorado Court of Appeals
    • September 11, 2014
    ...suspect class or a fundamental right, as here, we apply a rational basis standard of review. See People v. Dean, 2012 COA 106, ¶ 13, 292 P.3d 1066 (cert. granted Nov. 12, 2013). “Under rational basis review, the challenging party must demonstrate beyond a reasonable doubt that the classific......
  • Moore v. Exec. Dir. of Colo. Dep't of Corr., Court of Appeals No. 17CA1635
    • United States
    • Colorado Court of Appeals
    • July 12, 2018
    ...to grant or deny parole are wholly within the board’s discretion and not subject to review. See People v. Dean , 2012 COA 106, ¶ 34, 292 P.3d 1066, aff'd , 2016 CO 14, 366 P.3d 593 ; see also Fraser , 931 P.2d at 564. ¶ 18 In this case, Moore has not alleged that the parole board failed to ......

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