People v. Lyons
| Citation | 585 P.2d 916,196 Colo. 384 |
| Decision Date | 23 October 1978 |
| Docket Number | No. 28091,28091 |
| Parties | The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Joseph Carl LYONS a/k/a Jack Lyons, Defendant-Appellant. |
| Court | Supreme Court of Colorado |
J. D. MacFarlane, Atty. Gen., David W. Robbins, Deputy Atty. Gen., Edward G. Donovan, Sol. Gen., J. Stephen Phillips, Asst. Atty. Gen., Denver, for plaintiff-appellee.
Gregory Walta, Colorado State Public Defender, Craig L. Truman, Chief Deputy State Public Defender, Carol L. Gerstl, Deputy State Public Defender, Denver, for defendant-appellant.
On September 2, 1976, appellee filed Pro se a Crim.P. 35(b)(2) motion in the District Court of El Paso County to set aside and vacate a judgment sentencing him from one day to life under the Colorado Sex Offenders Act (section 16-13-201, Et seq., C.R.S.1973, formerly C.R.S.1963, 39-13-201, Et seq., Colo.Sess.Laws 1972 at 255). The court denied his motion to set aside and vacate the sentence. We affirm.
In November, 1971, appellee was charged with committing an assault on a child under sixteen, and with committing the crime against nature. After his entry of a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity to the first charge and a plea of guilty to the second charge, the district attorney dismissed the first charge. The defendant, pursuant to now section 16-13-205, moved the court to commence proceedings under the Sex Offenders Act. On May 19, 1972, the court sentenced the appellee under the Act. His sentence was upheld by this court in People v. Lyons, 185 Colo. 112, 521 P.2d 1265 (1974).
When appellee made the 35(b) motion, the court, without a hearing, found he had been extended all the procedural safeguards to which he was entitled at the time of his plea and was not entitled to a jury determination of sentence. Appellee does not challenge these findings on appeal, but urges that counsel should have been appointed to argue his claims before the trial court and that he should have been afforded an evidentiary hearing. These constitute the only issues on this appeal.
In December 1975, appellee filed a similar Crim.P. 35(b) motion. An identical copy of that motion was filed on April 28, 1976. At that time, counsel was appointed, a hearing was held, and the motion was "stricken." There appears to be no justification for repetitive motions. Consequently, the trial court did not err in not appointing counsel. In People v. Hubbard, 184 Colo. 243, 519 P.2d 945 (1974), involving a similar factual setting, this court considered the Sixth Amendment right to counsel in postconviction proceedings and stated:
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Coleman v. State, 81-115
...petition were too vague and illusory to warrant evidentiary hearing); Widermyre v. State (Alaska 1969), 452 P.2d 885; People v. Lyons (1978), 196 Colo. 384, 585 P.2d 916; Cook v. State (1976), 220 Kan. 223, 552 P.2d The decision to admit or deny an application for post-conviction relief is ......
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People v. Nix
...after the passage of 120 days from the date of the original sentence, to reduce the sentence to three years. People v. Lyons, Colo.App., 585 P.2d 916 (1980); People v. Johnson, supra. Therefore, the sentence reduction was In December 1978, the "resentencing" to indeterminate to ten years in......