People v. Washpun

• Decision Date: 28 April 1989
• Docket Number: Docket No. 100869
• Citation: 438 N.W.2d 305,175 Mich.App. 420
• Parties: PEOPLE of the State of Michigan, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Larry WASHPUN, Defendant-Appellant. 175 Mich.App. 420, 438 N.W.2d 305
• Court: Court of Appeal of Michigan — District of US

Page 305

438 N.W.2d 305

PEOPLE of the State of Michigan, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Larry WASHPUN, Defendant-Appellant.

Docket No. 100869.

175 Mich.App. 420, 438 N.W.2d 305

Court of Appeals of Michigan.

Submitted Sept. 8, 1988.

Decided March 6, 1989.

Released for Publication April 28, 1989.

[175 MICHAPP 421] Frank J. Kelley, Atty. Gen., Louis J. Caruso, Sol. Gen., James J. Gregart, Pros. Atty., and Michael H. Dzialowski, Asst. Pros. Atty., for the people.

Allen J. Lewis, Gobles, for defendant-appellant on appeal.

Before MacKENZIE, P.J., and WEAVER and McDONALD, JJ.

WEAVER, Judge.

This Court, on its own motion, granted rehearing in this matter.

Following a plea agreement, defendant pled guilty to breaking and entering an occupied dwelling with the intent to commit larceny, M.C.L. Sec. 750.110; M.S.A. Sec. 28.305, and larceny in a building, M.C.L. Sec. 750.360; M.S.A. Sec. 28.592, and was sentenced to five to fifteen and two to four years imprisonment respectively. Defendant appeals from his convictions and sentences as of right. We affirm.

On appeal defendant contends the sentencing court erred in ordering that restitution to the victim's insurance company be paid within one year of defendant's release from prison.

Defendant first argues that it was improper to impose restitution to be paid following defendant's [175 MICHAPP 422] release from prison, claiming the court will lack jurisdiction over defendant once the prison sentence is completed. We disagree. Section 16(12)(b) of the Crime Victim's Rights Act, M.C.L. Sec. 780.751 et seq.; M.S.A. Sec. 28.1287(751) et seq., specifically authorizes the imposition of restitution to be paid within two years after the end of imprisonment or discharge from parole. M.C.L. Sec. 780.766(12); M.S.A. Sec. 28.1287(766)(12) provides:

"(12) If not otherwise provided by the court under this subsection, restitution shall be made immediately. However, the court may require that the defendant make restitution under this section within a specified period or in specified installments. The end of the period or the last installment shall not be later than the following:

"(a) The end of the period of probation, if probation is ordered.

"(b) Two years after the end of imprisonment or discharge from parole, whichever occurs later, if the court does not order probation.

"(c) Three years after the date of sentencing in any other case."

We note that payment of restitution in this time sequence is also a statutory condition of parole pursuant to Sec. 16(13):

"(13) If the defendant is placed on probation or paroled, any restitution ordered under this section shall be a condition of that probation or parole. The court may revoke probation and the parole board may revoke parole if the defendant fails to comply with the order and if the defendant has not made a good faith effort to comply with the order. In determining whether to revoke probation or parole the court or parole board shall consider the defendant's employment status, earning ability, financial resources, and the willfulness of the defendant's failure to pay, and any other special [175 MICHAPP 423] circumstances that may have a bearing on the defendant's ability to pay."

Defendant next claims the order of restitution is improper as it awards restitution not to the victim, but to the victim's insurance company. We disagree.

Section 16(10) of the Crime Victim's Rights Act provides:

"(10) The court shall not order restitution with respect to a loss for which the victim or victim's estate has received or is to receive compensation, including insurance, except that the court may, in the interest of justice, order restitution to the crime victims compensation board or to any person who has compensated the victim or victim's estate for such a loss to the extent that the crime victims compensation board or the person paid the compensation. An order of restitution shall require that all restitution to a victim or victim's estate under the order be made before any restitution to any other person under that order is made."

The Legislature has here used the generic term "person" in designating the class which may be availed of the benefits of restitution, and thereby avoid the necessity of instituting separate litigation to the same end, while taking the profit, if any, out of crime.

As used in Sec. 16(10), "person" includes insurance companies as well as individuals. The Legislature has provided two apposite standing constructions to guide our interpretation of this provision:

"The word 'person' may extend and be applied to bodies politic and corporate, as well as to individuals." M.C.L. Sec. 8.3l; M.S.A. Sec. 2.212(12).

This statutory definition has been regularly applied[175 MICHAPP 424] by the judiciary. Grand Rapids v. Harper, 32 Mich.App. 324, 188 N.W.2d 668 (1971); Chicago & N.W. R. Co. v. Ellson, 113 Mich. 30, 71 N.W. 324 (1897); Bush v. Sprague, 51 Mich. 41, 16 N.W. 222 (1883). In this respect, criminal statutes are no different. People v. Ferguson, 119 Mich. 373, 78 N.W. 334 (1899).

The quoted statute is mandatory in its application, "unless such construction would be inconsistent with the manifest intent of the legislature." M.C.L. Sec. 8.3; M.S.A. Sec. 2.212. The Legislature has the prerogative of defining the sense in which words are employed in statutes. Erlandson v. Genesee Co. Employees' Retirement Comm., 337 Mich. 195, 59 N.W.2d 389 (1953); People v. Harrison, 194 Mich. 363, 160 N.W. 623 (1916).

The word "person" has also been given legislative definition in M.C.L. Sec. 761.1(a); M.S.A. Sec. 28.843(a), for purposes of the Code of Criminal Procedure, of which M.C.L. Sec. 780.766(10); M.S.A. Sec. 28.1287(766)(10) is a part:

"(a) 'Person' ... and similar words include unless a contrary intention appears, public and private corporations, partnerships, and unincorporated or voluntary associations."

The Legislature needed to define "victim" to include, inter alia, corporations in M.C.L. Sec. 780.766(1); M.S.A. Sec. 28.1287(766)(1) ¹, because it had not elsewhere supplied an applicable definition of the term. Having long since, however, defined "person," both in [175 MICHAPP 425] the general statutes and in the Code of Criminal Procedure, as including inter alia corporations, it had no need to further color that term in subsection (10) unless it wanted to change the extant connotation. The Legislature, which is deemed to be aware of the rules of statutory construction, Warner v. Collavino Bros., 133 Mich.App. 230, 347 N.W.2d 787 (1984); Hasty v. Broughton, 133 Mich.App. 107, 348 N.W.2d 299 (1984), thus assumed the Courts would utilize the definitions it had supplied, since legislatively mandated definitions supersede all other definitions, including judicial and lexicographic. Degrandchamp v. Michigan Mutual Ins. Co., 99 Mich.App. 664, 299 N.W.2d 18 (1980). When the Legislature has provided a definition, it is binding and the courts cannot "look afield" for their meaning elsewhere. W.S. Butterfield Theatres, Inc. v. Dep't of Revenue, 353 Mich. 345, 91 N.W.2d 269 (1958); Bennett v. Pitts, 31 Mich.App. 530, 188 N.W.2d 81 (1971).

Two purposes behind the Legislature's inclusion of Sec. 16(10) may be fairly readily discerned. One apparent legislative intent behind subsection (10) is to avoid ordering restitution which would doubly compensate a victim. The abhorrence of double compensation is well established in our jurisprudence. The Legislature wanted to place the financial burden of crime on the criminal, while fully, but not overly, compensating the victim and reimbursing any third party, such as an insurer, who compensated the victim on an interim basis. See Epps v. Mercy Hospital, 69 Mich.App. 1, 5, 244 N.W.2d 340 (1976):

"The thrust of this decision, and the 1963 amendment to the statute was the prevention of a windfall to an injured workman of money which has not been expended for his own medical expenses. [175 MICHAPP 426] This does not mean, however, that the employer should be able to enjoy a windfall simply because someone else has paid the injured workman's medical expenses, or provided him with medical services."

Substitute "victim" for "workman" and "criminal" for "employer" in the quoted material, and its application here becomes manifest. Accord: Ford Motor Co. v. Jackson (On Rehearing), 399 Mich. 213, 222, 249 N.W.2d 29 (1976) ("It is highly unlikely that in this context the Legislature intended a 'windfall,' as it has been aptly designated.").

The second principal effect of subsection (10) would seem to be to prevent application of the "collateral source doctrine" to crime victims' restitution situations. Without such a statutory directive, the victim could recoup damages from the criminal without regard to previous payment from insurance companies or other ancillary sources. Squires v. Kalamazoo Co. Road Comm'rs, 378 Mich. 613, 147 N.W.2d 65 (1967); Perrott v. Shearer, 17 Mich. 48 (1868). By enacting subsection (10), the Legislature limits restitution to those who have losses which are, as of the time restitution is paid, still out of pocket.

Neither postulated intent is "manifestly inconsistent" with embracing insurance companies within the class of juridical entities which may benefit from restitution pursuant to the Crime Victim's Rights Act. Victims of crimes are thus spared the expense, trouble, risk, and delay inherent in pursuing separate civil litigation over readily liquidatable damages from criminal acts, ² while [175 MICHAPP 427] the judicial system, and the taxpayers who fund its operation, having once determined responsibility, after according the full panoply of due process rights to the perpetrator, see Shadbolt v. Dep't of Corrections, 386 Mich. 232, 236, 191 N.W.2d 344 (1971), are spared the need to replicate those efforts on the civil side. Accordingly, we are bound by the...