People v. Wilder
| Citation | 412 P.3d 686 |
| Decision Date | 26 February 2015 |
| Docket Number | Court of Appeals No. 12CA0066 |
| Parties | The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff–Appellee, v. Terrance WILDER, Defendant–Appellant. |
| Court | Court of Appeals of Colorado |
Cynthia H. Coffman, Attorney General, Elizabeth Rohrbough, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Denver, Colorado, for Plaintiff–Appellee.
Law Offices of Brad Junge, Brad Junge, Grand Junction, Colorado, for Defendant–Appellant.
Opinion by JUDGE RICHMAN
¶ 1 Defendant, Terrance Wilder, stands convicted of first degree murder after deliberation (Count 1), second degree murder (Count 2), attempted first degree murder (Count 3), and conspiracy to commit first degree murder (Count 4). He appeals the trial court's order denying his motions for postconviction relief seeking resentencing on all convictions. We conclude that defendant's sentence on Count 1 must be vacated, and the case remanded for resentencing on that count consistent with the decision in Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460, 132 S.Ct. 2455, 183 L.Ed.2d 407 (2012). We do not reach his claim for resentencing on the other counts.
¶ 2 In 1998, at the age of seventeen, defendant conspired to murder his codefendant's husband and landlord. Defendant and his codefendant invited the two men to the house they were renting from the landlord. The husband did not arrive, but the landlord arrived with a friend. After an argument, the codefendant shot both the landlord and his friend several times. Defendant and his codefendant then left the house. The landlord's friend died from the gunshot wounds
. The landlord, however, did not die immediately. The landlord crawled into the house, where he was discovered by another person who notified defendant that the landlord was still alive. Defendant returned to the house and killed the landlord by repeatedly bludgeoning his head with a baseball bat.
¶ 3 Defendant was convicted by a jury of first degree murder as to the landlord (a class 1 felony), second degree murder as to the landlord's friend (a class 2 felony), attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder as to the husband (both class 2 felonies), and being an accessory to a class 1 or class 2 felony. In special interrogatories, a jury also found the presence of two sentencing aggravators: that defendant or his codefendant (1) possessed, used, or threatened use of a deadly weapon; and (2) caused the death or serious bodily injury of a person.
¶ 4 The trial court sentenced defendant to life without the possibility of parole on the class 1 felony, according to the mandatory sentencing statute in place at the time. In imposing the sentence, the judge emphasized the mandatory nature of the sentence, stating that the "charge of murder in the first degree requires that the Court impose a sentence that is required by law of life in prison without possibility of parole." It sentenced defendant to serve forty-eight-year terms for the three class 2 felonies, consecutive to the life sentence and to one another.1 Defendant was sentenced to serve twelve years for the accessory count, concurrent to the other sentences.
¶ 5 Following a direct appeal, a division of this court reversed defendant's accessory conviction and affirmed his remaining convictions. People v. Wilder, (Colo. App. No. 99CA1479, Aug. 16, 2001) (not published pursuant to C.A.R. 35(f) ) (Wilder I ).
¶ 6 Defendant then filed a pro se Crim. P. 35(c) motion, alleging that his convictions were unconstitutional because the trial court did not properly advise him of the right to testify, and that his trial counsel was ineffective for not objecting to the trial court's inadequate advisement. The postconviction court denied the motion in a summary order, and a division of this court affirmed the order on appeal. People v. Wilder, 2008 WL 2536265 (Colo. App. No. 05CA2064, June 26, 2008) (not published pursuant to C.A.R. 35(f) ) ( Wilder II ).
¶ 7 In 2011, defendant filed a second pro se Crim. P. 35(c) motion in which he asserted that his sentence to life without parole for the class 1 felony was unconstitutional under the Eighth Amendment and disproportionate given his juvenile status at the time he committed the crime. Defendant cited both case law and psychological literature indicating that juveniles are different from adults, and asserted that this difference must be considered when sentencing juvenile offenders. Defendant was appointed postconviction counsel, who supplemented defendant's motion with a Crim. P. 35(b) motion in which he argued for a reduction of sentence based on good behavior while incarcerated and stated that defendant was willing to comply with any conditions imposed by the court.
¶ 8 The postconviction court denied both motions without a hearing. In its written order, the postconviction court noted that the United States Supreme Court was then considering this issue, and invited defendant to file a second motion within ninety days of the announcement of any decision by the Supreme Court if it decided the issue differently. Defendant did not file any further motions. This appeal followed.
¶ 9 On appeal, defendant asserts that (1) his mandatory sentence to life without the possibility of parole for the first degree murder conviction is unconstitutional and (2) the aggregate of his remaining convictions results in an unconstitutional de facto sentence to life without parole. We agree that defendant's mandatory sentence to life without parole is unconstitutional and must be vacated, but decline to reach his second contention.
¶ 10 "The summary denial of a Crim. P. 35(c) motion for postconviction relief without a hearing presents a question of law we review de novo." People v. Rainer, 2013 COA 51, ¶ 15, 412 P.3d 520 (cert. granted Dec. 22, 2014). We also review de novo "the constitutionality of a trial court's sentencing determination." People v. Gutierrez–Ruiz, 2014 COA 109, ¶ 19, 383 P.3d 44.
¶ 11 A court's review of a Crim. P. 35(b) motion focuses on the fairness of the sentence in light of the purposes of the sentencing laws. A decision to reduce a sentence based on a Crim. P. 35(b) motion generally remains within the sound discretion of the trial court. People v. Dunlap, 36 P.3d 778, 780 (Colo. 2001).
¶ 12 The People concede that the Supreme Court's decision in Miller applies retroactively to defendant's sentence and that defendant properly preserved for appellate review his challenge to the mandatory life without parole sentence. For purposes of this case, the majority accepts the People's concession as to the retroactive application of Miller .
¶ 13 Miller, 567 U.S. at 469, 132 S.Ct. at 2463 (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). In the spirit of this proportionality requirement, the Supreme Court has decided a series of cases based on the idea that "children are constitutionally different from adults for purposes of [criminal] sentencing." Id. at 471, 132 S.Ct. at 2464.
¶ 14 First, in Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. 551, 578, 125 S.Ct. 1183, 161 L.Ed.2d 1 (2005), the Court held that the "Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments forbid imposition of the death penalty on offenders who were under the age of 18 when their crimes were committed."
¶ 15 Next, in Graham v. Florida, 560 U.S. 48, 74, 130 S.Ct. 2011, 176 L.Ed.2d 825 (2010), the Supreme Court held that "for a juvenile offender who did not commit homicide the Eighth Amendment forbids the sentence of life without parole." In establishing this categorical ban, the Court recognized that juvenile offenders are less culpable than their adult counterparts due to their lack of maturity, underdeveloped sense of responsibility, increased vulnerability and susceptibility to negative influences and peer pressure, and less well-formed personal characteristics. Id. at 68, 130 S.Ct. 2011 (citing Roper, 543 U.S. at 569, 125 S.Ct. 1183 ). The Court stated: "An offender's age is relevant to the Eighth Amendment, and criminal procedure laws that fail to take defendants' youthfulness into account at all would be flawed." Id. at 76, 130 S.Ct. 2011.
¶ 16 However, the Court in Graham also noted that "[j]uvenile offenders who committed both homicide and nonhomicide crimes present a different situation for a sentencing judge than juvenile offenders who committed no homicide." Id. at 63, 130 S.Ct. 2011. The Court explicitly limited its holding in Graham to juvenile offenders who committed solely nonhomicide offenses. Id.
¶ 17 In Miller, the Court expanded on its reasoning in Graham, citing the Court's history of adopting "categorical bans on sentencing practices based on mismatches between the culpability of a class of offenders and the severity of a penalty." 567 U.S. at 470, 132 S.Ct. at 2463. The Court stated that " Graham 's reasoning implicates any life-without-parole sentence imposed on a juvenile, even as its categorical bar relates only to nonhomicide offenses." Id. at 473, 132 S.Ct. at 2465. Employing an analysis similar to that in Graham, the Court held that the Eighth Amendment "forbids a sentencing scheme that mandates life in prison without possibility of parole for juvenile offenders," including those convicted of homicide crimes. Id. at 479, 132 S.Ct. at 2469 (emphasis added). The Court again recognized that juveniles are different from adults, and held that "[s]uch a [mandatory] scheme prevents those meting out punishment from considering a juvenile's ‘lessened culpability’ and greater ‘capacity for change.’ " Id. at 465, 132...
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