Sanders v. State, CACR12-597

• Decision Date: 12 December 2012
• Docket Number: No. CACR12-597,CACR12-597
• Citation: 2012 Ark. App. 697
• Parties: LINDA GAIL SANDERS APPELLANT v. STATE OF ARKANSAS APPELLEE
• Court: Arkansas Court of Appeals

2012 Ark. App. 697

LINDA GAIL SANDERS APPELLANT v. STATE OF ARKANSAS APPELLEE

No. CACR12-597

ARKANSAS COURT OF APPEALS DIVISION II

OPINION DELIVERED DECEMBER 12, 2012

APPEAL FROM THE LONOKE

COUNTY CIRCUIT COURT,

[NO. CR09-306]

HONORABLE BARBARA ELMORE,

JUDGE

AFFIRMED

ROBERT J. GLADWIN, Judge

Linda Gail Sanders appeals from the May 24, 2012 revocation of her probation in Lonoke County Circuit Court. The trial court found that Sanders failed to pay her fine and costs, and she contends that the trial court erred. We affirm the revocation.

On December 7, 2009, Sanders pled guilty to theft of property and criminal trespass. The trial court placed her on sixty months' supervised probation conditioned on, among other things, her paying $2420 in monthly installments of forty-six dollars to the Lonoke County Sheriff's Office, with a first payment of $150 due by January 7, 2010.

On August 31, 2011, the State filed a petition to revoke Sanders's probation, asserting that she had failed to report to her probation officer as directed; tested positive for opiates on three occasions; left inpatient treatment without permission from the trial court; and failed to provide proof of paying her fine and court costs. At the hearing on May 7, 2012, Kevin Trigg, a probation officer for the Department of Community Correction in Lonoke, testified that Sanders had not made any payments toward her fine or costs. Trigg acknowledged that Sanders was incarcerated from February 2011 to December 2011. He further stated that Sanders had made no payments since being released from prison.

The defense moved to dismiss the petition, arguing that the State failed to prove that Sanders is able to work, that she is working, or that she willfully disobeyed her requirements of paying the fine and costs. This motion was denied. The defense then introduced a letter from the Arkansas Department of Correction establishing the parameters of Sanders's incarceration. However, the trial court noted that no payments had been made since Sanders's release in December 2011.

At the sentencing hearing on May 11, 2012, the trial court found that Sanders had willfully failed to pay her fine and costs and sentenced her to three years' imprisonment, with one year suspended and credit for time served. This appeal timely followed. In a revocation hearing, the State is obligated to prove by a preponderance of the evidence a violation of a term or condition of the defendant's probation. Scroggins v. State, 2012 Ark. App. 87, ___ S.W.3d ___. Where the alleged violation involves the failure to pay ordered amounts, after the State has introduced evidence of nonpayment, the burden shifts to the probationer to provide a reasonable excuse for the failure to pay. Id. It is the probationer's obligation to justify his failure to pay, and this shifting of the burden of production provides an opportunity to explain the reasons for nonpayment. Id. The Stateneed only prove one violation in order to support revocation. Cheshire v. State, 80 Ark. App. 327, 95 S.W.3d 820 (2003).

Sanders claims that the trial court erred in revoking her probation for failure to report and pay fines and court costs. We note that this argument fails to acknowledge the trial court's ruling that Sanders violated probation based on her failure to pay and not on her failure to report. Thus, Sanders's arguments regarding grounds other than failure to pay are not...