State v. Caudle
| Citation | 388 S.W.3d 273 |
| Decision Date | 27 November 2012 |
| Docket Number | No. M2010–01172–SC–R11–CD.,M2010–01172–SC–R11–CD. |
| Parties | STATE of Tennessee v. Christine CAUDLE. |
| Court | Supreme Court of Tennessee |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Vanessa P. Bryan, District Public Defender, and James L. Elkins, III, Assistant Public Defender, for the appellant, Christine Caudle.
Robert E. Cooper, Jr., Attorney General and Reporter; William E. Young, Solicitor General; Benjamin A. Ball, Assistant Attorney General; Kim Helper, District Attorney General; and Mary Katherine White, Assistant District Attorney General, for the appellee, State of Tennessee.
The defendant pled guilty to reckless endangerment with a deadly weapon and theft of merchandise over five hundred dollars. The trial court sentenced the defendant as a Range II, multiple offender to three years on each count, to be served concurrently. On appeal, the defendant argued that the trial court erred by failing to apply certain mitigating factors and by failing to grant probation or an alternative sentence. The Court of Criminal Appeals, after declining to review the sentences because the defendant had failed to provide a transcript of the hearing on the guilty pleas, affirmed the judgment of the trial court based upon a presumption that the evidence was sufficient to support the sentences. After granting the defendant's application for permission to appeal because of conflicting opinions by the Court of Criminal Appeals as to whether the absence of a transcript of a guilty plea submission hearing precludes appellate review on the merits, we ordered that the record be supplemented. In this instance, the record was adequate for a meaningful review of the sentences either with or without the transcript of the hearing on the guilty pleas. By use of the recently adopted abuse of discretion standard for the review of sentences, we affirm the judgment of the trial court.
On February 8, 2010, Christine Caudle (the “Defendant”) entered pleas of guilt to reckless endangerment with a deadly weapon, seeTenn.Code Ann. § 39–13–103 (2010), and theft of merchandise over five hundred dollars, see id. § 39–14–146, both of which are Class E felonies. At the plea submission hearing, the Defendant acknowledged that she understood her rights as recited by the trial court and that her pleas of guilt were knowingly and voluntarily made. The trial court informed the Defendant of the requisite elements on each count and addressed each of the documents that the Defendant had signed in accordance with her pleas, including a stipulation as to the factual basis of her plea agreement.1 The Defendant stipulated that she qualified as a Range II, multiple offender and that the sentences for each crime would be served concurrently. After informing the Defendant that she faced a potential sentence of between two and four years and a potential fine of up to three thousand dollars on each count, the trial court approved the pleas of guilt.
At the sentencing hearing several weeks later, the facts were fully developed. TracyMavity, a loss prevention employee at JCPenney, testified that on December 17, 2008, she observed the Defendant and another woman concealing store merchandise. When she confronted the two women as they left the store, the Defendant attacked her, pulling her hair and dragging her towards a vehicle parked near the entrance, where a male driver was waiting for the Defendant and her female accomplice. Mavity testified that the Defendant pulled her by her hair partially into the vehicle, and, while the lower half of Mavity's body was still outside, the Defendant directed the driver to “gun it.” Mavity, who was dragged “[s]omewhere around 500 feet” before being thrown out of the vehicle, broke her right arm, right knee, and little finger, and suffered injuries to her left shoulder. While acknowledging that she was terminated by JCPenney on grounds of insubordination one year after the incident, Mavity claimed that she actually was discharged because she continued to be treated for emotional distress related to the attack.
Samuel L. Anderson, the Defendant's pastor, testified that even though the Defendant had been in some trouble during her teenage years, he had “seen a tremendous change” during the year he had come to know her, and she was a “complete[ly] different person.” He pointed out that the Defendant had brought her children and other young people into his church, and he expressed the belief that she was a good candidate for probation. On cross-examination by the State, Pastor Anderson acknowledged that he did not know the Defendant had prior criminal convictions and had previously used illegal drugs, although he had heard “rumor[s] around ... the community” to that effect.
Yolanda Foster, a long-time friend of the Defendant, also testified on her behalf. According to Foster, the Defendant had “changed dramatically” since the JCPenney incident because “she stopped drinking [and] she started going to church on a regular basis.” Foster testified that the Defendant was working and attending school full-time, and that she had “become a different person, like, completely all around ... in this past year.” Foster further testified that the Defendant had “removed all the negative people out of her life” and that she lived “strictly for her kids and God now.” On cross-examination, Foster speculated that the other female shoplifter may have attacked the victim because the Defendant had “never been like the leader type of a group.”
Kimberly Williams, whose brother had fathered three of the Defendant's five children, testified that she attended Brown Mackie College with the Defendant and worked and went to church with her. She also expressed the belief that the Defendant should be granted probation. On cross-examination, however, she acknowledged that the Defendant “ha[d] been given opportunity after opportunity” on her prior offenses and had “been given probation over, and over, and over again.”
The Defendant, who was twenty-six years old and had five children, admitted to several prior convictions, one of which resulted in a nine-month jail sentence. She acknowledged that she had “jumped bail,” failed drug tests, and committed additional offenses while on probation. She blamed her prior criminal history on bad choices she had made by “hanging around the wrong crowd [and] doing things that [she] thought would make [her] look better and cooler.” According to the Defendant, she had separated herself from those negative influences, stopped using drugs, and enrolled in college in pursuit of a degree in the medical field. She stated that she planned to obtain additional training to become a counselor for young girls who had experiences similar to her own. The Defendant, who was on probation at the time of her offenses at JCPenney, admitted that she had entered the store with the intention of stealing merchandise, but claimed she did not leave with any stolen items. She denied that she had pulled the victim's hair and dragged her into the getaway car, claiming that her accomplice, Janetta Hill, had done so. Although the Defendant claimed to have given the name of her female accomplice at the time of her arrest, she could not explain why the police did not list either of her accomplices in the indictment. While admitting that she had violated the conditions of her probation for several of her prior crimes, she promised to comply with the trial court's directives if granted probation for the JCPenney crimes.
At the conclusion of proof at the sentencing hearing, the trial court found that the Defendant's testimony lacked credibility and considered four statutory enhancement factors: (1) “The defendant has a previous history of criminal convictions or criminal behavior, in addition to those necessary to establish the appropriate range,” Tenn.Code Ann. § 40–35–114(1); (2) “The personal injuries inflicted upon, or the amount of damage to property sustained by or taken from, the victim was particularly great,” id. § 40–35–114(6); (3) “The defendant, before trial or sentencing, failed to comply with the conditions of a sentence involving release into the community,” id. § 40–35–114(8); and (4) “At the time the felony was committed, ... the defendant [ was] ... [r]eleased on probation,” id. § 40–35–114(13)(C). The trial court also applied one mitigating factor, finding that the Defendant appeared to be turning her life in the right direction by attending school and maintaining employment. See id. § 40–35–113(13). After considering these factors, the Defendant's pre-sentence report, the testimony from the sentencing hearing, the nature and characteristics of the Defendant's conduct, and the statutory purposes and principles of sentencing, the trial court imposed concurrent sentences of three years for each conviction. Although the trial court initially considered the Defendant to be a favorable candidate for alternative sentencing, see id.§ 40–35–102(6)(A), after reviewing the Defendant's extensive criminal record, the relative leniency she had received in prior cases, and her “outrageous conduct” during the JCPenney crimes, the court denied probation and ordered that the sentences be served in confinement. The trial court further ruled that confinement was necessary to avoid depreciating the seriousness of the offenses. See id. § 40–35–103(1)(B).
On appeal, the Defendant contended that the trial court had erred by failing to properly consider other applicable mitigating factors and by failing to grant probation or an alternative sentence. Because the Defendant had failed to include in the appellate record a transcript of the hearing on her guilty pleas, the Court of Criminal Appeals determined that it could not conduct a full de novo review of the...
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