Woodson v. Hobbs

• Decision Date: 23 July 2015
• Docket Number: No. CV–14–1102,CV–14–1102
• Parties: Paul Woodson, Appellant v. Ray Hobbs, Director, Arkansas Department of Correction, Appellee
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

2015 Ark. 304
467 S.W.3d 147

Paul Woodson, Appellant
v.
Ray Hobbs, Director, Arkansas Department of Correction, Appellee

No. CV–14–1102

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

Opinion Delivered July 23, 2015

Paul Woodson, Jr., pro se appellant.

Leslie Rutledge, Att'y Gen., by: Christian Harris, Ass't Att'y Gen., for appellee.

Opinion

PER CURIAM

Appellant Paul Woodson filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus in the circuit court of the county in which he was incarcerated, and the circuit court dismissed the petition.¹ Woodson appeals the circuit court's order dismissing the petition. We affirm.

In his petition for the writ, Woodson alleged that he had been convicted of two counts of first-degree sexual assault on a guilty plea and sentenced to concurrent terms of 240 months' imprisonment in the Arkansas Department of Correction (“ADC”) with an aggregate sentence of forty years' imprisonment. As grounds for issuance of the writ, Woodson asserted in the petition that the statute requiring him to serve 100 percent of his sentence was unconstitutional because there was no in-court determination that he was a violent second offender, that the ADC had incorrectly determined that he was a violent second offender, that he would not have entered his plea if he had been advised that he would have to serve 100 percent of his sentence, and that the judge at his plea hearing had failed to follow the required procedure because he was not advised that he would be required to serve 100 percent of his sentence. Woodson also alleged that trial counsel had assured him that he would only have to serve one quarter of his sentence before he was eligible for parole; that the sentence was not supported by sufficient evidence; that the State had violated the plea agreement; and that his plea was not knowingly, voluntarily or intelligently made because he relied on representations made before and at the plea hearing that he would not have to serve more than ten years of the forty-year sentence.

The circuit court dismissed the petition, noting that Woodson had failed to attach a copy of the contested judgment to the habeas petition. The court, however, dismissed with prejudice after it found that curing the defect would be futile because the claims in the petition were without merit. The circuit court concluded that the allegations in the petition did not establish probable cause that Woodson was being held illegally, that the trial court lacked...