On Point: E. Sentence

State v. Lynne M. Shirikian, 2023 WI App 13; case activity (including briefs)

Shirikian pleaded to OWI as a fifth offense. Back in 2019, the legislature amended the statutes to create a both a presumptive and a mandatory minimum sentence for OWI 5th and OWI 6th. See 2019 Wis. Act 106; Wis. Stat. § 346.65(2)(am)5. The presumptive minimum requires at least 18 months of initial confinement, but the statute lets a court go lower if it finds doing so in the best interest of the community and not harmful to the public. The court of appeals now holds that even if a court decides to give less than 18 months IC, it’s still obligated to impose a bifurcated sentence. Since bifurcated sentences necessarily involve at least a year of IC, see Wis. Stat. § 973.01(2)(b), that year is the true mandatory minimum. Further, the court holds, a sentencing judge can’t avoid this minimum by imposing and staying a prison sentence and ordering of probation. Because the judge here did order probation, the court of appeals remands with directions that the lower court impose a legal sentence.

State v. Jack B. Gramza, 2020 WI App 81; case activity (including briefs)

If an inmate serving the initial confinement (IC) portion of a bifurcated sentence completes the Substance Abuse Program (SAP), § 302.05(3)(c)2. mandates that the sentencing court “shall” modify the inmate’s sentence by converting the remaining period of IC to extended supervision (ES) so that the inmate is released from confinement to ES. The court of appeals holds this mandate doesn’t apply to an inmate who is serving a mandatory minimum term of IC for an OWI offense if the inmate hasn’t yet served the mandatory minimum term.

State v. Jacqueline Robinson, 2014 WI 35, affirming an unpublished court of appeals decision; case activity

From the majority opinion, this looks like an open and shut case. When sentencing Robinson, the trial judge said he misunderstood the sentence she had received in another matter. One day later, he recalled the case and increased the sentence. No double jeopardy violation here, says the majority, Robinson could not yet have had a legitimate expectation of finality in her sentence. The 28-page concurrence and 20-page dissent suggest this case isn’t so simple.

Review of per curiam court of appeals decision; case activity

Issue (from the Petition for Review):

Were Robinson’s state and federal constitutional rights against double jeopardy violated when, after imposing a sentence and remanding her to start serving the sentence forthwith, the circuit court recalled the case the next day and increased her sentence, not based on an error of law or a misstatement of fact?

Consecutive sentences following partial plea withdrawal and reconviction

Click here for court of appeals decision, petition for review granted 10/27/10

Defense counsel: Donna L. Hintze, SPD, Madison Appellate

Issue/Holding: After sentencing on 3 separate counts, the trial court granted Lamar’s motion to withdraw his guilty pleas to 2 of the counts. He continued to serve the sentence on the unchallenged count. Upon subsequent reconviction on the 2 counts,

State v. Charles Lamar, 2009 WI App 133, PFR filed 9/10/09
For Lamar: Donna L. Hintze, SPD, Madison Appellate

Issue/Holding: No presumption of vindictiveness applied to resentencing by a different judge upon guilty pleas re-entered after the original trial court granted Lamar’s postconviction motion to withdraw the initial guilty pleas.

¶17      In Naydihor, our supreme court found that the Pearce presumption did not apply.

State v. Bart C. Gruetzmacher, 2004 WI 55, on certification
For Gruetzamacher: Jennelle London Joset

Issue/Holding:

¶14. We now decide whether circuit courts should be allowed to correct obvious errors in sentencing where it is clear that a good faith mistake was made in an initial sentencing pronouncement, where the court promptly recognizes the error, and where the court, by reducing an erroneous original sentence on one count and increasing the original sentence on another,

State v. Timothy J. Helm, 2002 WI App 154, PFR filed 6/11/02

Issue: Whether resentencing, to correct an illegal sentence, violated double jeopardy because it resulted in an increase in the original sentence.

Holding: On sentence after revocation, the trial court reimposed probation on one of the counts; this was an unauthorized disposition which the trial court properly corrected by subsequently resentencing to an active term of imprisonment on that count.  

State v. Ary L. Jones, 2002 WI App 208
For Jones: Arthur B. Nathan

Issue/Holding:

¶14. The rule we adopt in Wisconsin, therefore, is that when a defendant makes a fraudulent representation to the sentencing court and the court accepts and relies upon that representation in determining the length of the sentence, the defendant has no reasonable expectation of finality in the sentence. The court may later declare the sentence void and double jeopardy will not bar subsequent resentencing to place the defendant in the position he or she would have been in if the fraud or corruption had been exposed at the time of the original sentence.

State v. Guy R. Willett, 2000 WI App 212, 238 Wis.2d 621, 618 N.W.2d 881
For Willett: Susan E. Alesia, SPD, Madison Appellate

Issue: Whether the trial court had authority to change its sentences from concurrent to consecutive to a separately imposed sentence, four months later, after concluding that its sentencing was based on an erroneous understanding of the law.

Holding: Although the trial court clearly wanted its sentences to run consecutive to a separately imposed sentence,