[Cite as State v. Bright,
2025-Ohio-725.]
COURT OF APPEALS
STARK COUNTY, OHIO
FIFTH APPELLATE DISTRICT
STATE OF OHIO : JUDGES:
: Hon. Craig R. Baldwin, P.J.
Plaintiff-Appellee : Hon. Andrew J. King, J.
: Hon. David M. Gormley, J.
-vs- :
:
VANESSA ANNE BRIGHT : Case No. 2024CA00116
:
Defendant-Appellant : OPINION
CHARACTER OF PROCEEDING: Appeal from the Court of Common
Pleas of Stark County
2024 CR 0911
JUDGMENT: Affirmed
DATE OF JUDGMENT: March 3, 2025
APPEARANCES:
For Plaintiff-Appellee For Defendant-Appellant
Kyle L. Stone George Urban
Prosecuting Attorney 116 Cleveland Ave. NW,
Suite 808
By: Christopher A. Piekarski Canton, Ohio 44702
Assistant Prosecuting Attorney
110 Central Plaza South,
Suite 510
Canton, Ohio 44702-1413
Gormley, J.
{¶1} At her sentencing hearing on a felony charge of assault in Stark County,
Vanessa Bright was placed on community-control supervision and was ordered to abstain
from the use of illegal drugs and alcohol and to stay away from bars. She argues here
that those conditions are unconnected to the crime and that they therefore ought not be
part of her supervision requirements. Because Bright did not object to the sentence in
the trial court, however, our review is limited to a plain-error analysis, and we readily
conclude that the sentence clears that low bar. The judgment of the trial court is affirmed.
Facts and Procedural History
{¶2} On April 19, 2024, City of Alliance police officer Bob Rajean noticed a truck
parked on property belonging to Bright. With the help of a computer in his police cruiser,
Officer Rajean learned that the truck belonged to Bright and that a warrant for her arrest
had been issued.
{¶3} Officer Rajean then knocked on the door to Bright’s home. Bright opened her
door, and Officer Rajean attempted to place her under arrest. While she was being taken
into custody, Bright struck Officer Rajean, bit his arm, and attempted to flee.
{¶4} Bright was indicted on one count of assault with a specification that the victim
was a peace officer who had been performing his official duties. At the conclusion of her
jury trial on that felony charge in June 2024, Bright was found guilty, and she was
sentenced the same day.
{¶5} The trial court sentenced Bright to three years of community control. As part
of Bright’s community-control sentence, the trial court ordered Bright to abstain from all
alcohol and drugs and to avoid any establishment where the sale of alcohol is the primary
source of business. It is these community-control conditions that Bright challenges here.
Bright’s Failure to Object in the Trial Court Leaves Her with Little Recourse Here
{¶6} In her sole assignment of error, Bright claims that the trial court abused its
discretion by imposing a prohibition on alcohol and drug use as a condition of Bright’s
community-control sentence.
{¶7} Bright did not, however, object to the community-control conditions that were
imposed at her sentencing hearing. An error “that was not called to the attention of the
trial court at a time when the error could have been avoided or corrected by the trial court”
is deemed forfeited absent plain error. State v. Haudenschild, 2024-Ohio-407, ¶ 15 (5th
Dist.). See also Crim.R. 52(B) and State v. Whitaker,
2022-Ohio-2840, ¶ 166 (“because
Whitaker failed to object to the imposition of consecutive sentences at the sentencing
hearing, he has forfeited this issue, absent plain error”).
{¶8} To be sure, had the trial judge announced the sentence and then abruptly left
the courtroom without giving the parties a chance to raise objections to the judge’s ruling,
Bright could not be faulted now for having stayed silent then. See, e.g., United States v.
Ralston, 110 F.4th 909, 919 (6th Cir. 2024) (noting that federal district courts “are required
to ask the parties during the sentencing hearing whether they have any objections to the
sentence that has been imposed”); U.S. v. Bostic,
371 F.3d 865, 872 (6th Cir. 2004)
(where a trial court fails to provide the parties with an opportunity to object to the sentence,
the parties “will not have forfeited their objections and thus will not be required to
demonstrate plain error on appeal[]”).
{¶9} Here, the trial judge — by asking the parties, after the sentence was
announced, if they had “[a]nything further” to say — gave Bright a meaningful opportunity
to express the concerns that Bright now raises here. Neither Bright’s trial counsel nor
Bright herself objected to the sentence. We, therefore, review Bright’s community-control
sentence for plain error.
We See No Plain Error in the Sentence
{¶10} To constitute plain error, an error “must be on the record, palpable, and
fundamental, so that it should have been apparent to the trial court without objection.”
State v. Dunlap, 2004-Ohio-6652, ¶ 34 (8th Dist.). “Notice of plain error under Crim.R.
52(B) is to be taken with the utmost caution, under exceptional circumstances and only
to prevent a manifest miscarriage of justice.” State v. Long,
53 Ohio St.2d 91 (1978),
paragraph three of the syllabus.
{¶11} Under Ohio law, a sentencing court in a felony case “may directly impose a
sentence that consists of one or more community control sanctions[.]” R.C.
2929.15(A)(1). As part of those sanctions, a trial court “may impose any other conditions
of release under a community control sanction that the court considers appropriate[.]” Id.
Sentencing courts “thus [have] broad discretion . . . in imposing community-control
sanctions.” State v. Talty,
2004-Ohio-4888, ¶ 10. Sanctions available to a sentencing
court include “[a] term of drug and alcohol use monitoring[.]” R.C. 2929.17(H).
{¶12} The authority to impose community-control conditions is not, however,
absolute. Talty at ¶ 11. Restrictions imposed as part of a community-control sentence
“cannot be overly broad so as to unnecessarily impinge upon the probationer’s liberty.”
State v. Jones,
49 Ohio St.3d 51, 52 (1990), citing State v. Maynard,
47 Ohio App.3d 76,
77 (6th Dist. 1988). In determining whether a community-control condition is appropriate,
courts must “consider whether the condition (1) is reasonably related to rehabilitating the
offender, (2) has some relationship to the crime of which the offender was convicted, and
(3) relates to conduct which is criminal or reasonably related to future criminality and
serves the statutory ends of probation.” Id. at 53.
{¶13} In a recent case, we found that a trial court’s imposition of a community-
control sentence that included a ban on the use of medical marijuana by the defendant
— who was being sentenced for the crime of attempted felonious assault — was an abuse
of discretion where nothing in the record indicated that drugs or alcohol were involved in
the offense. State v. Lynn, 2023-Ohio-4429, ¶ 49 (5th Dist.). We observed that “[s]everal
Ohio courts have required some nexus between an offender’s crime and drug or alcohol
abuse in order to uphold an alcohol-related community-control condition.” Id. at ¶ 48.
The defendant in that case, we note, did object to the no-medical-marijuana condition in
the trial court, thus availing himself of an abuse-of-discretion standard of review in this
court. Id. at ¶ 6.
{¶14} No evidence was introduced at Bright’s trial suggesting that drugs or alcohol
played a role in her assault of Officer Rajean. Under Lynn, that lack of a nexus between
the no-drugs-or-alcohol and no-going-to-bars supervision terms and the crime could well
be viewed as unduly restrictive were we applying an abuse-of-discretion standard. See,
e.g., State v. Chavers, 2005-Ohio-714, ¶ 12 (9th Dist.) (finding that a trial court had
abused its discretion by imposing a no-alcohol supervision term where there was “nothing
in the record to indicate that alcohol was involved” in the crime or in the defendant’s past
brushes with the law).
{¶15} But was the sentence in this case plainly erroneous? We readily conclude
that it was not. Trial courts enjoy “broad discretion” to impose community-control
conditions that are reasonably related to the goals of rehabilitation, administering justice,
and ensuring good behavior. City of Cleveland v. Pentagon Realty, LLC, 2019-Ohio-
3775, ¶ 10, 13 (8th Dist.). And our review of the no-alcohol and no-entry-into-bars
supervision terms “must be conducted ‘with the understanding that the court will act
reasonably at a revocation hearing, aware of the practicalities and fundamental goals of
probation.’” State v. Ice, 2024-Ohio-5341, ¶ 27 (7th Dist.), quoting State v. Jones,
49
Ohio St.3d 51, 55 (1990).
{¶16} Plain error should be found — and the outcome in a criminal case overturned
because of it — “with the utmost caution, under exceptional circumstances and only to
prevent a manifest miscarriage of justice.” State v. Jackson, 2025-Ohio-109, ¶ 54 (8th
Dist.), quoting State v. Long,
53 Ohio St.2d 91, 97 (1978). See also State v. Gasper,
2024-Ohio-4782, ¶ 14 (“To show reversible error under plain-error review, . . . the
deviation must have affected substantial rights”).
{¶17} To be sure, the alcohol-related conditions imposed by the trial court in this
case limit Bright’s choices and her freedom of movement, but state and federal courts
have long recognized that “a court granting probation may impose reasonable conditions
that deprive the offender of some freedoms enjoyed by law-abiding citizens.” United
States v. Knights, 534 U.S. 112, 119 (2001). See also State v. Chapman, 2020-Ohio-
6730, ¶ 16 (“because convicted criminals serving their sentences enjoy diminished liberty
interests when compared with the general population, a trial court can impose community-
control sanctions that limit the offender’s fundamental rights, provided that such
limitations further the statutory goals of community control and are not overbroad”).
{¶18} The trial court’s decision to include the no-alcohol and no-entry-into-bars
restrictions in this assault case did not undercut defendant Bright’s substantial rights or
impose a manifest injustice on her, and this is surely not the kind of exceptional case that
calls out for corrective action on our part now. In short, we find no plain error here.
{¶19} For the reasons explained above, we affirm the judgment of the trial court.
By: Gormley, J.
Baldwin, P.J. and
King, J. concur.
