Public-domain · open source
OpenJurist

286 Mont. 41

State v. Coates

Montana Supreme Court

Decided June 13, 1997

Montana Supreme Court · decided 1997-06-13

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1997-06-13

How this case has been cited

Cited by 36 later decisions — most recently November 2025 · most notably Hulse v. State, Department of Justice (1998), State v. Elison (2000)

36 state decisions

2401997200020102020decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

¶1On December 11, 1996, it was ordered, adjudged and decreed that for the offense of Sexual Intercourse Without Consent, a felony, the defendant is sentenced to the Montana Department of Corrections for a period of twenty-five (25) years, with fifteen (15) years suspended, upon the conditions hereinafter set forth. The Department may place the defendant into an appropriate community based program, facility, or a State correctional institution. The Court recommends the defendant be placed under the intensive supervision program when determined to be eligible for that program by Montana Department of Corrections personnel. The Court recommends that in the event the defendant is returned to the prison from a community placement that he not be granted parole until he has successfully completed sex offender therapy at Montana State Prison, as deemed necessary by the Classification Committee at the prison. Conditions of defendant’s probation/parole are stated in the December 11, 1996 judgment.

¶2On May 8,1997, the Defendant’s application for review of that sentence was heard by the Sentence Review Division of the Montana Supreme Court.

¶3The Defendant was present and proceeded Pro Se. The state was not represented.

¶4Before hearing the application, the Defendant was advised that the Sentence Review Division has the authority not only to reduce the sentence or affirm it, but also to increase it. The defendant was further advised that there is no appeal from a decision of the Sentence Review Division. The defendant acknowledged that he understood this and stated that he wished to proceed.

¶5Rule 17 of the Rules of the Sentence Review Division provides: "The sentence imposed by the District Court is presumed correct, and the sentence will not be reduced or increased unless it is deemed clearly inadequate or excessive." (Section 45-18-904(3), *42MCA.) The Division finds that the reasons advanced for modification are insufficient to hold that the sentence imposed by the District Court is inadequate or excessive.

DATED this 13th day of June, 1997.

¶6After careful consideration, it is the unanimous decision of the Sentence Review Division that the sentence shall be affirmed.

¶7Done in open Court this 8th day of May, 1997.

¶8Chairman, Hon. Jeffrey M. Sherlock, Member, Hon. Wm. Neis Swandal and Alternate Member, Hon. Robert Boyd.

¶9The Sentence Review Board wishes to thank Mark S. Coates for representing himself in this matter.

/286/mont/41 · .json · Public domain