State v. Cates

                                                                                Office of the
                                                                                    Director            New Mexico
                                                                                                        Compilation
                                                                                 2023.01.23             Commission
                                                                            '00'07- 11:51:26
              IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF NEW MEXICO

Opinion Number: 

Filing Date: October 24, 2022

No. S-1-SC-38989

STATE OF NEW MEXICO,

        Plaintiff-Appellant,

v.

NORMAN TYRELL CATES,

        Defendant-Appellee.

APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF HARDING COUNTY
Albert J. Mitchell, Jr., District Judge

Hector H. Balderas, Attorney General
Maris Veidemanis, Assistant Attorney General
Santa Fe, NM

for Appellant

Bennett J. Baur, Chief Public Defender
Thomas J. Lewis, Assistant Appellate Defender
Santa Fe, NM

for Appellee

                                               OPINION

ZAMORA, Justice.

I.      INTRODUCTION

{1}     This matter comes to us on appeal of the district court’s grant of Defendant
Norman Tyrell Cates’ petition for writ of habeas corpus. We consider whether the district
court erred by concluding that Defendant, a serious youthful offender serving less than
life imprisonment, is eligible to earn meritorious deductions under the Earned
Meritorious Deductions Act (EMDA), NMSA 1978, § 33-2-34 (2015). 1 In State v. Tafoya,

1We note that the 2004 statute was in effect at sentencing, but the EMDA has not changed materially
since then and, for ease of future reference and application, we cite the current version of the EMDA
throughout this opinion.


, 

, 

, we held that the authority of a
district court to sentence a serious youthful offender to less than life imprisonment
“implies the discretion to award [a] serious youthful offender[] good-time credit eligibility
within the existing framework of the EMDA, that is, zero, four, or thirty days good-time
credit eligibility per month.” In this opinion, we clarify that a serious youthful offender
serving less than a term of life imprisonment only becomes eligible to earn meritorious
deductions if expressly made eligible to do so by the sentencing court. We conclude
that Defendant’s original judgment and sentence is silent as to his good-time eligibility,
and he is not eligible to earn meritorious deductions. Accordingly, the district court that
heard the habeas petition (the habeas court) erred by granting Defendant’s petition and
ordering that his judgment and sentence be amended to provide for this eligibility.

{2}   We reverse the district court’s order and remand with instructions to vacate
Defendant’s amended judgment and sentence and to reinstate the original judgment
and sentence.

II.    BACKGROUND

{3}     In 2006, Defendant was convicted of first-degree murder, NMSA 1978, § 30-2-
1(A) (1994), in the stabbing and beating death of his elderly neighbor, Lena Barrett.
According to evidence adduced at trial, Defendant violently attacked the victim in her
home while she was sleeping, stabbed her twenty-eight times, bludgeoned her, and
choked her repeatedly. Defendant was seventeen years old at the time of the offense.
The district court sentenced him as a serious youthful offender. See NMSA 1978, § 31-
18-15.2(A) (1996) (defining a “‘serious youthful offender’” as “an individual fifteen to
eighteen years of age who is charged with and indicted or bound over for trial for first
degree murder”). The parties agree that the district court sentenced Defendant to less
than life imprisonment, as allowed by statute, NMSA 1978, § 31-18-15.3(D) (1993).
Defendant was given a term of thirty years of incarceration followed by five years of
parole. The parties dispute whether Defendant’s sentence made him eligible to earn
meritorious deductions.

{4}     During Defendant’s sentencing hearing, the district court accepted proffers and
heard statements regarding Defendant and his offense. Defense counsel requested a
sentence of eighteen to twenty years, “with a recommendation of treatment
accompanying the judgment and sentence,” but did not request that Defendant be made
eligible for meritorious deductions. The State requested a sentence of life. After
commenting on the evident brutality and senseless nature of the murder, the district
court announced an intent to sentence Defendant to “the maximum penalty of life in
prison.” Notwithstanding this verbally expressed intent, the district court entered a
written judgment and sentence providing that Defendant would be incarcerated for a
fixed-term sentence of thirty years. During the sentencing hearing, the court also
expressed an intent to “permit participation in therapeutic amenities during the term of
incarceration.” However, the court did not reference the EMDA, and Defendant’s
judgment and sentence is silent as to his eligibility to earn meritorious deductions.
{5}     The parties do not explain the discrepancy between the sentencing court’s oral
pronouncement to give a life sentence and its written judgment and sentence giving a
thirty-year term sentence. The record fails to reflect, for example, whether the court
decided to reduce Defendant’s sentence before issuing the written judgment and
sentence, whether any error was made in preparing the document, or whether there is
some other explanation for the discrepancy.

{6}    Fourteen years after his sentencing hearing, Defendant filed a habeas petition in
the district court seeking to clarify his eligibility to earn meritorious deductions. During
his term of incarceration, Defendant has engaged in therapeutic and educational
programming, including passing his high school equivalency exam and speaking at
community outreach events for at-risk youth. Although the New Mexico Corrections
Department (NMCD) kept track of Defendant’s participation in these programs,
Defendant learned that NMCD was not awarding him good time against his sentence for
these activities.

{7}     In his amended habeas petition, Defendant contended that NMCD had wrongly
concluded that he was ineligible to earn meritorious deductions because he was not
serving a life sentence. See § 33-2-34(G) (“The provisions of [the EMDA] shall not be
interpreted as providing eligibility to earn meritorious deductions from a sentence of life
imprisonment or a sentence of life imprisonment without possibility of release or
parole.”). Defendant further argued that, since his judgment and sentence was silent as
to his eligibility to earn meritorious deductions, the sentencing court had not expressly
limited his good-time eligibility. Because first-degree murder is not listed as a serious
violent offense in the EMDA, Defendant reasoned that his crime must be designated a
nonviolent offense under Section 33-2-34(L)(3), making him eligible for up to thirty days
of deductions per month of time served under Section 33-2-34(A)(2).

{8}    Although the State stipulated that Defendant was not serving a life sentence, it
nevertheless opposed habeas relief. The State argued that Defendant was not eligible
to earn meritorious deductions because the sentencing court had not affirmatively
exercised its discretion to grant Defendant eligibility to earn deductions.

{9}     The district court held a hearing on Defendant’s habeas petition and, after
hearing arguments, partially granted the petition. Relying on Tafoya, the court
concluded that a serious youthful offender sentenced to less than life imprisonment is
eligible to earn meritorious deductions and must be considered to have committed a
“serious violent offense” under Section 33-2-34(L)(4). The court rejected the State’s
contention that “silence in the [j]udgment and [s]entence regarding good-time equates to
zero days per month credit,” and rejected Defendant’s contention that such silence
“equates to thirty . . . days per month.” The court further reasoned that “not including
first degree murder as a serious violent offen[s]e or discretionary serious violent offense
would lead to a nonsensical result” in light of Tafoya, 

.

{10} Accordingly, the habeas court determined that Defendant’s judgment and
sentence rendered him eligible to earn meritorious deductions of up to four days per
month. The court also concluded that Defendant was eligible to earn lump-sum credits
as provided by Section 33-2-34(D) and (E). The court ordered that Defendant’s
judgment and sentence be amended to conform to this legal conclusion.

{11} The State timely filed a notice of appeal. We have jurisdiction over this appeal
from a grant of a petition for writ of habeas corpus under Rule 12-102(A)(3) NMRA.

III.   STANDARD OF REVIEW

{12} We consider whether the district court correctly concluded that Defendant is
eligible to earn meritorious deductions within the framework of the EMDA. This is a
question of law that we review de novo. Dominguez v. State, 

, 

 (reiterating that, when reviewing a ruling on a petition for writ of habeas corpus
involving questions of law or questions of mixed fact and law, a de novo review assures
that this Court maintains its role as arbiter of the law).

IV.    DISCUSSION

{13} The authority of a district court to impose a sentence is derived from statute.
State v. Chadwick-McNally, 

, 

. “This limitation on
judicial authority reflects the separation of powers notion that it is solely within the
province of the Legislature to establish penalties for criminal behavior.” State v.
Martinez, 

, 

, 

 (internal quotation marks
and citation omitted). Yet a court’s sentencing authority “is not a purely ministerial task,”
and courts possess inherent discretion to fashion an appropriate sentence within the
framework of our sentencing laws. Id. ¶ 13.

{14} Under the Criminal Sentencing Act, NMSA 1978, §§ 31-18-12 to -26 (1977, as
amended through 2022), adults convicted of first-degree murder must be sentenced to
either life imprisonment or life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. Section 31-
18-14. Serious youthful offenders convicted of the same offense, however, may be
sentenced to less than the mandatory life term for an adult. See § 31-18-15.3(D)
(providing that a district court may sentence a serious youthful offender “to less than,
but not exceeding, the mandatory term for an adult”); § 31-18-15.1(G) (“[W]hen the
offender is a serious youthful offender or a youthful offender, the judge may reduce the
sentence by more than one-third of the basic sentence.”). In Tafoya, we determined that
the authority to grant good-time eligibility to serious youthful offenders is in the district
court’s discretionary sentencing authority, which it may use to advance the rehabilitative
purposes of both the EMDA and the juvenile sentencing scheme. 

.

{15} Defendant asserts, and the habeas court concluded, that a serious youthful
offender sentenced to less than life imprisonment is eligible to earn meritorious
deductions under the EMDA, citing our opinion in Tafoya, 

. According
to Defendant, this case presents “essentially the same issues of statutory construction”
as Tafoya and thus should “yield the same result,” that is, eligibility to earn up to four
days of deductions per month of time served. Alternatively, Defendant contends that the
sentencing court was unaware of the possibility that he might be eligible to receive
meritorious deductions. Defendant thus suggests that the sentencing court abused its
discretion because the judgment and sentence was based on a misunderstanding of
law. Defendant also argues that the habeas court properly exercised its discretion in
amending the judgment and sentence to provide for his good-time eligibility.

{16} We conclude that a serious youthful offender does not become eligible to earn
meritorious deductions solely by virtue of being sentenced to less than life
imprisonment. However, in exercising its discretion to sentence a serious youthful
offender to less than the mandatory life sentence of an adult, a sentencing court may
specify that the offender is eligible to earn deductions within the existing framework of
the EMDA. Tafoya, 

. The district court did not expressly exercise
this discretion in sentencing Defendant; therefore, he is not eligible to earn meritorious
deductions. We further reject Defendant’s assertion that the district court abused its
discretion by not expressly addressing Defendant’s good-time eligibility, and we explain
that the habeas court did not have discretion to amend Defendant’s judgment and
sentence to provide for this eligibility.

A.    A Serious Youthful Offender Is Eligible to Earn Meritorious Deductions
      Only if the Sentencing Court Expressly Confers Such Eligibility

1.    Overview of the EMDA, the Criminal Sentencing Act, and Tafoya

{17} The EMDA is “a detailed set of guidelines for both the courts and the [NMCD] to
administer in the ultimate determination of a prisoner’s eligibility for good-time
reductions from [the prisoner’s] period of confinement.” State v. Rudolfo, 2008-NMSC-
036, ¶ 35, 

, 

. Under the EMDA, eligible prisoners may earn
deductions of either a maximum of four or thirty days per month, “upon recommendation
by the classification supervisor, based upon the prisoner’s active participation in
approved programs and the quality of the prisoner’s participation in those approved
programs.” Section 33-2-34(A), (B). A prisoner confined for a “nonviolent offense” is
eligible to earn deductions of up to thirty days per month during the prisoner’s term of
incarceration. Section 33-2-34(A)(2). A prisoner confined for a “serious violent offense”
is eligible to earn up to four days of deductions per month served. Section 33-2-
34(A)(1).

{18} The EMDA enumerates fourteen offenses as per se serious violent offenses,
including second-degree murder and voluntary manslaughter. Section 33-2-34(L)(4)(a)-
(n). Another fifteen offenses may be designated by the sentencing court as serious
violent offenses “when the nature of the offense and the resulting harm are such that
the court judges the crime to be a serious violent offense.” Section 33-2-34(L)(4)(o). The
statute defines nonviolent offenses residually as “any offense other than a serious
violent offense.” Section 33-2-34(L)(3).

{19} “Courts generally have a limited role in administering the EMDA.” Tafoya, 2010-
NMSC-019, ¶ 8 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). A sentencing court
typically must only determine “which offenses are to be considered ‘serious violent
offenses’ for good time purposes.” Rudolfo, 

. After sentencing,
“the deduction of good time credits from an inmate’s sentence is a discretionary matter
entrusted not to the courts but to the administrators of the [NMCD] or the county jails.”
State v. Aqui, 

, ¶ 9, 

, 

, holding limited by
Brooks v. Shanks, 

, ¶¶ 8-9, 

, 

. We have
recognized that Section 33-2-34 and NMSA 1978, Section 33-2-36 (1999, amended
2006), pertaining to forfeiture of earned meritorious deductions, create a statutory
entitlement for due process purposes, and a prisoner’s meritorious deductions, once
earned, may not “be subjected to a forfeiture or termination . . . unless the appropriate
procedures were followed.” Brooks, 

, ¶ 10; see also Miller v. Tafoya,

, 

, 

 (“The statutorily created right to
good-time credit is a liberty interest protected by the Due Process Clause of the
Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Therefore, before a prisoner
may be deprived of good-time credits, he or she must be afforded due process.”
(citations omitted)). However, prisoners do not have an interest in erroneously granted
or unearned meritorious deductions. Tafoya, 

.

{20} A prisoner serving a life sentence is ineligible for, and cannot earn, meritorious
deductions under the EMDA. Section 33-2-34(G). The Criminal Code defines first-degree murder as a capital felony, § 30-2-1, subject by the Criminal Sentencing Act to a
mandatory life sentence when committed by an adult, § 31-18-14. Thus, an adult
prisoner convicted of first-degree murder clearly would be ineligible to earn meritorious
deductions according to the plain language of the EMDA. Section 33-2-34(G). Perhaps
because of this, the offense of first-degree murder is not expressly addressed by the
EMDA. See Rudolfo, 

 (“The offense of first-degree murder is not
only conspicuously missing from the offenses that can be considered ‘serious violent
offenses,’ it is specifically dealt with in Section 33-2-34(G), which precludes the award
of any good time whatsoever for offenses carrying sentences of death or life
imprisonment.”).

{21} However, the Criminal Sentencing Act provides that a serious youthful offender
convicted of first-degree murder may be sentenced to less than the mandatory life term
of an adult. Section 31-18-15.3(D). If a serious youthful offender is sentenced to less
than life imprisonment, as Defendant was here, the offender would not be excluded
from eligibility to earn deductions under the plain language of Section 33-2-34(G).
Further, because first-degree murder is not enumerated as either a per se or
discretionary serious violent offense, an application of the plain language of the statute
would result in first-degree murder being categorized as a nonviolent offense. Section
33-2-34(L)(3), (4).

{22} In Tafoya, 

, we considered this interplay between the EMDA and
the serious youthful offender sentencing scheme in the context of a serious youthful
offender who was expressly made eligible for meritorious deductions at sentencing. The
defendant in Tafoya, a serious youthful offender, was sentenced to a term of less than
life imprisonment. Id. ¶¶ 1, 4. The defendant’s sentence expressly authorized NMCD to
“award [the d]efendant good time credit in accordance with New Mexico law.” Id. ¶ 4.
Because NMCD interpreted this language to mean that the defendant was eligible for
deductions of up to thirty days per month, the state filed a motion to clarify the sentence.
Id. Following a hearing, the district court clarified that the defendant was eligible to earn
up to four days per month. Id. The defendant appealed, arguing that the EMDA granted
him eligibility of up to thirty days and the district court erred in limiting his maximum
eligibility. Id. ¶¶ 5, 22.

{23} The question presented in Tafoya was whether the district court could limit the
defendant’s maximum good-time eligibility. Id. ¶¶ 1-2. The Court answered this question
in the affirmative, concluding that the district court had discretion to specify the
maximum amount of deductions for which the defendant would be eligible. Id. ¶ 2. The
Court rejected the argument that the defendant was eligible to earn up to thirty days per
month as technically a nonviolent offender. Id. ¶ 15. While noting that this interpretation
was supported by the plain meaning of the statutory text, the Court stated that
“[c]lassifying first degree murder by a serious youthful offender as a per se nonviolent
offense is the sort of absurd result for which we forego applying the plain meaning
test.” 2 Id.

{24} The Tafoya Court also rejected the State’s argument that Section 33-2-34(G)
categorically precluded the defendant from earning deductions, explaining that the
subsection “speaks in terms of sentence length rather than the crime for which the
sentence is imposed.” Tafoya, 

. The Tafoya Court, 

distinguished our earlier opinion in Rudolfo, 

, which stated that
the EMDA “precludes the award of any good time whatsoever for offenses carrying
sentences of death or life imprisonment.” The Court explained that categorical
preclusion was limited to adults who must serve a mandatory life sentence and that
Section 33-2-34(G) did not preclude an award of eligibility to a serious youthful offender
who is sentenced to less than life imprisonment. Tafoya, 

.

{25} “Reading the EMDA and the serious youthful offender sentencing statutes in
harmony,” and noting the rehabilitative policies expressed by both enactments, the
Tafoya Court reasoned that “the discretion granted to judges in sentencing serious
youthful offenders would be severely curtailed if serious youthful offenders were strictly
prohibited from earning good time credits during imprisonment.” Id. ¶ 20. The Court also
noted its statement in State v. Trujillo, 

, 

, 

, that a sentence authorizing a serious youthful offender to earn meritorious
deductions was “‘authorized by statute.’” Tafoya, 

 (quoting

2In declining to follow the plain language of the statute, Tafoya departed with our past approach to
interpreting the EMDA, as we have generally refused to construe an offense as a serious violent offense
unless it is specifically enumerated as such in the EMDA. See, e.g., State v. McDonald, 

, 

, 

 (concluding that conspiracy to commit armed robbery is not an
enumerated serious violent offense and thus falls within the definition of a nonviolent offense for purposes
of the EMDA); State v. Bennett, 

, 

, 

 (rejecting the
state’s contention that the Legislature’s failure to define aggravated battery with a deadly weapon on a
household member as a serious violent offense was a “mistake” and reversing the district court’s
limitation on defendant’s eligibility to earn meritorious deductions). Nevertheless, we agree with Tafoya
that classifying first-degree murder as a nonviolent offense would be absurd. Tafoya, 

. We view the omission of first-degree murder from the plain language of the EMDA as a confirmation
of an intent to exclude the offense of first-degree murder from that act, § 33-2-34(G), and not as
expressing an intent to classify first-degree murder as a nonviolent offense.
Trujillo, 

). The Court construed the Legislature’s silence on the
issue since Trujillo as indicative of legislative acquiescence. Tafoya, 

.

{26}   The Tafoya Court thus held that

       the explicit [l]egislative grant of discretion to the district court in sentencing
       [the d]efendant as a serious youthful offender implies the discretion to
       award serious youthful offenders good time credit eligibility within the
       existing framework of the EMDA, that is, zero, four, or thirty days good
       time credit eligibility per month.

Id. ¶ 21. Critically, the Court did not rely on the EMDA for this holding; it

       underscore[d] that this discretion is based not on the district court’s
       defining first degree murder committed by a serious youthful offender as a
       serious violent offense or a nonviolent offense for purposes of the EMDA,
       but rather on the discretion our Legislature granted sentencing courts in
       imposing a sentence that will best contribute to the rehabilitation of the
       child.

Id. In other words, the Court determined that the authority to grant good-time eligibility to
serious youthful offenders is an incident of the district court’s discretionary sentencing
authority, which it may use to advance the rehabilitative purposes of both the EMDA
and the juvenile sentencing scheme. Id. ¶¶ 20-21; see also Martinez, 

 (recognizing that “courts inherently possess ample right to exercise reasonable,
that is, judicial, discretion to enable them to wisely exert their authority” in sentencing a
defendant (internal quotation marks and citation omitted)).

{27} Tafoya also explicitly declined to define first-degree murder as either a nonviolent
or serious violent offense, further underscoring that the authority to make a serious
youthful offender eligible to earn meritorious deductions does not emanate from the
EMDA. 

. Indeed, in affirming the district court, the Court
expressly relied upon the fact that “the district court did not define the crime which [the
d]efendant committed as a serious violent offense; rather, the district court determined
that [the d]efendant should be eligible to earn good time credits during his imprisonment
as an exercise of discretion to increase [the d]efendant’s chance of rehabilitation.” Id. ¶
22.

2.     A serious youthful offender’s eligibility to earn meritorious deductions may
       be authorized only through an express exercise of discretion by the
       sentencing court

{28} Defendant contends, and the habeas court concluded, that Tafoya recognizes
that a serious youthful offender serving less than a life sentence is eligible to earn
meritorious deductions under the EMDA. But Tafoya does not support this contention.
To the contrary, the Tafoya Court made clear that a court possesses the discretionary
authority to award a serious youthful offender “zero . . . good time credit eligibility per
month.” 

. Yet there is no category of offense under the EMDA
that addresses the award of zero meritorious deductions, reaffirming that the Court
recognized that the decision to award a serious youthful offender good-time eligibility is
fully discretionary and does not arise from the EMDA itself. The defendant in Tafoya
was eligible to earn up to four days per month of meritorious deductions because the
sentencing court in that case expressly exercised its discretion to award the defendant
this eligibility. Id. ¶ 4. Tafoya does not address the situation presented here, where the
sentencing court was silent as to whether Defendant would be eligible to earn
meritorious deductions.

{29} Thus, we must consider whether a judgment and sentence providing that a
serious youthful offender will serve less than life imprisonment but not expressly stating
that the offender will be eligible to earn meritorious deductions, nevertheless makes the
offender eligible to earn deductions pursuant to the EMDA and the Criminal Sentencing
Act. We conclude that it does not.

{30} Neither the EMDA nor the Criminal Sentencing Act expresses an intent to make
a serious youthful offender sentenced to less than life imprisonment eligible to earn
meritorious deductions in the absence of the district court’s affirmative authorization of
this good-time eligibility. Under the Criminal Sentencing Act, a serious youthful offender
convicted of first-degree murder is, by statutory default, subject to a life sentence for his
or her capital offense. Section 31-18-14; § 31-18-15.3(D); see also State v. Jones,

, 

, 

 (noting that serious youthful offenders
“are automatically sentenced as adults if convicted”). If given that default life sentence,
a serious youthful offender would be expressly precluded from earning deductions
under the plain language of the EMDA. Section 33-2-34(G).

{31} If not given the statutory default life sentence, the Legislature has provided that
“[t]he court may sentence the offender to less than, but not exceeding, the mandatory
term for an adult.” Section 31-18-15.3(D). The Legislature has not detailed the exact
amount by which a serious youthful offender’s sentence may be reduced from this
otherwise life sentence. See § 31-18-15.1(G) (“[W]hen the offender is a serious youthful
offender or a youthful offender, the judge may reduce the sentence by more than one-third of the basic sentence.”). Thus, a sentencing court is given discretion to fashion an
appropriate sentence for a serious youthful offender within the existing framework of our
sentencing laws. Cf. Martinez, 

 (recognizing a court’s “inherent
discretionary authority” to award presentence confinement credits as long as the credit
“does not lessen the penalty intended by the Legislature, or otherwise frustrate the
Legislature’s constitutional function of establishing criminal penalties”).

{32} The Legislature’s decision to grant discretion to district courts in sentencing
serious youthful offenders is grounded in the unique considerations that arise in the
context of juvenile sentencing. Cf. Ira v. Janecka, 

, 

 (identifying “three themes regarding the constitutionality of juvenile sentencing” and
observing that juveniles may have more potential for reform than adults). However,
unlike other juvenile defendants, a serious youthful offender is not afforded the
protections of the Delinquency Act, NMSA 1978, §§ 32A-2-1 to -33 (1993, as amended
through 2021). Section 32A-2-3(H). Thus, the Legislature has expressed an intent to
distinguish serious youthful offenders from other juvenile offenders, likely in view of the
severity of the serious youthful offender’s capital offense. Cf. State v. Ortiz, 2021-
NMSC-029, ¶¶ 37, 39, 

 (rejecting an equal protection claim for a serious
youthful offender’s exclusion from the protections of the Delinquency Act, including an
amenability hearing, because of the serious nature of first-degree, felony murder).

{33} The EMDA mirrors this distinction between capital and noncapital offenses.
Section 33-2-34(G). We read Section 33-2-34(G) and the omission of first-degree
murder from the offenses enumerated by the EMDA as expressing the Legislature’s
intent to exclude prisoners convicted of capital offenses from the benefit of the statutory
provisions. Even before the 1999 repeal and reenactment of Section 33-2-34, which
added Subsection (G)’s exclusion of life sentences, our meritorious deductions statute
applied only to prisoners convicted of noncapital offenses. See 1999 N.M. Laws, ch.
238, § 1; Compton v. Lytle, 

, 

, 

(“Because Section 33-2-34 describes the meritorious deductions as pertaining to ‘basic’
and ‘enhanced’ sentences, and the relevant provisions of the Criminal Sentencing Act
only describe noncapital felonies as having basic and enhanced sentences, we
conclude that the Legislature intended that only inmates convicted of noncapital crimes
receive the benefit of good-time credits.”). Subsection (G) merely clarified and continued
this intent to exclude prisoners serving life sentences for their capital offenses. See
Compton, 

 (“Having removed the language that implicitly tied
meritorious deductions to noncapital sentences, it is understandable that the Legislature
would have wanted to add other language clarifying that the section, as amended, ‘shall
not be interpreted as providing eligibility to earn meritorious deductions from a sentence
of life imprisonment or a sentence of death.’” (emphasis added) (quoting Section 33-2-
34(G))). Thus, while we agree with Tafoya, 

, that Section 33-2-
34(G), by its language, does not preclude a serious youthful offender sentenced to less
than life imprisonment from good-time eligibility, we nevertheless view Section 33-2-
34(G) as advising against our presuming that such an offender is eligible.

{34} A serious youthful offender’s life sentence may be reduced only through an
express exercise of discretion by the sentencing court. Section 31-18-15.3(D). Likewise,
we conclude that a serious youthful offender’s eligibility to earn meritorious deductions
may be authorized only through an express exercise of discretion by the sentencing
court. Accordingly, when a serious youthful offender’s judgment and sentence says
nothing about the offender’s good-time eligibility, the judgment and sentence should be
understood to have not made the offender eligible to earn meritorious deductions. As
stated in Tafoya, 

, the serious youthful offender in this scenario
has been granted “zero . . . good time credit eligibility.” Because Defendant’s judgment
and sentence was silent as to his good-time eligibility, he was not eligible to earn
meritorious deductions. The habeas court erred by concluding otherwise.
B.     The District Court Did Not Abuse Its Discretion in Sentencing Defendant
       Without Eligibility to Earn Meritorious Deductions

{35} Defendant also argues that the sentencing court abused its discretion because
the court wrongly assumed that it could not authorize good-time eligibility. Defendant
asserts that the district court did not “have the benefit of this Court’s Tafoya analysis”
when he was sentenced in 2006, and thus was unaware of the possibility that an
offender in Defendant’s position might be eligible to earn meritorious deductions.
Defendant states, “Without the guidance of Tafoya, the sentencing court misunderstood
the law and failed to give due consideration to [Defendant’s] status as a [serious]
youthful offender.”

{36} As we have explained, Tafoya stands for the proposition that a district court may,
in its discretion, authorize a serious youthful offender to earn meritorious deductions.
But the sentencing court is not required to explicitly disavow this sentencing possibility.
See State v. Ferry, 

, 

 (“Discretion is the authority of a
district court judge to select among multiple correct outcomes.”); § 31-18-15.3(D) (“The
court may sentence the offender to less than, but not exceeding, the mandatory term for
an adult.” (emphasis added)). The district court did not abuse its discretion by not
expressly addressing Defendant’s good-time eligibility in its judgment and sentence.

{37} Further, we will not speculate about what rules of law the sentencing court
considered at the time of sentencing. We cannot say, as a matter of law, that the district
court in 2006 was unaware of the possibility that it could, in its discretion, make
Defendant eligible for meritorious deductions. As noted in Tafoya, 

, we recognized in 2002 that a judgment and sentence providing that a serious
youthful offender could earn meritorious deductions was “authorized by statute.” Trujillo,

. Indeed, the sentencing courts in Trujillo and Tafoya expressly
awarded good-time eligibility to the serious youthful offenders in those cases before we
addressed the issue. Trujillo, 

; Tafoya, 

.
Moreover, any factual dispute over the extent of the sentencing court’s legal knowledge
or understanding was not preserved, and we are in no position to rule on the issue. See
Rule 12-321(A) NMRA (“To preserve an issue for review, it must appear that a ruling or
decision by the trial court was fairly invoked.”).

{38} Finally, Defendant’s contention that the sentencing court did not give due
consideration to his status as a serious youthful offender is directly refuted by the record
on appeal, which demonstrates that the court was well apprised of Defendant’s juvenile
status and expressly considered his age in determining his sentence.

C.     The Habeas Court Did Not Have Discretion to Amend Defendant’s Lawful
       Judgment and Sentence

{39} Defendant suggests that, in partially granting his petition for habeas corpus, the
habeas court was properly exercising the discretion afforded to it under Tafoya.
However, Tafoya does not recognize that a court has discretion to amend a final
judgment and sentence on a petition for habeas corpus. As the habeas court itself
clarified with the parties, and Defendant conceded, the court did not have authority to
change the decision of the sentencing court; instead, it was seeking to determine the
legal effect of the sentence that was already imposed.

{40}   Rule 5-802 NMRA permits a prisoner to file a petition for a determination that

       [Their] custody or restraint is, or will be, in violation of the constitution or
       laws of the State of New Mexico or of the United States; that the district
       court was without jurisdiction to impose such sentence; or that the
       sentence was illegal or in excess of the maximum authorized by law or is
       otherwise subject to collateral attack.

Rule 5-802(A). We have determined that Defendant’s judgment and sentence was
statutorily authorized and made within the sentencing court’s sound discretion; thus, the
habeas court had no basis to amend the judgment and sentence by way of habeas
corpus.

{41} Defendant does not cite any other authority that would allow the court to amend
his judgment and sentence in these proceedings. Nor are we aware of any authority that
would allow it to do so. Our sentencing scheme requires a district court to fashion an
appropriate sentence at a sentencing hearing held within a reasonable time after the
adjudication of guilt. Rule 5-701(B), (C) NMRA. Once finalized, legal judgments and
sentences are generally subject to amendment only by motions to reduce the sentence,
Rule 5-801 NMRA, or motions to correct clerical errors, Rule 5-113 NMRA. Neither
party suggests that Rule 5-801 or Rule 5-113 is applicable here. The district court’s
order, if made under Rule 5-801, also would conflict with the strict time limits set by Rule
5-801(A).

{42} As the habeas court had no authority to amend Defendant’s legal judgment and
sentence, it erred by ordering that the judgment and sentence be amended.

V.     CONCLUSION

{43} We conclude that Defendant’s sentence for a term of years, rather than life, for
first-degree murder as a serious youthful offender did not automatically make him
eligible to earn meritorious deductions. In order for a serious youthful offender convicted
of first-degree murder to be eligible to earn meritorious deductions, the sentencing court
must explicitly grant such eligibility. The sentencing court made no such provision here,
and the habeas court erred by ordering that Defendant’s judgment and sentence be
amended to afford him good-time eligibility. We therefore reverse the order of the district
court granting Defendant’s habeas petition. We remand this matter to the district court
with instructions to vacate the amended judgment and sentence and to reinstate the
original judgment and sentence.

{44}   IT IS SO ORDERED.

BRIANA H. ZAMORA, Justice
WE CONCUR:

C. SHANNON BACON, Chief Justice

MICHAEL E. VIGIL, Justice

DAVID K. THOMSON, Justice

JULIE J. VARGAS, Justice