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657 So. 2d 603

Docket No. 94 KA 1099.

State v. Soco

STATE of Louisiana v. Jerome SOCO.

Louisiana Court of Appeal

Decided June 23, 1995.

Louisiana Court of Appeal · decided 1995-06-23

Relies on State v. Chapman · 506 So. 2d 802 - State v. Brady · 542 So. 2d 154 - State v. Russland Enterprises, Inc.

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1995-06-23

How this case has been cited

Cited by 10 later decisions — most recently May 2018

10 state decisions

60199520002010decided

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.

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¶1Camille A. Morvant, II, Thibodaux, for appellee, State of Louisiana.

¶2John Bourgeois, Thibodaux, for defendant/appellant, Jerome Soco.

¶3Before LEBLANC, PITCHER and FITZSIMMONS, JJ.

¶4LEBLANC, Judge.

¶5Defendant, Jerome Soco, was charged by bill of information with four counts of armed robbery, violations of La.R.S. 14:64. He pled not guilty and, after trial by jury, was found guilty of all four counts. Defendant subsequently was sentenced to thirty years at hard labor without benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence and with credit for time served. He has appealed, urging one assignment of error. This Court has noticed error patent on the face of the record which requires us to remand this matter for further proceedings before we can consider defendant's appeal.

¶6The sentence imposed in this case is illegal. Defendant's convictions of four counts of armed robbery require the imposition of four separate sentences. Instead of imposing a separate sentence for each count, the trial court imposed one sentence of thirty years at hard labor without benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence. A defendant can appeal from a final judgment of conviction only where a sentence has been imposed. La.C.Cr.P. art. 912(C)(1); State v. Chapman,471 So.2d 716 (La.1985). Patent sentencing error occurs when a trial court, in sentencing for multiple counts, does not impose a separate sentence for each count. See State v. Russland Enterprises, Inc.,542 So.2d 154, 155 (La.App. 1st Cir.1989); State v. Brady,506 So.2d 802, 803 (La.App. 1st Cir.1987). In the absence of valid sentences, the defendant's appeal is not properly before this Court. Accordingly, the sentence imposed by the trial court is vacated, and we remand this matter to the trial court for resentencing consistent with the views expressed herein. After resentencing, defendant may perfect a new appeal.

¶7*604 SENTENCE VACATED; REMANDED FOR RESENTENCING.

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