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683 So. 2d 853

Docket No. 96-K-2176.

State v. Compton

STATE of Louisiana, v. Morris COMPTON.

Louisiana Court of Appeal

Decided October 23, 1996.

Louisiana Court of Appeal · decided 1996-10-23

Cited by 7 later decisions — most recently November 1998

7 state decisions

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“.... This Court will not uphold a trial judge's discretion to deviate from a legislatively mandated minimum sentence without a record that contains a searching inquiry into and a meaningful assessment of exceptional facts and circumstances that justify the exercise of judicial discretion in a particular case. Some significant facts and circumstances in this context include family history, prior criminal conduct in light of whether it was violent or nonviolent and whether it was similar or dissimilar to the conviction for which the defendant is being sentenced, other aggravating and mitigating circumstances such as those provided in the Code of Criminal Procedure article 894.1, and the impact of the crimes upon the victims. A record that reflects that a sentence was imposed after careful consideration of a particular defendant and the facts of the exceptional case in light of such concerns as these will support a trial judge's discretion under Dorthey to depart from a minimum sentence mandated by the Habitual Offender Law.”

quoted by 2 later decisions, including 693 So. 2d 246 - State v. Johnson, 695 So. 2d 1121 - State v. Lacoste

“The court is deviating from the mandatory minimum sentence of life imprisonment. Although the defendant, in my opinion, has a significant criminal history and I am—the rape conviction, in my opinion, is the one that is of most concern to me in May of 1983. I understand that it occurred in Jefferson Parish. I also understand he received a two-year sentence for pleading guilty to a charge of forcible rape ... The jury finds him guilty of possession of cocaine in a jury trial in this court. I believe that I have to take into account the fact that the jury did come back and make a lesser finding, that they did not find him guilty of possession with the intent to distribute cocaine. But that they made a lesser finding of possession of cocaine. I also note for the record the State informs me that other than those three convictions I have already listed Mr. Lee has a prior conviction for possession of PCP as well as a possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. Nonetheless, with five previous convictions—this is his sixth felony conviction—this conviction is for the offense of possession of cocaine. I again note that it is what I consider to be a large number of rocks, 17 pieces. I still, however, feel that to order him to be sentenced for the rest of his natural life, in my opinion, would be an excessive sentence that I feel that it would make no measurable contribution to the acceptable goals of punishment or that the sentence would amount, in my opinion, to nothing more than a ”

quoted by 1 later decision, including 699 So. 2d 461 - State v. Lee

Relies on State v. Dorthey · 603 So. 2d 739 - State v. Lobato · 593 So. 2d 704 - State v. Scott

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1996-10-23

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

¶1*854 Harry F. Connick, District Attorney of Orleans Parish, Kevin J. Gillie, Assistant District Attorney of Orleans Parish, New Orleans, for the State of Louisiana.

¶2Before BYRNES, LOBRANO and PLOTKIN, JJ.

¶3PLOTKIN, Judge.

¶4The defendant was convicted in 1984 for purse snatching (La.R.S. 14:65.1) and in 1993 for theft (La.R.S. 14:67). On July 2, 1996, the defendant pleaded guilty to possession of a stolen vehicle valued at $500 or more (La. R.S. 14:69) and access device fraud (La.R.S. 14:70.4). On September 25, 1996, he was adjudicated a third offender. The minimum sentence mandated by the Habitual Offender Law (La.R.S. 15:529.1) for this defendant is life imprisonment without parole. The trial judge, however, sentenced the defendant to serve concurrently eight years at hard labor on count one and two years at hard labor on count two, citing State v. Dorthey, 623 So.2d 1276 (La.1993).

¶5The trial judge reiterated the boilerplate language of the jurisprudence to find that the mandatory minimum sentence would make no measurable contribution to the acceptable goals of punishment and would amount to nothing more than a purposeful imposition of pain and suffering, which would be grossly out of proportion to the severity of the crimes to which he pleaded guilty. The trial judge justified departing from the statutory mandatory minimum sentence with the facts that the defendant pleaded guilty, that one of the predicate offenses occurred over ten years prior in 1984, and that the predicate purse snatching offense was not a serious offense.

¶6The Louisiana Supreme Court responded to the legislature's grant of discretion to district attorneys to file multiple offender bills leading to severe mandatory minimum sentences for felony recidivists by granting trial judges the discretion to deviate from mandatory minimum sentences but neglected to give any greater guidance in the exercise of that discretion than a vague standard adapted from State v. Lobato, 603 So.2d 739, 751 (La.1992), and State v. Scott, 593 So.2d 704, 710 (La.App. 4th Cir.1991): "[A] punishment is constitutionally excessive if it makes no measurable contribution to acceptable goals of punishment and is nothing more than the purposeless imposition of pain and suffering and is grossly out of proportion to the severity of the crime." This standard cannot be satisfied by its recitation alone or by any other boilerplate language. This Court will not uphold a trial judge's discretion to deviate from a legislatively mandated minimum sentence without a record that contains a searching inquiry into and a meaningful assessment of exceptional facts and circumstances that justify the exercise of judicial discretion in a particular case. Some significant facts and circumstances in this context include family history, prior criminal conduct in light of whether it was violent or nonviolent and whether it was similar or dissimilar to the conviction for which the defendant is being sentenced, other aggravating and mitigating circumstances such as those provided in Code of Criminal Procedure article 894.1, and the impact of the crimes upon the victims. A record that reflects that a sentence was imposed after careful consideration of a particular defendant and the facts of the exceptional case in light of such concerns as these will support a trial judge's discretion under Dorthey to depart from a minimum sentence mandated by the Habitual Offender Law.

¶7The reasons for sentencing in the instant case do not reflect a sufficiently searching inquiry into the facts and circumstances to justify departing from the mandatory minimum sentence of the Habitual Offender Law for this particular defendant. Accordingly, the defendant's multiple bill sentence is vacated and the matter remanded for resentencing.

¶8WRIT GRANTED.

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