Case Title: In re Hart

Citation: 167 Vt. 630, 715 A.2d 640

Docket Number: 

State: vermont

Court: Vermont Supreme Court

Date: 1998-03-25T00:00:00Z

Document:
In re Hart  (97-059); 167 Vt. 630; 715 A.2d 640

[Opinion Filed 25-Mar-1998]

[Motion for Reargument Denied 10-Apr-1998]

                          ENTRY ORDER

                 SUPREME COURT DOCKET NO. 97-059

                        OCTOBER TERM, 1997

In re Phillip F. Hart           }     APPEALED FROM:
                                }
                                }
                                }     Orange Superior Court
                                }
                                }
                                }     DOCKET NO. 223-11-94 Oecv

               In the above-entitled cause, the Clerk will enter:

       Petitioner appeals the Orange County Superior Court's denial of his
  petition for post-conviction relief pursuant to 13 V.S.A. § 7131.  He
  argues that the court erred when it allocated to him the burden of proving
  that he had not deliberately bypassed the opportunity to directly appeal an
  error made by the sentencing court in the application of Rule 32(c)(3).  We
  affirm.

       In 1992, petitioner was sentenced to serve twelve to twenty years in
  prison for the sexual assault of a minor, and this Court affirmed the
  conviction in State v. Hart, 161 Vt. 647, 643 A.2d 853 (1994).  In 1996,
  petitioner filed a petition for post-conviction relief requesting the
  superior court to vacate his sentence and order re-sentencing.  As grounds
  for relief, petitioner alleged: (1) that counsel at his sentencing hearing
  had been ineffective, and (2) that, in determining the sentence, the court
  improperly considered and relied upon information not previously disclosed
  to petitioner and his counsel.  See V.R.Cr.P. 32(c)(3) ("sentencing court
  shall disclose to the defendant, his attorney, and the prosecution, all
  information submitted to it for consideration at sentencing").

       After a hearing on the merits, the superior court denied petitioner's
  claim of ineffective assistance of counsel.  The superior court concluded,
  however, that the sentencing court did "consider and rely upon petitioner's
  violent history with his former wife . . . without providing notice in the
  manner described under V.R.Cr.P. 32(c)(3)."  Petitioner introduced no
  evidence to establish why he had not raised the Rule 32 issue in his direct
  appeal, although he did contend the record failed to show he had
  deliberately bypassed the opportunity.  The State introduced no evidence on
  petitioner's bypass of the issue.  The superior court concluded that
  petitioner had failed to satisfy his burden of showing that his failure to
  raise the claimed error on direct appeal was an "inadvertent waiver," and
  thus denied the petition.(FN1)

       Vermont's post-conviction relief statute, 13 V.S.A. §§ 7131-7137,
  permits "challenges to confinement . . . [where] the sentence is subject to
  collateral attack," State v. Cooley, 135 Vt. 409, 411,