Case Title: State v. Miller

Citation: 2010-Ohio-5705

Docket Number: 20091606

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 2010-11-30T00:00:00Z

Document:
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it may be cited as 
State v. Miller, Slip Opinion No. 2010-Ohio-5705.] 
 
 
NOTICE 
This slip opinion is subject to formal revision before it is published in 
an advance sheet of the Ohio Official Reports.  Readers are requested 
to promptly notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of Ohio, 
65 South Front Street, Columbus, Ohio 43215, of any typographical or 
other formal errors in the opinion, in order that corrections may be 
made before the opinion is published. 
 
SLIP OPINION NO. 2010-OHIO-5705 
THE STATE OF OHIO, APPELLEE, v. MILLER, APPELLANT. 
[Until this opinion appears in the Ohio Official Reports advance sheets, it 
may be cited as State v. Miller, Slip Opinion No. 2010-Ohio-5705.] 
Criminal law — Sentencing — Nunc pro tunc — Court may not use a nunc pro 
tunc entry to impose a sanction that the court did not impose as part of the 
sentence — Judgment reversed and cause remanded. 
(No. 2009-1606 — Submitted September 15, 2010 — Decided  
November 30, 2010.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Cuyahoga County, 
No. 91543, 2009-Ohio-3307. 
__________________ 
SYLLABUS OF THE COURT 
A court may not use a nunc pro tunc entry to impose a sanction that the 
court did not impose as part of the sentence. 
__________________ 
O’CONNOR, J. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
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{¶ 1} After appellant, Andrew Miller, was indicted on two counts of 
felonious assault, the state offered him the opportunity to plead guilty to a single 
count of aggravated assault.  In discussing the plea agreement with Miller, a 
visiting judge informed him that the victim had requested $20,410 in restitution.  
Miller’s attorney acknowledged that Miller was aware of the request for 
restitution but stated that restitution “was of concern” to Miller.  Nevertheless, 
after consulting with counsel, Miller eventually pleaded guilty to the reduced 
charge.  The visiting judge informed Miller that his sentence would include 
community control, court costs, random drug tests, and restitution.  Miller stated 
that he understood the consequences of his guilty plea. 
{¶ 2} Two weeks later, at the sentencing hearing, the visiting judge 
sentenced Miller to an 18-month suspended prison sentence, community control, 
and drug testing, but the judge did not impose fines.  He also failed to impose 
restitution either orally or by journal entry. 
{¶ 3} Almost two months later, the state moved the trial court “to 
convene a hearing to determine restitution.”  The state’s motion asserted that 
restitution to the victim in the amount of $20,409.35 was part of the plea 
agreement and that it had been “inadvertently omitted from the plea and 
sentencing orders.” 
{¶ 4} Two months later, the trial court judge wrote on the motion, “The 
court, having been read the transcript of the plea proceedings by [the court 
reporter] is satisfied that [Miller] entered his guilty plea with full knowledge of 
and agreement to the restitution [amount] of $20,409.35; the court finds that the 
order of restitution was inadvertently omitted by the visiting judge at sentencing.  
The court therefore amends the sentencing entry to also include [restitution] of 
$20,409.35 * * *.” 
{¶ 5} Miller appealed, asserting that the trial court had “abused its 
discretion by entering a restitution order after the final sentencing order had been 
January Term, 2010 
3 
 
journalized.”  A divided court of appeals affirmed, holding that the trial court has 
“continued jurisdiction to correct clerical mistakes.”  State v. Miller, Cuyahoga 
App. No. 91543, 2009-Ohio-3307, ¶ 16.  We granted discretionary review, 124 
Ohio St.3d 1447, 2010-Ohio-188, 920 N.E.2d 376, and now reverse. 
Analysis 
{¶ 6} In holding that the trial court could impose restitution on Miller 
through an “amended journal entry,” the court of appeals concluded that the trial 
court retained jurisdiction to include restitution as part of the sentence even 
though restitution had not been imposed at sentencing or in the sentencing entry.  
Miller, 2009-Ohio-3307, ¶ 10.  It was error to do so. 
{¶ 7} The court of appeals recognized that the trial court had failed to 
both advise Miller of the restitution amount at sentencing and include restitution 
in the original sentencing entry.  Id.  But the court of appeals held that the 
amendment was permissible.  Id. 
{¶ 8} In reaching its conclusion, the appellate court relied on State v. 
Middleton, Preble App. No. CA2004-01-003, 2005-Ohio-681.  There, the trial 
judge had been informed, erroneously, that the burglary count against the 
defendant was a third-degree felony.  Id. at ¶ 4.  In fact, the defendant had been 
charged with a second-degree felony.  Id.  The court sentenced the defendant to 
four years’ imprisonment.  Id.  The court then adjourned the sentencing hearing.  
Id. at ¶ 5. 
{¶ 9} Immediately after the hearing, and while the appellant was still 
present, the judge was informed of the error, i.e., that the charge was burglary in 
the second degree for which the potential prison term was two to eight years.  Id. 
at ¶ 4.  “The court then stated, on the record, while appellant was still present in 
the courtroom, that it was imposing seven years for the burglary count.”   Id. at ¶ 
5. 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
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{¶ 10} On appeal, Middleton argued that the trial court could not modify 
the sentence after it had orally announced it and had adjourned the sentencing 
hearing.  Id. at ¶ 8.  In rejecting that claim, the court of appeals held that the trial 
court did not "modify" an imposed sentence because the seven-year prison 
sentence that Middleton challenged was the only one journalized.  Id.  at ¶ 9. 
{¶ 11} In dicta, the court of appeals continued, “Nevertheless, we can find 
no law preventing the common pleas court from imposing the seven-year sentence 
once it became aware at the sentencing hearing that the burglary count was 
actually a second-degree felony.  Crim.R. 36 states that ‘errors * * * arising from 
oversight or omission, may be corrected by the court at any time.’  In this case, 
the common pleas court corrected an error it had made when it initially sentenced 
appellant for a third-degree felony instead of the second-degree felony of which 
appellant was convicted.  The court’s mistake was due to a clerical error in the 
pre-sentence investigation report.  Appellant was fully aware that he had pled 
guilty to and was convicted of a second-degree felony.  In a written waiver, 
appellant had previously acknowledged that the maximum penalty for the 
burglary charge, a second-degree felony, was  eight years.  We find no error by 
the common pleas court in immediately correcting a mistake arising from an 
oversight that occurred at the sentencing hearing.”  Id. at ¶ 10. 
{¶ 12} Unlike the court of appeals in this matter, we do not find 
Middleton dispositive here.  Foremost, as the court of appeals in Middleton 
observed, the axiomatic rule is that a court speaks through its journal entries.  
Middleton, 2005-Ohio-681, ¶ 9.  See, e.g., Gaskins v. Shipley (1996), 76 Ohio 
St.3d 380, 382, 667 N.E.2d 1194.  Thus, in Middleton, there was no reversible 
error because the court’s journal entry was consistent with the sentence that was 
imposed on the appellant.  That sentence was never modified, and it was upheld 
on that basis. 
January Term, 2010 
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{¶ 13} But the case before us is wholly distinguishable from Middleton.  It 
is not the original journal entry that is at issue here, but rather, a substantially 
altered one.  In fact, we are presented with a journal entry that was modified 
several months after the visiting judge had pronounced sentence and after he had 
issued the journal entry memorializing that sentence.  Moreover, it was modified 
based on the trial judge’s review of transcripts of hearings in which she did not 
participate.  Thus, Middleton does not control nor persuade. 
{¶ 14} Moreover, a trial court lacks the authority to reconsider its own 
valid, final judgment in a criminal case with two exceptions: (1) when a void 
sentence has been imposed, and (2) when the judgment contains a clerical error.  
State ex rel. Cruzado v. Zaleski, 111 Ohio St.3d 353, 2006-Ohio-5795, 856 
N.E.2d 263, ¶ 19, citing Crim.R. 36.  The court of appeals in this case suggested 
that the latter exception applied and that nothing more than a nunc pro tunc entry 
was invoked.  Not so. 
{¶ 15} A clerical error or mistake refers to “ ‘a mistake or omission, 
mechanical in nature and apparent on the record, which does not involve a legal 
decision or judgment.’ ”  Cruzado, 111 Ohio St.3d 353, 2006-Ohio-5795, ¶ 19, 
quoting State v. Brown (2000), 136 Ohio App.3d 816, 819-820, 737 N.E.2d 1057.  
“Although courts possess inherent authority to correct clerical errors in judgment 
entries so that the record speaks the truth, ‘nunc pro tunc entries “are limited in 
proper use to reflecting what the court actually decided, not what the court might 
or should have decided.” ’ ”  Cruzado, 111 Ohio St.3d 353, 2006-Ohio-5795, 856 
N.E.2d 263, ¶ 19, quoting State ex rel. Mayer v. Henson, 97 Ohio St.3d 276, 
2002-Ohio-6323, 779 N.E.2d 223, ¶ 14, quoting State ex rel. Fogle v. Steiner 
(1995), 74 Ohio St.3d 158, 164, 656 N.E.2d 1288.  The amended journal entry in 
this case may reflect what the trial court should have decided at sentencing.  It 
does not reflect what the trial court did decide but recorded improperly.  Thus, the 
use of the nunc pro tunc entry to impose restitution upon Miller was improper 
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO 
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because it does not reflect the events that actually occurred at the sentencing 
hearing. 
{¶ 16} Notably, the determination of restitution entails a substantive legal 
decision or judgment and is not merely a mechanical part of a judgment.  
Restitution is a financial sanction, based on a victim’s economic loss, that is 
imposed by a judge as part of a felony sentence.  See R.C. 2929.18(A)(1).  See 
also State v. Danson, 105 Ohio St.3d 127, 2005-Ohio-781, 823 N.E.2d 444, 
syllabus.  It is not an order that is so “mechanical in nature” that its omission can 
be corrected as if it were a clerical mistake.  Londrico v. Delores C. Knowlton, 
Inc. (1993), 88 Ohio App.3d 282, 285, 623 N.E.2d 723.  As the dissenting judge 
stated, a nunc pro tunc order cannot cure the failure of a judge to impose 
restitution in the first instance at sentencing.  Miller, 2009-Ohio-3307, ¶ 24.  
Accord Caprita v. Caprita (1945), 145 Ohio St. 5, 30 O.O. 238, 60 N.E.2d 483, 
paragraph two of the syllabus (a nunc pro tunc entry corrects a judicial record that 
fails to show a correct order or judgment of the court because the order or 
judgment was not recorded properly in the first place).  We agree and therefore 
hold that a court may not use a nunc pro tunc entry to impose a sanction that the 
court did not impose as part of the sentence. 
{¶ 17} We need go no further.  The trial court improperly used a nunc pro 
tunc entry to impose a sanction on Miller that was not imposed by the visiting 
judge at sentencing.  It was error to do so, and the court of appeals erred in 
affirming the order.  We therefore reverse its decision and remand the cause to the 
trial court to vacate the nunc pro tunc order and the order of restitution. 
Judgment reversed 
and cause remanded. 
BROWN, C.J., and PFEIFER, LUNDBERG STRATTON, O’DONNELL, 
LANZINGER, and CUPP, JJ., concur. 
__________________ 
January Term, 2010 
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Robert L. Tobik, Cuyahoga County Public Defender, and John T. Martin, 
Assistant Public Defender, for appellant. 
______________________