Title: Ex Parte Zimmerman

State: alabama

Issuer: Alabama Supreme Court

Document:

838 So. 2d 408 (2002)
Ex parte Levanure ZIMMERMAN.
(In re Levanure Zimmerman v. State of Alabama.)
1002104.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
June 14, 2002.
Levanure Zimmerman, pro se.
Bill Pryor, atty. gen., and G. Ward Beeson III, asst. atty. gen., for respondent.
BROWN, Justice.
In 1991, Levanure Zimmerman was convicted of murder. He was sentenced, as an habitual offender with three prior felony convictions, to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. On direct appeal, the Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed his conviction and sentence, without an opinion. Zimmerman v. State, 602 So. 2d 1235 (Ala.Crim.App.1992) (table).
This present petition seeks certiorari review of a judgment of the Court of Criminal *409 Appeals, issued on June 29, 2001, affirming the Calhoun Circuit Court's denial of Zimmerman's postconviction petition,[1] in which Zimmerman contested the legality of his 1991 sentence. Zimmerman v. State, 838 So. 2d 404 (Ala.Crim.App.2001). Zimmerman contends that his sentence as an habitual felony offender of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole violates his right to equal protection under the laws, by virtue of a relatively recent amendment to the Alabama Habitual Felony Offender Act. Specifically, he argues that § 13A-5-9(c)(3), Ala.Code 1975, as amended effective May 25, 2000, impermissibly treats Class A felony offenders who have three prior felony convictions, none of which are Class A felonies, differently based on whether the offender's sentence was not final in the trial court on May 25, 2000.
Before May 25, 2000, § 13A-5-9(c), Ala. Code 1975, provided, in pertinent part:
Section 13A-5-9(c), Ala.Code 1975, as amended by Act No. 2000-759, Ala. Acts 2000, provides, in pertinent part:
Thus, § 13A-5-9(c)(3), as amended, gives the trial court discretion to sentence a Class A felony offender with three prior felony convictions to imprisonment for life or imprisonment for life without the possibility of parole, if none of those three prior felony convictions was for a Class A felony.
In § 3 of Act No. 2000-759, the Alabama Legislature specifically provided that the amended version of § 13A-5-9(c)(3) was to be applied prospectively, that is, to only those cases in which the sentence was not final on May 25, 2000, the effective date of the Act. Section 3 provides:
(Emphasis added.)
When Zimmerman committed the murder for which he was punished as an habitual offender, the mandatory sentence upon application of § 13A-5-9(c)(3) for a Class A felony offender with three prior felony convictions was imprisonment for life without the possibility of parole, even if none of those prior convictions was for a Class A felony. The prior convictions used to enhance Zimmerman's sentence were not for Class A felonies. He contends that the prospective application of the amended sentencing statute violates his right to equal protection under the laws by creating a date-based classification that confers the possibility of more lenient sentencing on a class of persons whose sentences were not final as of May 25, 2000, the effective date of the Act, while arbitrarily and inequitably excluding from the possibility of that leniency those persons, like him, whose sentences for offenses of the same nature or seriousness were final before the effective date of the Act.[2]
The Court of Criminal Appeals, in a well-reasoned and thorough opinion written by Retired Appellate Judge Patterson, rejected Zimmerman's equal-protection argument. In a footnote in its opinion, the Court of Criminal Appeals cites the following general rule:
838 So. 2d  at 405-06 n. 1, quoting 24 C.J.S. Criminal Law § 1462 (1989) (footnotes omitted). The Court of Criminal Appeals went on to state:
838 So. 2d  at 406-07 (footnote omitted).
We agree with the rationale and holding in the Court of Criminal Appeals' opinion, and we adopt its analysis as part of the opinion of this Court. The Court of Criminal Appeals cited In re Moreno, 58 Cal. App. 3d 740, 130 Cal. Rptr. 78 (1976), in its opinion. The California Court of Appeal stated in In re Moreno:
58 Cal. App. 3d  at 743, 130 Cal. Rptr.  at 80-81. The disparity of which Zimmerman complains does not run between classes of persons whose situations are indistinguishable. Zimmerman was sentenced under § 13A-5-9(c)(3) and his sentence became final before the May 25, 2000, amendment became effective. He is being treated similarly to all other offenders sentenced under the law in effect at the time he was sentenced. More importantly, the State has a legitimate interest in seeking to ameliorate the perceived harshness of the Habitual Felony Offender Act and a strong concomitant interest in maintaining the finality of judgments and "`assur[ing] that penal laws will maintain their desired deterrent effect by carrying out the original prescribed punishment as written.'" In re Moreno, 58 Cal. App. 3d  at 743, 130 Cal. Rptr.  at 81, quoting In re Kapperman, 11 Cal. 3d 542, 546, 522 P.2d 657, 659, 114 Cal. Rptr. 97, 99 (1974). The prospective *413 application of a sentencing statutewhich may result in the punishment of offenders based upon the date of final judgmentis reasonably related to these legitimate State interests and does not violate an offender's right to equal protection.
The judgment of the Court of Criminal Appeals is affirmed.
AFFIRMED.
MOORE, C.J., and HOUSTON, SEE, LYONS, JOHNSTONE, HARWOOD, WOODALL, and STUART, JJ., concur.
[1]  Zimmerman styled the petition as a "petition for writ of habeas corpus" and filed it in the Jefferson Circuit Court. That court, however, correctly construed the petition as one seeking postconviction relief under Rule 32, Ala. R.Crim. P., and transferred it to the Calhoun Circuit Court, the court in which Zimmerman was convicted.
[2]  Presumably, the relief Zimmerman seeks is a new sentencing hearing, at which the trial court will be allowed to exercise its discretion to sentence him to imprisonment for life instead of imprisonment for life without the possibility of parole.