Title: Austin Knight v. State of Indiana

State: indiana

Issuer: Indiana Supreme Court

Document:

ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT  
 
 
 
ATTORNEYS FOR APPELLEE 
Anthony S. Churchward 
 
 
 
 
 
Gregory F. Zoeller 
Fort Wayne, Indiana 
 
 
 
 
 
Attorney General of Indiana 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Marjorie Lawyer-Smith 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Deputy Attorney General 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Indianapolis, Indiana 
 
 
______________________________________________________________________________ 
 
In the 
Indiana Supreme Court  
_________________________________ 
 
No. 02S03-1006-CR-339 
 
AUSTIN KNIGHT, 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Appellant (Defendant below), 
 
v. 
 
STATE OF INDIANA, 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Appellee (Plaintiff below). 
_________________________________ 
 
Appeal from the Allen Superior Court, No. 02D04-0702-FA-20 
The Honorable John F. Surbeck, Jr., Judge 
_________________________________ 
 
On Petition To Transfer from the Indiana Court of Appeals, No. 02A03-0811-CR-532 
_________________________________ 
 
 
June 30, 2010 
 
 
Rucker, Justice. 
FILED
CLERK
of the supreme court,
court of appeals and
tax court
Jun 30 2010, 1:50 pm
 
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Austin Knight pleaded guilty to several felony offenses for which he was sentenced to an 
aggregate term of seventy years.  Under our constitutional authority we revise the sentence to a 
total aggregate term of forty years.  
 
Facts and Procedural History 
 
 
In the early morning hours of February 19, 2007, seventeen-year-old Knight and three 
other men – Malcom Ellis, Johnnie Walker, and Antonio Wright – used keys they had previously 
stolen from an apartment complex office to gain entry to two separate units in the complex.  
Upon entering the first apartment, the four men found a lone resident asleep in her bed.  The men 
tied the resident up, stuffed a rag in her mouth, covered her face, and then proceeded to ransack 
the apartment, stealing money and property from her.  Before leaving, one of the men shot the 
resident in the legs more than 10 times at close range with a pellet gun.  The resident‟s goldfish 
was also shot and killed.  
 
 
 
The men then entered a second apartment and encountered four occupants therein.  
Brandishing guns, the men rounded up the occupants from their two bedrooms and ordered them 
to the floor in the main room.  One of the four occupants was ordered to drive to an ATM to 
make a withdrawal.  The intruders remaining at the apartment ordered one of the female 
occupants to disrobe.  After taking money and property from the occupants and after the others 
had returned, the men heard sirens and fled.  Three of the four men, including Knight, were 
apprehended nearby. 
 
 
On February 22, 2007, the State charged Knight with: (1) Count I, burglary as a class A 
felony; (2) Count II, robbery as a class B felony; (3) Count III, criminal confinement as a class B 
felony; (4) Count IV, burglary as a class B felony; (5) Count V, robbery as a class B felony; (6) 
Count VI, robbery as a class B felony; (7) Count VII, criminal confinement as a class B felony; 
(8) Count VIII, criminal confinement as a class B felony; (9) Count IX, criminal confinement as 
a class B felony; (10) Count X, robbery as a class B felony; and (11) Count XI, criminal 
confinement as a class B felony. 
 
 
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On July 6, 2007, Knight entered into a plea agreement with the State in which he agreed 
to plead guilty to Count I, burglary as a class A felony and Count IV, burglary as a class B felony 
with the remaining counts being dismissed.  Appellant‟s App. at 43-45.  The State agreed to a 
sentence of twenty years executed on Count I and ten years executed on Count IV, with the 
sentences running consecutively for a total executed term of thirty years.  In return Knight was 
required to testify truthfully in any proceedings the State brought against Knight‟s three 
codefendants.  Id.  The trial court took the plea agreement under advisement and scheduled a 
sentencing hearing for September 10, 2007, which was later continued until April 3, 2008.  
However on March 3, 2008, the plea agreement was rescinded upon the State‟s motion when 
Knight refused to testify against Antonio Wright, one of the codefendants.  
 
 
Thereafter Knight pleaded guilty to all eleven counts without the benefit of a plea 
agreement.  After a hearing, the trial court sentenced Knight as follows: thirty years on Count I 
and ten years on Count II to be served concurrently; ten years on Count IX to be served 
consecutively to the sentences imposed on Counts I and II; and six years on each of Counts IV, 
V, VI, X, and XI, to be served consecutively to each other and consecutive with the sentences 
imposed on Counts I, II, and IX, for a total executed term of seventy years.1  Knight appealed 
contending the sentence was inappropriate in light of the nature of the offense and his character.  
In an unpublished memorandum decision, the Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment of the 
trial court.  See Knight v. State, No. 02A03-0811-CR-532 (Ind. Ct. App. June 17, 2009).  We 
grant transfer.   
 
Discussion 
 
 
For burglary as a class A felony as charged in Count I and robbery as a class B felony as 
charged in Count II the trial court imposed the advisory sentences of thirty years and ten years 
respectively.  As for confinement as a class B felony as charged in Count IX the trial court 
imposed the advisory sentence of ten years.  And for robbery as a class B felony as charged in 
Counts IV, V, VI and X and confinement as a class B felony as charged in Count XI, the trial 
court imposed six year minimum sentences.  There is no question that the trial court properly 
                                                 
1 The trial court merged Counts III, VII, and VIII into Counts I, V, and VI, respectively. 
 
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exercised its sentencing discretion in this case.  Nonetheless, “[a]lthough a trial court may have 
acted within its lawful discretion in determining a sentence, Article VII, Sections 4 and 6 of the 
Indiana Constitution „authorize[ ] independent appellate review and revision of a sentence 
imposed by the trial court.‟”  Anglemyer v. State, 868 N.E.2d 482, 491 (Ind. 2007) (alterations in 
original) (quoting Childress v. State, 848 N.E.2d 1073, 1080 (Ind. 2006)).  Our appellate 
authority is implemented through Indiana Appellate Rule 7(B), which allows us to “revise a 
sentence authorized by statute if, after due consideration of the trial court‟s decision, the Court 
finds that the sentence is inappropriate in light of the nature of the offense and the character of 
the offender.”  We also observe that although we “need not compare” sentences of codefendants, 
Dennis v. State, 908 N.E.2d 209, 214 (Ind. 2009), “we are not precluded” from “compa[ring] 
sentences among those convicted of the same or similar crimes.”  Trowbridge v. State, 717 
N.E.2d 138, 150 (Ind. 1999), reh‟g denied (revising 199-year sentence of a fourteen-year-old 
convicted of multiple offenses including murder, rape, robbery, and burglary “in light of 
Trowbridge‟s age and comparisons to the sentences of other juveniles convicted of the same or 
similar crimes.”). 
 
 
In this case the seventy-year sentence imposed by the trial court on one of Knight‟s 
codefendants – Malcolm Ellis – was revised on appeal to a total executed term of thirty-six years 
with four years probation.  As with Knight, Ellis also entered a plea agreement calling for a 
thirty-year sentence and requiring him to testify truthfully in any proceedings the State brought 
against any of the other three codefendants.  As with Knight, Ellis‟ plea agreement was rescinded 
when he also refused to testify against codefendant Antonio Wright.  And as with Knight, Ellis 
has a juvenile criminal history that includes what would have been a class B felony if committed 
by an adult.  The only difference between the two is that Knight was seventeen years old at the 
time of the instant offenses and Ellis was sixteen.  Although apparently acknowledging that the 
nature of the crimes was horrendous, in revising Ellis‟ sentence the Court of Appeals majority 
had this to say about the character of the offender: 
 
[W]e are concerned about the effect that a lengthy seventy-year 
prison sentence may have on a sixteen year old.  His imprisonment 
will house him with older, hardened criminals and without a „light 
at the end of the tunnel,‟ Ellis might be less susceptible to 
redemption.  The State apparently recognized that a lower sentence 
 
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might be more appropriate in this case by offering Ellis an 
aggregate sentence of thirty years.  We agree.  In order for the 
prison sentence to retain a somewhat rehabilitative character for 
Ellis, we decrease his sentence. 
 
Ellis v. State, No. 02A03-0811-CR-557, slip op. at 4 (Ind. Ct. App. May 18, 2009).  These 
observations apply with equal force in this case.  Indeed “a defendant‟s youth . . . is a significant 
mitigating circumstance in some circumstances including the commission of a heinous crime by 
a juvenile.”  Trowbridge, 717 N.E.2d at 150 (internal citations and quotations omitted).  We do 
not condone Knight‟s past or current violations of the law.  Nonetheless, we cannot conclude that 
Knight‟s transgressions necessarily “demonstrate a character of such recalcitrance or depravity” 
that they justify a seventy-year sentence.  Hollin v. State, 877 N.E.2d 462, 465-66 (Ind. 2007) 
(quoting Frye v. State, 837 N.E.2d 1012, 1015 (Ind. 2005)).  And although we are not inclined to 
revise Knight‟s sentence to be precisely the same as that of Knight‟s codefendant, we do believe 
a revision is in order.  We therefore revise Knight‟s six-year consecutive sentences imposed on 
Counts IV, V, VI, X, and XI to run concurrently with the thirty-year and ten-year concurrent 
sentences imposed on Counts I and II and the ten-year consecutive sentence imposed on Count 
IX for a total executed term of forty years.  
 
Conclusion 
 
 
We remand this cause to the trial court with instructions to enter a sentence consistent 
with this opinion.  
 
Shepard, C.J., and Sullivan, J., concur. 
Dickson and Boehm, JJ., dissent without separate opinion.