Title: The People &c., ex rel. Anthony Gill v. Cary Greene, as Superintendent of Great Meadow Correctional Facility

State: new-york

Issuer: New York Appellate Court

Document:

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This opinion is uncorrected and subject to revision before
publication in the New York Reports.
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No. 1 
The People &c., ex rel. Anthony 
Gill, 
            Respondent, 
        v. 
Gary Greene, as Superintendent of 
Great Meadow Correctional 
Facility, 
            Appellant.
Barbara D. Underwood, for appellant.
Robert C. Newman, for respondent.
District Attorneys Association of the State of New
York, amicus curiae.
SMITH, J.:
We hold that, when a court is required by statute to
impose a sentence that is consecutive to another, and the court
does not say whether its sentence is consecutive or concurrent,
it is deemed to have imposed the consecutive sentence the law
requires.
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No. 001
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I
In 1994, Anthony Gill was sentenced as a second felony
offender to an indeterminate term of 2½ to 5 years for criminal
possession of stolen property.  Before then, he had been
convicted and sentenced twice for earlier crimes, for
manslaughter in 1982 and for several larceny-related offenses in
1993.  Neither of Gill's previous sentences had been discharged
by 1994; he had been paroled on the first, and had absconded from
a temporary release program while serving the second. 
It is undisputed that the court that sentenced Gill in
1994 was required by Penal Law § 70.25 (2-a) to impose a prison
term to run consecutively to his previous, undischarged
sentences.  It is also undisputed, however, that that court did
not say, orally or in any document, that the sentence it imposed
was either consecutive to or concurrent with the previous ones. 
The court was simply silent on that subject.  The Department of
Correctional Services (DOCS) calculated Gill's release date on
the assumption that the 1982, 1993 and 1994 sentences were
consecutive to each other.
In 2006, Gill, pro se, began this proceeding against
the Superintendent of the prison where he was held, seeking a
writ of habeas corpus.  He asserted that his 1994 sentence was,
as a matter of law, concurrent with his earlier ones, because the
sentencing court had not said otherwise.  Supreme Court dismissed
the petition without reaching the merits of this claim, on the
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No. 001
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ground that even if Gill were correct he would not have been
entitled to habeas corpus.  
Gill appealed to the Appellate Division, which
converted his proceeding to one under CPLR article 78, reversed
Supreme Court and annulled DOCS's determination that Gill's
sentences ran consecutively (People ex rel. Gill v Greene, 48
AD3d 1003 [3d Dept 2008]).  The Appellate Division agreed with
Gill "that DOCS had no authority to calculate his sentences
consecutively where the court did not do so" (id. at 1005).  The
Appellate Division granted the Superintendent permission to
appeal to this Court, and we now reverse.
II
There is no question that, as the Appellate Division
acknowledged and as Gill concedes, the sentencing court was
required in 1994 to impose a consecutive sentence.  Gill was
sentenced under the second felony offender statute, Penal Law §
70.06, and his sentence was therefore governed by Penal Law §
70.25 (2-a), which says: "When an indeterminate . . . sentence of
imprisonment is imposed pursuant to section . . . 70.06 . . . and
such person is subject to an undischarged indeterminate or
determinate sentence of imprisonment imposed prior to the date on
which the present crime was committed, the court must impose a
sentence to run consecutively with respect to such undischarged
sentence."  But Gill argues, and the Appellate Division held,
that though the court was required to impose a consecutive
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No. 001
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sentence it did not do so, and that DOCS cannot correct the
court's error.
Gill relies on Matter of Garner v New York State Dept.
of Correctional Servs. (10 NY3d 358 [2008]), in which we held
that, where a court omits to impose a required term of post-
release supervision (PRS), the error can be corrected only by a
court, not by correctional authorities.  He also relies on Earley
v Murray (451 F3d 71 [2d Cir 2006]), in which the Court of
Appeals for the Second Circuit held that it violated due process
for DOCS to correct a sentencing court's error in failing to
impose a term of PRS.  But the analogy Gill draws between
consecutive sentencing and PRS is flawed.  
The problem in Garner and Earley was that a part of the
sentence -- the PRS term -- was never imposed.  In each case, the
court imposed a term of imprisonment, and said nothing about PRS. 
That was indeed an error that only a court could correct.  But
here, the sentence at issue -- a term of imprisonment for 2½ to 5
years -- was imposed.  All that was omitted was the
characterization of the sentence as either concurrent or
consecutive.  
That characterization is provided by the statute, Penal
Law § 70.25 (2-a), which says the sentence must be consecutive. 
Nothing in the statute and nothing in the Constitution requires
the sentencing court to say the word "consecutive," either orally
or in writing.  Nothing in the statute even requires that the
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No. 001
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sentencing court be made aware that the prior sentences are
undischarged.  Unlike the petitioners in Garner and Earley, who
were told nothing about PRS by the courts that sentenced them,
Gill was told in plain terms that he was being sentenced to 2½ to
5 years in prison.  He was never given any reason to think that
part or all of that sentence would be effectively nullified, by
running simultaneously with sentences he had already received. 
Indeed, nothing in the record here shows the court knew that
previous undischarged sentences existed. 
We read the words of Penal Law § 70.25 (2-a) -- "the
court must impose a sentence to run consecutively with respect to
such undischarged sentence" -- to mean that any sentence imposed
by the court shall run consecutively to the undischarged
sentence, whether the sentencing court says so or not.  This
reading is supported by subdivision 1 of Penal Law § 70.25, in
which the Legislature provided rules for interpreting sentences
that might otherwise be thought either consecutive or concurrent. 
Section 70.25 (1) says that as a general rule -- with exceptions
that include cases subject, as this one is, to section 70.25 (2-
a) -- sentences "shall run either concurrently or consecutively .
. . in such manner as the court directs at the time of sentence." 
The statute goes on to provide a default rule: "If the court does
not specify the manner in which a sentence imposed by it is to
run," the sentences shall run concurrently in certain classes of
cases, and consecutively in others (Penal Law § 70.25 [1] [a],
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No. 001
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[b]).  But where, as in this case, the court has no choice about
which kind of sentence to impose, no default rule for
interpreting the court's silence is provided by statute, because
none is necessary.  The court is simply deemed to have complied
with the statute. 
In short, the sentencing court here committed no error
and there was none for DOCS to correct.  DOCS properly
interpreted Gill's 1994 sentence as being consecutive to his
previous undischarged sentences, as Penal Law § 70.25 (2-a)
requires.
Accordingly, the order of the Appellate Division should
be reversed without costs and the petition dismissed.     
*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   * 
Order reversed, without costs, and petition dismissed.  Opinion
by Judge Smith.  Judges Ciparick, Graffeo, Read, Pigott and Jones
concur.  Chief Judge Lippman took no part.
Decided February 12, 2009