Title: Duran v. State

State: wyoming

Issuer: Wyoming Supreme Court

Document:

Duran v. State1997 WY 152949 P.2d 885Case Number: 96-168Decided: 12/22/1997Supreme Court of Wyoming
 

CONRAD DURAN, 

Appellant (Defendant), 

 

v. 

 

The STATE of WYOMING, 

Appellee (Plaintiff).

 

Appeal 
from District Court of Laramie County

The 
Honorable Nicholas G. Kalokathis, Judge

 

 

 

Representing 
Appellant: 

Conrad 
Duran, Pro Se.

 Representing 
Appellee: 

William U. 
Hill, Attorney General; Paul S. Rehurek, Deputy Attorney General; D. Michael 
Pauling, Senior Assistant Attorney General and Mark T. Moran, Assistant Attorney 
General.

 

Before 
TAYLOR, C.J., and THOMAS, MACY, GOLDEN, and LEHMAN, 
JJ.

TAYLOR, Chief 
Justice. 

[¶1]      Having signed a 
plea agreement without reading the document, appellant feels he should be 
excused from the penitentiary term therein agreed to. That term was the most 
prominent feature of two judgments and sentences which were not appealed. We 
affirm the district court's denial of appellant's efforts to avoid his plea 
agreement through the filing of a motion purportedly seeking correction of an 
illegal sentence.

 

I. 
ISSUES

 

[¶2]      Appellant, Conrad 
Duran (Duran), failed to articulate his issue(s). We summarize the thrust of his 
argument:

 

1. Due to his inattention to the plea agreement he 
signed, should appellant be entitled to post-conviction relief, sentence 
reduction, or permission to withdraw his guilty plea?

 

[¶3]      Appellee, State 
of Wyoming, states one issue:

 

Whether the district court correctly denied 
appellant's "Motion for Correction of Sentence (Rule 35 W.R.Cr.P.)" and whether 
appellant's motion or petition are properly before the 
court.

 

II. 
FACTS

 

[¶4]      On June 7, 1995, 
Duran was convicted of two counts of delivery of marijuana and sentenced to a 
term of not less than thirty months nor more than forty months in the Wyoming 
State Penitentiary. Duran does not contest that conviction and it is not the 
subject of this appeal, although the length of the sentence has relevance 
here.

 

[¶5]      Following the 
events which gave rise to the foregoing conviction, a named informant made a 
purchase of marijuana from Duran, and the resultant search of Duran's residence 
yielded a quantity of marijuana (which Duran admitted was his) as well as the 
scales and packaging materials which are common accoutrements of the "hemp" 
trade. Based upon those events, Duran was charged with two new counts of 
delivery of marijuana or possession thereof with intent to 
deliver.

 

[¶6]      When the 
privately retained attorney who had represented Duran in his earlier trial 
withdrew from the instant case, Duran requested the services of a public 
defender because he wanted "to plea-bargain and move on with [his] life." 
Following submission of an affidavit of indigence, a public defender was 
assigned.

 

[¶7]      Notwithstanding 
the desire of his client to reach a plea agreement, Duran's counsel filed a 
battery of pretrial motions tailored to the unique circumstances of the latest 
charges, and the district court responded favorably to those motions while the 
prosecuting attorney afforded Duran's counsel full discovery. Notwithstanding 
his counsel's preparedness for trial, Duran chose to enter into a plea agreement 
offered by the district attorney which would result in a guilty plea to one 
charge in return for dismissal of the second and a sentence which would run 
concurrently with his earlier thirty to forty month sentence, requiring only 
that Duran serve an additional six months pursuant to his guilty plea. Another 
advantage of this plea agreement, as perceived by Duran, was the permission he 
received to plead pursuant to North 
Carolina v. Alford, 400 U.S. 25, 91 S. Ct. 160, 27 L. Ed. 2d 162 (1970), thus 
receiving the benefits of the plea bargain while being relieved of having to 
provide a factual basis for his plea.

 

[¶8]      In response to 
questions from the district court, Duran repeatedly insisted that he was "just 
taking the plea agreement." He described one clear advantage of the plea 
agreement, asserting his understanding that proceeding to trial would mean: "I'd 
be on two charges instead of one." Pressed by the district court as to why he 
would take the plea agreement, Duran twice acknowledged the benefit of receiving 
only six months of additional penitentiary time for his latest 
conviction:

 

THE COURT: Meaning that you then fear that there's a 
risk that you might have to serve more time than the six 
months?

THE DEFENDANT: Yes, sir.

THE COURT: Is that what you're 
saying?

THE DEFENDANT: Yes.

* * *

THE COURT: Well, what is so good about the plea 
agreement that you want to take it? You've got to tell me in your own words. Is 
that basically it?

THE DEFENDANT: Plead guilty, admit it to the court, 
not get as much time as if found guilty. 

THE COURT: So you don't want to run that risk of 
having more than six months for this charge?

THE DEFENDANT: Yes, sir.

 

[¶9]      On August 22, 
1995, the district court accepted Duran's guilty plea and handed down the 
agreed-upon sentence to the penitentiary "for a period of not less than 
thirty-six (36) months nor more than forty-six (46) months," with credit for 222 
days served at the Laramie County Detention Facility. No appeal followed. 
However, two months later, Duran notified the district court and the district 
court clerk, via handwritten notes, that "when the Judgment and Sentence of the 
court was written it did not say if the 2 sentence[s] [were] to run concurrent 
or consecutive. * * * Please send the paper work showing that they are to run 
concurrent." The district court responded with an amended judgment and sentence 
reiterating the thirty-six to forty-six month sentence, but making it clear that 
the sentence would run concurrently with Duran's earlier thirty to forty month 
sentence. Again, no appeal followed.

 

[¶10]   Five months later, Duran filed a 
motion for sentence reduction, acknowledging the district court's "sentence of 
36-46 months in the Wyoming State Penitentiary," but asking for a reduction 
because he had been a "model prisoner" who "consistently and successfully 
attended psychoactive substance education, Narcotics Anonymous and Alcoholics 
Anonymous (certificates attached)." That motion for sentence reduction was 
denied.

 

[¶11]   Duran then filed a self-titled 
"Motion for Correction of Sentence (Rule 35, W.R.Cr. P.)," the body of which 
prayed the district court "to vacate his judgment and sentence, pursuant to 
7-14-101 et. seq., Wyoming Statutes 1977 as amended," and also suggested that 
his guilty plea had been the product of a misunderstanding with his own 
attorney. From the denial of that pleading, Duran timely filed this 
appeal.

 

III. 
STANDARDS OF REVIEW

 

[¶12]   The apparent tension between the 
title and prayers of the pleading, the denial of which has occasioned this 
appeal, requires our review of pertinent standards applicable to petitions for 
post-conviction relief, motions for correction of an illegal sentence, and 
post-sentencing requests for permission to withdraw a guilty 
plea.

 

It is universally recognized that post-conviction 
relief is not a substitute for an appeal and the petition will not lie where the 
matters alleged as error could or should have been raised in an appeal or in 
some other alternative manner. Munoz v. 
Maschner, Wyo., 590 P.2d 1352 (1979).

 

Pote v. State, 733 P.2d 1018, 1022 (Wyo. 1987). Issues amenable to 
redress through direct appeal are foreclosed from consideration in the context 
of a petition for post-conviction relief by the doctrine of res judicata. Cutbirth v. State, 751 P.2d 1257, 1262 
(Wyo. 1988) (citing, inter alia, Wright 
v. State, 718 P.2d 35, 37 (Wyo. 1986)).

 

[¶13]   A motion to correct an illegal 
sentence is necessarily predicated upon the validity of the underlying 
conviction and may not be used to examine alleged errors taking place prior to 
the imposition of sentence. Evans v. 
State, 892 P.2d 796, 797 (Wyo. 1995). District courts are vested with broad 
discretion in dealing with motions brought pursuant to W.R.Cr.P. 35, and 
appellate review will not yield a reversal absent demonstration of a clear abuse 
of that discretion. Asch v. State, 
784 P.2d 235, 237 (Wyo. 1989). An illegal sentence is one which exceeds 
statutory limits, imposes multiple terms of imprisonment for the same offense, 
or otherwise violates constitutions or the law. Ellett v. State, 883 P.2d 940, 942 (Wyo. 
1994) (citing Hill v. United States, 
368 U.S. 424, 430, 82 S. Ct. 468, 472, 7 L. Ed. 2d 417 
(1962)).

 

[¶14]   Finally, a motion for withdrawal of 
a guilty plea made after imposition of sentence may be set aside "only to 
correct manifest injustice." W.R.Cr.P. 32(d). We have no license to reverse a 
district court's denial of a motion to withdraw a guilty plea unless the 
appellant can establish that the district court could not reasonably have 
concluded as it did and, as a result, clearly abused its discretion. Bird v. State, 901 P.2d 1123, 1131 (Wyo. 
1995) (quoting Martin v. State, 720 P.2d 894, 896 (Wyo. 1986)); Rude v. 
State, 851 P.2d 20, 22-23 (Wyo. 1993) (quoting Martinez v. State, 611 P.2d 831, 
838 (Wyo. 1980)).

 

IV. 
DISCUSSION

 

[¶15]   The core "fact" of this appeal is 
Duran's insistence that his understanding of the plea agreement was that he 
would be required to serve no additional penitentiary time for this, his third 
conviction for delivery of a controlled substance within a three month period. 
Given his colloquy with the district court at the time he entered his plea and 
was sentenced, the only possible way for him to expect no additional 
penitentiary time would be if the district attorney's office had offered him a 
sentence of six months, to run concurrently with a previous sentence of thirty 
to forty months, for Duran's third conviction in three months for delivery of 
marijuana.

 

[¶16]   Duran admits that he signed the 
plea agreement without reading it, but proceeds to ask that he be relieved of 
that plea agreement because he claims to have misunderstood it. Acknowledging 
that written agreements are, without doubt, far from the norm in the illicit 
drug trade, we must determine whether Duran's failure to read his plea agreement 
or the two judgments and sentences which followed should entitle him to 
post-conviction relief, sentence reduction, or permission to withdraw his guilty 
plea.

 

[¶17]   Were we to consider this appeal as 
being from the district court's denial of a petition for post-conviction relief, 
we would be obliged to dismiss it because Duran failed to file a petition for 
review within eleven days of the district court's denial of the petition, as 
required by W.R.A.P. 13.03(a) and Wyo. Stat. § 7-14-107 (1997). Even more 
fundamental to our decision on the post-conviction relief issue is Duran's 
failure to mount an appeal, either from the judgment and sentence originally 
imposed or the amended judgment and sentence. Both sentencing documents 
expressly and explicitly informed Duran that he faced a term of not less than 
thirty-six months nor more than forty-six months for his guilty plea. He offers 
no explanation of why, if such a sentence was contrary to his understanding, an 
appeal was not immediately commissioned. Without such an appeal, or credible 
evidence of facts supportive of an appeal which became available to Duran only 
after the time for appeal had passed, Wyo. Stat. § 7-14-103(a)(i) (1997) 
precludes post-conviction relief, foreclosing appellate review 
thereof.

 

[¶18]   Taking the title of Duran's brief 
at face value, we must consider whether the district court properly denied his 
pleading as a motion for sentence reduction pursuant to W.R.Cr.P. 35. Fatal to 
this claim is the imposition of a sentence which was neither in excess of the 
statutory maximum, duplicative of another sentence for the same offense, nor 
violative of constitution or law. Of course, Duran does not claim the sentence 
was illegal, only that his understanding of that sentence was imperfect; 
otherwise, he would not have entered his guilty plea. Therefore, his true issue 
is not with the sentence but with proceedings prior to the imposition of that 
sentence. Proceedings prior to the imposition of sentence are beyond the scope 
of W.R.Cr.P. 35, and will not be addressed in the context of a motion made 
pursuant to W.R.Cr.P. 35.

 

[¶19]   At last, we must determine whether 
Duran should be permitted to withdraw his guilty plea. To succeed in such a 
quest at this juncture would require Duran to demonstrate a manifest injustice 
which the district court abused its discretion in failing to recognize. In 
service of such a determination, we reiterate the essential position of Duran at 
the time he entered into the plea agreement he would now disclaim: (1) he was 
already laboring under a sentence of thirty to forty months for two earlier 
convictions on two counts of delivery of marijuana; (2) he was facing trial on 
two new counts of delivery of, or possession with intent to deliver, marijuana; 
and (3) the State had a firm case against him. From such dire straits, Duran 
would have us believe that he salvaged a plea agreement whereby the State would 
dismiss one of the two counts against him and recommend a sentence of only six 
months on the other count, to run concurrently with his prior sentence, in 
return for which his sole "sacrifice" was an Alford plea. It is clear that there 
was no abuse of discretion in the district court's implicit finding that Duran 
failed to show any error in the acceptance of his Alford plea, let alone manifest 
injustice.

 

V. 
CONCLUSION

 

[¶20]   Duran's conviction and sentencing 
were virtually flawless exercises. Affirmed.