Title: CRAIG JAMES BEYER v. THE STATE OF WYOMING

State: wyoming

Issuer: Wyoming Supreme Court

Document:

CRAIG JAMES BEYER v. THE STATE OF WYOMING2008 WY 137Case Number: No. S-08-0046Decided: 11/19/2008NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in Pacific Reporter Third. Readers are requested to notify the Clerk of the Supreme Court, Supreme Court Building, Cheyenne, Wyoming 82002, of any typographical or other formal errors so correction may be made before final publication in the permanent volume.
OCTOBER 
TERM, A.D. 2008

 
 
CRAIG JAMES 
BEYER,

 
 
Appellant

(Defendant),

 
 
v.

 
 
THE 
STATE OF WYOMING,

 
 
Appellee

(Plaintiff).

 
 
Appeal 
from the DistrictCourtofSheridanCounty

The 
Honorable John G. Fenn, Judge

 
 
Representing 
Appellant:

Craig James Beyer, pro 
se.

 
 
Representing 
Appellee:

Bruce A. Salzburg, 
Attorney General; Terry L. Armitage, Deputy Attorney General; D. Michael 
Pauling, Senior Assistant Attorney General; Graham Macdonald Smith, Assistant 
Attorney General.

 
 
Before VOIGT, C.J., 
and GOLDEN, HILL, KITE, and BURKE, JJ.

 
 
BURKE, 
Justice.

[¶1]           
Craig Beyer appeals 
the denial of his motion to correct an illegal sentence.  We affirm.

ISSUE

 
 

[¶2]           
Mr. Beyer presents a 
single issue:

Did the district court 
abuse its discretion and impose an illegal sentence when it denied the Appellant 
credit for time served on probation in a court-ordered drug treatment 
program?

FACTS

 
 

[¶3]           
On July 26, 2002, the 
State filed an information charging Mr. Beyer with one count of felony child 
abuse in violation of Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 6-2-503(b)(i) (LexisNexis 2001) and 
misdemeanor battery of a household member in violation of Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 
6-2-501(b) and (e).1  Pursuant to a plea agreement, Mr. Beyer 
pled guilty to the charge of felony child abuse and the misdemeanor battery 
charge was dismissed.  Also as part 
of the plea agreement, the State recommended a sentence of three to five years 
imprisonment, to be suspended in favor of six months in jail followed by five 
years of supervised probation.  The 
district court entered a judgment and sentence in accordance with the 
recommendation.  As part of the 
judgment and sentence, the district court imposed the following terms and 
conditions of probation:

XI.       The 
Defendant shall not consume any intoxicants or controlled substances . . . 
.

XII.      The Defendant 
shall not be present at any place where alcohol is the main item for sale or 
distribution . . . .

. . 
.

XIV.     The Defendant shall 
undergo a substance-abuse evaluation at a licensed facility at Defendant's own 
expense, within 30 (thirty) days from the date of this hearing; . . . the 
Defendant shall follow all recommendations of the evaluation. . . . 

[¶4]           
On July 3, 2003, the 
court entered a Stipulated Order 
Releasing Defendant from Custody for House Arrest.  The stipulated order, as its title 
suggests, provided that Mr. Beyer was to be released from custody and 
placed on house arrest.  It also 
provided "that all other conditions contained in the Judgment and Sentence . . . 
shall continue in full force and effect."  
Scarcely a month later, on August 5, the State filed a petition to revoke 
Mr. Beyer's probation.  The petition 
alleged that Mr. Beyer had consumed alcohol.  Mr. Beyer admitted this allegation.  The district court entered an order 
revoking Mr. Beyer's probation, revoked his house arrest status, and reimposed 
the remainder of the six month jail time.  
Mr. Beyer served this jail time without incident and was released on 
probation.

[¶5]           
On May 11, 2006, the 
State filed a second petition to revoke Mr. Beyer's probation.  The State alleged that Mr. Beyer 
violated the probation conditions by drinking alcohol, and by purchasing alcohol 
from a bar and a package liquor store.  
Mr. Beyer admitted these violations.  On June 26, 2006, the court entered an 
Order of Probation Revocation.  In that order, the court imposed the 
original sentence of three to five years imprisonment.  The order contained conflicting 
calculations of the credit Mr. Beyer was to receive for time served.  One paragraph of the order stated that 
Mr. Beyer was entitled to 180 days of credit.  Another stated that he was entitled to 
297 days of credit.  Several days 
later, the State filed a Motion for Order 
Nunc Pro Tunc to correct the order to reflect credit of 180 days.  The district court granted this motion. 

[¶6]           
On December 13, 2007, 
Mr. Beyer filed a Motion for Correction 
of Illegal Sentence.  Accompanying that motion was an affidavit 
in which Mr. Beyer alleged that his probation officer ordered him to attend an 
inpatient substance abuse treatment program "under threat of revocation and an 
escape charge if [he] did not comply."  
Mr. Beyer also alleged that, during the time he was on probation, he 
spent 117 days "in treatment and/or the transitional phase of the treatment 
program."  Mr. Beyer contended that 
the probation officer's ultimatum implicated YellowBear v. State, in which we stated 
that "[w]hen a probationer spends time at an alcoholism treatment facility as a 
condition of his probation, he is entitled to receive a credit for that time 
toward his sentence if a charge of escape from official detention will 
lie."  874 P.2d 241, 245 (Wyo. 1994).  The district court denied Mr. Beyer's 
motion on January 18, 2008, stating that "[t]here is no evidence in the file to 
suggest that Defendant should have been given credit for time served at [the 
treatment facility]."  Mr. Beyer 
timely appealed.

Standard of 
Review

 
 

[¶7]           
A sentence that does 
not include proper credit for presentence confinement is illegal.  Doolittle v. State, 2007 WY 52, ¶ 18, 
154 P.3d 350, 356 (Wyo. 2007).  
Whether a sentence is illegal is a question of law, which we review de novo.  Manes v. State, 2007 WY 6, ¶ 7, 150 P.3d 179, 181 (Wyo. 2007).

Discussion

 
 

[¶8]           
Mr. Beyer, both in the 
district court and in this Court, accurately states that a probationer is 
entitled to credit for time spent in an inpatient alcohol treatment facility 
when a charge of escape will lie.2  YellowBear, 874 P.2d  at 245.  He does not, however, correctly apply 
this rule of law to the facts in this case.  Mr. Beyer asserts the following: 

In telling [Mr. Beyer] 
that he would be revoked and charged with escape, the Parole Officer made 
attendance and completion of the [treatment] Program a de facto condition of his probation, as 
well as an actual condition imposed in the Judgment and 
Sentence.

Mr. Beyer appears to 
reason that the probation officer's statement entitles him to credit for his 
time spent in the inpatient alcohol treatment program.  We disagree.

[¶9]           
In YellowBear, we examined three separate 
periods of court-ordered treatment.  
Id. at 
245-46.  The district court's order 
regarding Mr. YellowBear's first period of treatment 
stated:

IT IS FURTHER 
ORDERED that the Defendant 
shall not leave the treatment center except in the custody of the Fremont County 
Sheriff's Department, and that the 
Defendant is considered to be in custody while at the 
program.

Id. at 245 (emphasis 
added).  When we considered this 
language, we determined that "[t]he district court's order defined a level of 
custody which was tantamount to confinement at the Fremont County Jail.  The order contemplated that the custody 
would be at the level of official detention."  Id.

[¶10]       
We arrived at the 
opposite conclusion for Mr. YellowBear's second and third treatment 
periods.  The district court in YellowBear stated the following 
regarding the second period of treatment:

Should you leave the 
[treatment] program without authority or be terminated before you complete 
treatment, the Fremont County Sheriff's office shall be notified immediately by 
the program and any peace officer locating you is hereby authorized and directed 
to detain you and keep you in jail or other suitable detention facility pending 
transportation back to the Fremont County Jail.

Id. at 246.  Similarly, the court stated the 
following regarding the third treatment: "Mr. YellowBear should be released 
only to Community Alternatives of Casper upon the completion of his treatment 
program at ThunderChildTreatmentCenter."  Id.  We determined that the latter two 
provisions did not impose official detention upon Mr. YellowBear.  Instead, they merely represented 
conditions of supervised probation.  
Accordingly, we held that he was not entitled to credit for those 
periods.  Id.  

[¶11]       
In this case, the 
provisions of the Judgment and Sentence more closely resemble those that we 
determined in YellowBear did not 
amount to official detention.  Mr. 
Beyer was ordered to undergo a substance abuse evaluation that met certain 
requirements.  He was further 
ordered to follow the recommendations of that evaluation.  At no point did the district court order 
or suggest that Mr. Beyer would be subject to a charge of escape if he did not 
complete the required treatment.  
Neither did the district court's order "contemplate[] that the custody 
would be at the level of official detention."  Id. 
at 245.  Unlike the first treatment 
period in YellowBear, Mr. Beyer was 
not cautioned by the court that he was "considered to be in custody while at the 
program."  Id.  At most, he was subject to revocation of 
his probation for failing to comply with that condition.

[¶12]       
The alleged statement 
by the probation officer that Mr. Beyer could be charged with escape does not 
impact our analysis.  Mr. Beyer 
presents no authority for the proposition that the officer's statement imposes 
official detention for the purposes of the escape statute.  In YellowBear, the district court's order 
imposed official detention.  
Id.  We did not state or suggest that verbal 
statements by a probation officer have the same effect.  Mr. Beyer is not entitled to credit 
against his sentence for the time he spent undergoing 
treatment.

[¶13]       
Affirmed.

FOOTNOTES

1Wyo. Stat. 
Ann. § 6-2-503(b) states:

Except 
under circumstances constituting a violation of W.S. 6-2-502, a person is guilty 
of child abuse, a felony punishable by imprisonment for not more than five (5) 
years, if a person responsible for a child's welfare as defined in W.S. 
14-3-202(a)(i) intentionally or recklessly inflicts upon a child under the age 
of eighteen (18) years:

(i)  Physical injury as defined in W.S. 
14-3-202(a)(ii)(B), excluding reasonable corporal 
punishment.

Wyo. 
Stat. Ann. § 14-3-202(a)(ii)(B) (LexisNexis Supp. 2002) 
states:

"Physical 
injury" means any harm to a child including but not limited to disfigurement, 
impairment of any bodily organ, skin bruising if greater in magnitude than minor 
bruising associated with reasonable corporal punishment, bleeding, burns, 
fracture of any bone, subdural hematoma or substantial 
malnutrition.

Wyo. 
Stat. Ann. § 6-2-501 states, in pertinent part:

(b)  
A person 
is guilty of battery if he unlawfully touches another in a rude, insolent or 
angry manner or intentionally, knowingly or recklessly causes bodily injury to 
another.

. . . 

(e)  A household member as defined by W.S. 
35-21-102 who is convicted upon a plea of guilty or no contest or found guilty 
of simple assault against any other household member, after having been 
convicted upon a plea of guilty or no contest or found guilty of a violation of 
W.S. 6-2-501(a), (b), (e) or (f), 6-2-502, 6-2-503, 6-2-504 or other 
substantially similar law of this or any other state, tribe or territory against 
any other household member, is guilty of a misdemeanor punishable by 
imprisonment for not more than six (6) months, a fine of not more than seven 
hundred fifty dollars ($750.00), or both.

2"A 
person commits a crime if he escapes from official detention."  Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 
6-5-206(a).

"Official detention" means arrest, detention 
in a facility for custody of persons under charge or conviction of [a] crime or 
alleged or found to be delinquent, detention for extradition or deportation, or 
detention in any manner and in any place for law enforcement purposes.  "Official detention" does not include 
supervision on probation or parole or constraint incidental to release on 
bail.

Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 
6-5-201(a)(ii).