Order Michigan Supreme Court 

Lansing, Michigan 

January 13, 2006 Clifford W. Taylor,

 Chief Justice 

127795 Michael F. Cavanagh 

Elizabeth A. Weaver 

Marilyn Kelly 

Maura D. Corrigan 

Robert P. Young, Jr. PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN, Stephen J. Markman, Plaintiff-Appellee, Justices 

v SC: 127795 

 COA: 257591 

Oakland CC: 2002-185833-FC 

PAUL T. HENDRIX, 2002-187092-FC 

Defendant-Appellant. 

_________________________________________/ 

On order of the Court, the application for leave to appeal the December 17, 2004 

order of the Court of Appeals is considered, and it is DENIED, because we are not 

persuaded that the questions presented should be reviewed by this Court. 

WEAVER, J., concurs and states as follows: 

I concur with the denial order and agree with the majority’s decision to deny leave 

to appeal. 

The trial court in this case satisfied the requirement to articulate “a substantial and 

compelling reason”1

 for its departure from the guidelines, and, given that this case 

involves repeated criminal sexual misconduct with minor children by a “serial child sex 

abuser,”2

 the trial court’s decision did not venture beyond the range of principled 

outcomes under the circumstances. Therefore, denial of leave to appeal is appropriate. 

 The Michigan Legislature has enacted guidelines regarding minimum sentences to 

be imposed by state courts. MCL 769.34. The guidelines permit upward and downward 

departures: 

1

 MCL 769.34(3). 

2

 Trial court sentencing transcript, p 16. 
2 

A court may depart from the appropriate sentence range established 

under the sentencing guidelines set forth in chapter XVII if the court has a 

substantial and compelling reason for that departure and states on the 

record the reasons for departure. [MCL 769.34(3).] 

Had the trial court not departed from the guidelines in this case, defendant’s 

minimum sentence would have fallen between 135 and 225 months. But the trial court, 

noting that defendant had been convicted of five counts of repeated sexual misconduct 

with minor children, determined that an upward departure was necessary and imposed a 

minimum sentence of 50 years’ imprisonment. The trial court articulated the following 

reasons for its approximately 31-year departure: 

The Court finds that substantial and compelling reasons justify the 

departure from the sentencing guidelines in connection with this count if 

not all the counts. The reasons include the following. The Defendant has 

been convicted of five counts of Criminal Sexual Conduct involving 

minors. Those convictions involve more than one victim. Those 

convictions also involve same gender sexual abuse. 

Moreover any attempts of remorse or understanding of the grave 

nature of these crimes is simply incredible. In the Defendant’s description 

of the offense in the Presentence Investigative Report he is stated to have 

the attitude that, that [sic] the offenses are nothing more than harmless 

games and were not meant for any kind of gratification. Now that’s a 

paraphrase of what he said, I understand that’s not a direct quote. 

The Court has carefully observed the Defendant’s prior appearances 

before the Court and today. The record shall reflect the Court finds the 

Defendant’s mannerisms, facial expressions, and other indicators of 

truthfulness or remorse to be without merit. 

I understand the Court of Appeals does not have the ability when 

examining the cold transcript to observe what I observed, the transcript 

does not reflect the climate or atmosphere of this and prior proceedings or 

his character. I have witnessed a disingenuous man whose statements . . . 

should be disregarded. 

Furthermore, the Defendant undertook a pattern of repeated sexual 

conduct—misconduct with minors. These were not isolated, discreet 

incidents. These incidents do not have spontaneity. To the contrary, 

Defendant clearly engaged in continuous repeated and deliberate patterns of 

Criminal Sexual Conduct involving more than one victim. 

Indeed the Defendant engaged in a series of premeditated acts 

purposefully creating circumstances or taking advantages of circumstances 

by which he could be alone with and victimize young children. Although I 
 

 

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will not repeat the Defendant’s, the agent’s description of the offenses here, 

they involve creating opportunities to prey upon the children of his friends. 

By doing so he corrupted, scarred and stained the lives of the victims and 

the families of the victims with his wilful, wanton, and despicable behavior 

and he breached positions of trust as well. 

This Court has also reviewed correspondence from a number of 

interested parties, half of which paint him as an innocent angel and the 

other half painting him as an evil, wicked man who must be placed in 

prison to protect society. 

The Court finds unequivocally that the latter description is 

appropriate. One of the victims’ father[s] has written the Defendant went 

on a relentless pursuant [sic] to befriend him and his young son and he 

believes that the Defendant did so to position himself to sexually molest his 

son. 

The Defendant’s older sister has written that the Defendant sexually 

assaulted two of his (sic) sons. In other words, his own nephews when they 

were young children. The Defendant’s oldest brother has written and has 

asked for a life sentence for his brother and characterized him as a serial 

rapist. He states that the Defendant raped his daughter when she was eight 

years old. 

The Defendant’s niece states that she was molested when she was 

five or six years old, that she personally knows many other victims. 

I want to make clear right here and right now that I’m not sentencing 

the Defendant for crimes for which he has not been tried or convicted. 

Nevertheless justice dictates in a case such as this the Court must not 

have a blind eye to the unrelenting serial nature of the crimes for which he 

has been convicted, the nature of which are illuminated in form by the 

allegations of parallel conduct surrounding the Defendant. There is every 

indication from the record the Defendant is a serial child sex abuser who 

will simply take up where he leaves off. 

A light sentence would be putting our children at risk and a grave 

miscarriage of justice. In pronouncing the sentence the Court must punish 

the crimes that have been committed and protect society at large. The 

crimes committed demand a substantial upward departure. Protecting 

society in this case demands a substantial upward departure. In fact if an 

upward departure from the guidelines is not warranted in the instant case, 

the guidelines should be burned now because there would rarely be more 

forthright justification for an upward departure.[3] 

3

 Transcript, pp 13-17. 
 

 

 

 

4 

The trial court’s statement indicates and the record confirms that defendant 

engaged in continuous, repeated, and deliberate criminal sexual conduct with several 

young victims. The presentence investigation report provided to the trial court indicated 

that defendant befriended two preteen boys who were the sons of defendant’s friends. 

Over an approximately two-year period, defendant repeatedly sexually molested both 

boys. The molestation included frequent oral and anal sex: one victim stated that 

defendant performed anal sex and “things of this nature happened so many times . . . that 

it [was] hard to remember all of them.”4 Another victim reported that after one such 

incident, “it hurt so much that he could barely walk and there was blood on the floor and 

lotion on the nightstand.”5

 Defendant purposely created opportunities to prey upon these young children, took 

advantage of them, breached their trust, and evidently still does not view his actions as 

criminal, calling them “harmless games.”6

 Defendant is characterized by the trial court 

as “a serial child sex abuser who will simply take up where he leaves off”7

 as long as 

young children are within reach. It simply cannot be said that these are not wellarticulated, substantial, and compelling reasons for the departure. 

Moreover, it is equally apparent that given defendant’s repeated criminal sexual 

conduct, his refusal to acknowledge the criminal nature of his actions, and the likelihood 

that he will reoffend and put more youth at risk, it cannot be said that a 50-year minimum 

sentence is not proportionate because it is beyond the range of principled outcomes. 

Under these circumstances, such a sentence is within the range of principled outcomes. 

When the Legislature passed these sentencing guidelines, it certainly did not have in 

mind that this Court would engage in overzealous review of a trial court’s sentencing 

authority, where the trial court took pains to clearly indicate that its basis for exceeding 

the guidelines was the court’s firm belief that the defendant would commit additional sex 

crimes against young children. 

For these reasons, I concur with the order denying leave to appeal. 

KELLY, J., dissents and states as follows: 

I would remand this case to the Court of Appeals for consideration as on leave 

granted. I would direct that Court to consider whether the trial court articulated 

substantial and compelling reasons for this particular departure from the guidelines 

4

 Presentence investigation report, p 2. 

5 Id. 

6 Id., p 3. 

7

 Transcript, p 16. 
 _________________________________________ 

 

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recommendation and whether the sentence imposed is proportionate. See People v 

Hegwood, 465 Mich 432, 437 n 10 (2001), and People v Babcock, 469 Mich 247 (2003). 

t0110 

I, Corbin R. Davis, Clerk of the Michigan Supreme Court, certify that the 

foregoing is a true and complete copy of the order entered at the direction of the Court. 

January 13, 2006 

Clerk