COURT OF APPEALS OF VIRGINIA 

Present: Judges Benton, Bumgardner and Retired Judge Smith∗

Argued at Salem, Virginia 

JEFFREY AUSTIN BARRON 

 MEMORANDUM OPINION∗∗ BY 

v. Record No. 1798-02-3 JUDGE RUDOLPH BUMGARDNER, III 

 JUNE 24, 2003 

COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA 

FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF MONTGOMERY COUNTY 

Ray W. Grubbs, Judge 

 George F. Marable, III, for appellant. 

 Kathleen B. Martin, Assistant Attorney 

General (Jerry W. Kilgore, Attorney General, 

on brief), for appellee. 

Jeffrey Austin Barron appeals his convictions for 

abduction, Code § 18.2-47, and carjacking, Code § 18.2-58.1(B). 

He maintains double jeopardy bars his conviction of abduction 

because the detention of the victim was incidental to and an 

essential part of the carjacking. He argues the victim was the 

"tool" used to seize the car. He also maintains the sentence 

imposed for abduction was improper. We conclude the two 

convictions were appropriate and affirm them. The Commonwealth 

 ∗

Retired Judge Charles H. Smith, Jr., took part in the 

consideration of this case by designation pursuant to Code 

§ 17.1-400. 

∗∗Pursuant to Code § 17.1-413, this opinion is not 

designated for publication. 
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concedes the trial court sentenced the defendant to a term 

greater than the maximum permitted. 

The victim was a taxi driver dispatched to the Montgomery 

Regional Hospital where she picked up the defendant. As they 

left the hospital, the defendant put a gun to her head and 

ordered her to drive where he told her to go. They started 

toward Christiansburg but eventually drove into Craig County 

before returning to Montgomery County. At some point, the 

defendant took over as driver and held the victim as a passenger 

against her will. The defendant released the victim on the side 

of the road in Montgomery County and drove off in the taxi. 

The carjacking statute specifically provides, "The 

provisions of this section shall not preclude the applicability 

of any other provision of the criminal law of the Commonwealth 

which may apply to any course of conduct which violates this 

section." Code § 18.2-58.1(C). By enacting this language, "the 

General Assembly made it clear that conviction for the offense 

of carjacking does not prohibit the Commonwealth from pursuing 

any other crime an offender commits while the carjacking is in 

progress." Brown v. Commonwealth, 37 Va. App. 507, 518, 559 

S.E.2d 415, 420-21 (2002). Where the legislative intent is 

clear, and multiple sentences were intended, there is no viable 

double jeopardy claim. Turner v. Commonwealth, 221 Va. 513, 

530, 273 S.E.2d 36, 47 (1980) (Code § 18.2-53.1). 
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[O]ne accused of abduction by detention and 

another crime involving restraint of the 

victim, both growing out of a continuing 

course of conduct, is subject upon 

conviction to separate penalties for 

separate offenses only when the detention 

committed in the act of abduction is 

separate and apart from, and not merely 

incidental to, the restraint employed in the 

commission of the other crime. 

Brown v. Commonwealth, 230 Va. 310, 314, 337 S.E.2d 711, 713-14 

(1985) (abduction and rape). See also Cardwell v. Commonwealth, 

248 Va. 501, 511, 450 S.E.2d 146, 152 (1994) (abduction and 

robbery); Abraham v. Commonwealth, 32 Va. App. 22, 27-28, 526 

S.E.2d 277, 279 (2000) (abduction, robbery, and carjacking). 

The trial court specifically found the detention "was more 

than merely incidental to the carjacking." The evidence 

supports that finding. The defendant accomplished the 

carjacking when he took control of the car at gunpoint and 

ordered the victim to drive as he directed. He detained and 

transported the victim for several hours. After they returned 

to Montgomery County, the defendant was the driver and the 

victim his captive passenger. At that point alone, the 

detention was completely separate from the restraint employed to 

seize control of the car. The acts constituting abduction and 

carjacking were separate and distinct. 

 The Commonwealth conceded the defendant was sentenced to 

fifteen years for abduction when the maximum punishment was ten 

years. Code §§ 18.2-10 and -47. "Where the sentence imposed is 
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in excess of that prescribed by law, that part of the sentence 

which is excessive is invalid." Deagle v. Commonwealth, 214 Va. 

304, 305, 199 S.E.2d 509, 510 (1973) (trial court properly 

imposed sentence and not fine where jury improperly punished 

defendant with both). We hold that five years of the 

fifteen-year sentence is void and order the sentence reduced to 

ten years. Brown v. Commonwealth, 26 Va. App. 758, 763, 497 

S.E.2d 147, 150 (1998) (appellate court may reduce fine to what 

legislature authorized). 

 Accordingly, we affirm the convictions of abduction and 

carjacking but reduce the sentence for abduction to ten years. 

Affirmed as modified.