With regard to the robbery conviction, the judgment form signed by the trial judge states that the Appellant

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was placed on probation for six years. The probation order entered by the trial judge recites that the Appellant was

“placed on probation for a period of 5 years and 1 day (after serving 11 months and 29 days).” Moreover, the probation

(continued...)

IN THE COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS OF TENNESSEE

AT JACKSON

Assigned on Briefs January 11, 2005

STATE OF TENNESSEE v. KENDRICK LAMONT BROOKS

 Appeal from the Circuit Court for Madison County

No. 97-374 Roy B. Morgan, Jr., Judge

No. W2004-00475-CCA-R3-CD - Filed April 28, 2005

The Appellant, Kendrick Lamont Brooks, appeals the revocation of his probation by the Madison

County Circuit Court. On appeal, Brooks argues that the trial court was without authority to revoke

his probation because the violation warrant was issued after his sentence had expired. Finding this

argument without merit, we affirm the judgment of the trial court.

Tenn. R. App. P. 3; Judgment of the Circuit Court Affirmed; Remanded for Corrected

Judgments of Conviction

DAVID G. HAYES, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which JOHN EVERETT WILLIAMS and 

J. C. MCLIN, JJ., joined.

George Morton Googe, District Public Defender; and Stephen P. Spracher, Assistant Public

Defender, Jackson, Tennessee, for the Appellant, Kendrick Lamont Brooks.

Paul G. Summers, Attorney General and Reporter; David E. Coenen, Assistant Attorney General;

Jerry Woodall, District Attorney General; and Jody S. Pickens, Assistant District Attorney General,

for the Appellee, State of Tennessee.

OPINION

On January 7, 1998, the Appellant pled guilty to robbery and misdemeanor possession of

cocaine. He received concurrent sentences of six years for the robbery conviction, which was

ordered suspended, and eleven months and twenty-nine days for the possession conviction, to be

served in the county jail. No pretrial jail credit is reflected on the judgment form for either 1
(...continued) 1

order provides, “The expiration date of this probationary sentence is the 7 day of January, 2004 . . . Ordered . . . this th

the 7 day of January 1998.” th

Because no jail credit is shown on either judgment form, a remand is necessary for correction of the forms for

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an accurate record of the proceedings below with regard to jail credits and for Department of Correction purposes with

regard to the felony conviction.

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conviction; however, the appellate record was supplemented with a “mittimus” which reflects that

the Appellant was credited with “320 days jail time” for both sentences. Although the record is 2

silent on this point, we presume, based upon the number of pretrial jail credits, that the Appellant

was released to supervised probation on the date the guilty pleas were entered.

On June 19, 2003, a probation violation warrant was issued alleging that the Appellant had

violated the conditions of probation based upon new arrests and convictions for DUI, driving on a

suspended license, disobeying a traffic sign, not having proof of insurance, leaving the scene of an

accident, and domestic assault. Additionally, the warrant charged failure to report to his probation

officer and failure to inform of a change in employment. A revocation hearing was held on February

17, 2004, at which time the Appellant conceded the alleged violations. He argued, however, that the

three hundred twenty days of pretrial jail credit reduced his six-year sentence by the same number

of days; thus, he asserted that his sentence had expired in February 2003, prior to the issuance of the

probation warrant in June 2003, and that the trial court was without jurisdiction to revoke. The trial

court rejected this argument and reinstated the original six-year sentence, granting the Appellant jail

credit of three hundred twenty days against the sentence. The Appellant appeals this ruling.

Analysis

On appeal, the Appellant raises the legal question of whether the detention period awaiting

trial, or in this case the period prior to entry of the guilty plea, proportionally reduces the

probationary sentence. In effect, the Appellant contends that his probationary period had expired

prior to the issuance of the revocation warrant “because of the three hundred twenty days credit due

for his pre-plea incarceration.” It is fundamental that a trial court has no authority to cause

revocation of a suspended sentence after the sentence has expired. State v. Steven B. Mangrum, No.

01C01-9007-CC-00176 (Tenn. Crim. App. at Nashville, Feb. 21, 1991). 

The Appellant cites as authority State v. Watkins, 972 S.W.2d 703 (Tenn. Crim. App. 1998)

to support his argument that his probationary sentence had expired. The holding in Watkins did not

decide the underlying issue presented in the instant case and is, thus, not dispositive. Watkins

involved the probation revocation of two consecutive eleven month and twenty-nine day

misdemeanor sentences. Central to the Watkins holding was that “the trial court may not impose a

period of probation that exceeds the sentence authorized by law.” 972 S.W.2d at 705. The Watkins

court concluded that because the imposed probationary period extended beyond the maximum time

allowed for the conviction, i.e., eleven months and twenty-nine days, the sentence had expired before

the violation warrant issued. Id. at 705-706. Moreover, although the Appellant argues that his
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service of three hundred twenty days in jail proportionally reduced the expiration date of his

probationary sentence, two opinions of this court have reached contrary conclusions. See State v.

William A. Marshall, No. M2001-02954-CCA-R3-CD (Tenn. Crim. App. at Nashville, Oct. 14,

2002) (pretrial jail credits do not accelerate the expiration date of a defendant’s probationary

sentence); State v. Dennis R. Jacks, No. E2000-00643-CCA-R3-CD (Tenn. Crim. App. at Knoxville,

May 7, 2001), perm. app. denied, (Tenn. 2001) (pretrial jail credit did not affect the expiration date

of the probationary sentence). 

The expiration date of a sentence of probation is expressly governed by the provisions of

Tennessee Code Annotated section 40-35-310 (2003) which provide:

The trial judge shall possess the power, at any time within the maximum time which

was directed and ordered by the court for such suspension, after proceeding as

provided in § 40-35-311, to revoke and annul such suspension, and in such cases the

original judgment so rendered by the trial judge shall be in full force and effect from

the date of the revocation of such suspension, and shall be executed accordingly . .

. .

(emphasis added); See also State v. Taylor, 992 S.W.2d 941, 944-45 (Tenn. 1999). In Taylor, the

Appellant received a four-year sentence which was suspended after he had served a period of

incarceration. On appeal, he argued that his sentence had expired prior to the institution of

revocation proceedings. Deciding adversely to the Appellant, the court reasoned:

A four-year sentence will expire after service of 1460 days . . . . [Taylor had] 549

days of sentencing credits. . . . He did successfully complete a term of three years and

186 days probation. However, he had not completed an entire four-year term of

probation prior to the revocation proceedings. . . . Therefore, [Taylor’s] sentence had

not expired because he had neither served the entire four years nor successfully

completed a four-year term of probation. 

Id.

It is manifest from a reading of Tennessee Code Annotated section 40-35-310 that the trial

court in this case possessed the power at any time within six years from the date the sentence was

imposed to revoke suspension of the sentence. The probationary period ofsix yearsis clearly within

the fifteen-year statutory maximum time for the class C conviction offense of robbery. The trial

court imposed a six-yearsuspended sentence and placed the Appellant on probation for six years on

January 7, 1998; thus, the Appellant remained on probation until January 7, 2004. Because the

probation violation warrant issued in June 2003, the trial court possessed the power to revoke.

CONCLUSION
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Based upon the foregoing, the trial court was within its authority to revoke the Appellant’s

suspended sentence. The judgment is affirmed.

___________________________________ 

DAVID G. HAYES, JUDGE