Court of Appeals of Indiana | Opinion 27A02-1701-CR-59 | August 1, 2017 Page 1 of 10

ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT

Jerry T. Drook

Marion, Indiana

ATTORNEYS FOR APPELLEE

Curtis T. Hill, Jr.

Attorney General of Indiana

Katherine Cooper

Deputy Attorney General

Indianapolis, Indiana

I N T H E

COURT OF APPEALS OF INDIANA

Cody R. Hickman,

Appellant-Defendant,

v.

State of Indiana,

Appellee-Plaintiff

August 1, 2017

Court of Appeals Case No.

27A02-1701-CR-59

Appeal from the Grant Superior 

Court

The Honorable Jeffrey D. Todd, 

Judge

Trial Court Cause Nos.

27D01-1209-FD-132,

27D01-1209-FB-133

Mathias, Judge.

[1] In this probation revocation case, we consider whether the trial court abused its 

discretion in concluding that Cody R. Hickman (“Hickman”) was not entitled 

to accrued time against his sentence for time spent in a halfway house as part of 

a reentry-court program and as a condition of his probation.
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[2] We affirm.

Facts and Procedural Posture

[3] In November 2012, Hickman pleaded guilty in Grant Superior Court to three 

counts of burglary and theft under Cause Number FB-133 and admitted a 

probation violation in Cause Number FD-132, whereunder he had pleaded 

guilty to theft and resisting law enforcement in April 2012. In December 2012, 

Hickman was sentenced to a mix of executed and suspended time on the new 

conviction and violation, including a total of four years supervised probation.

[4] Hickman served time in prison, was released, and began his four-year probation 

in Grant County in January 2015. As a condition of his probation, Hickman 

was required to successfully complete Grant County’s reentry-court program.1

Through reentry court, Hickman came to live at Grace House, apparently a 

halfway house, or, as Hickman assures us without record citation, “a residential 

program established to help men in their process of recovery from substance 

abuse/addiction.” Appellant’s Br. at 12.

[5] During his stay at Grace House, and as part of reentry court in general, 

Hickman was required to keep a 10:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. curfew during “Phase 

1” of the program. Tr. pp. 22–23. Hickman asserts that he “was required to be 

at Grace House unless he had signed out for work or group meetings or to see 

 

1 Reentry courts are “problem solving court[s] . . . focused on the needs of individuals who reenter the 

community after a period of incarceration . . . that may provide a range of necessary reintegration services for 

eligible individuals, including the following [seven listed services].” Ind. Code § 33-23-16-9.
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his probation officer.” Appellant’s Br. at 7. This assertion apparently rests on 

the following testimony from Hickman’s probation officer and case manager 

concerning Hickman’s compliance (or lack of it) with reentry-court program 

rules:

[Hickman] was living in the Grace House in, um, October of 

2016, and he was, um, signed up for—or he was working, um, at, 

uh, Hardy’s . . . in the Gas City I69 exit, and he was supposed to 

sign out, um, to go to, uh, daily schedule, um, at the Grace 

House, to go to work or groups or come see me, and he was 

signing out to leave the Grace House and, um, he did—he was 

no longer working, and he was not reporting that to Reentry 

Court staff or Grace House staff, and so he was leaving the Grace 

House, um, under the, um, belief that he was going to work and 

doing a prosocial event when he was not doing that, he was just 

out, um, doing whatever he wanted to do. This happened, uh, . . 

. five times [in October 2016].

Tr. pp. 18-19.

[6] It does not appear from the record precisely how long Hickman was at Grace 

House, but it was apparently not for the entire period of his participation in 

reentry court. See Appellant’s App. p. 11 (chronological case summary entry 

dated September 6, 2016, approving one month’s stay at Grace House). In any 

event, the State petitioned to revoke Hickman’s participation in reentry court in 

June 2016, less than a year and a half after Hickman began the reentry-court 

program in January 2015, and then again on October 25, 2016. Between 

January 2015 and October 25, 2016, Hickman tested positive for marijuana five 

times; broke curfew eight times; missed two “Saturday Work Crew[]”
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assignments; patronized a bar twice; pleaded guilty to battery causing serious 

bodily injury, disorderly conduct, possession of marijuana, and possession of 

paraphernalia under three separate cause numbers; and totally absconded from 

the program for two months from June 2016 to August 2016 — all in violation 

of program rules. Appellant’s App. p. 50; Tr. pp. 30, 33.

[7] The trial court granted the State’s second petition to revoke Hickman’s reentrycourt participation on November 14, 2016. The State then petitioned to revoke 

Hickman’s probation the same day. At the conclusion of a revocation hearing 

on December 13, 2016, the court granted the State’s petition and ordered 

Hickman to execute his four-year suspended sentence. The court credited 

Hickman with seventy-eight days against that sentence for time served in jail 

since January 2015, but denied Hickman’s request for additional credit for the 

“period of time where his liberties and freedoms ha[d] been taken away” at 

Grace House during his reentry-court participation. Tr. p. 50.

[8] This timely appeal followed. Hickman challenges the trial court’s denial of 

credit time for time spent at Grace House.

Standard of Review

[9] In general, imposing sanction for a probation violation lies within the trial 

court’s sound discretion, and we will reverse only for abuse of that discretion. 

Heaton v. State, 984 N.E.2d 614, 616 (Ind. 2013). A trial court abuses its 

discretion by ruling in a way clearly against the logic and effect of the facts and 

circumstances before it, or by misinterpreting the law. Id. Because credit time is 
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a matter of statutory right, if a trial court finds that a person comes within the 

statutory entitlement, the court has no discretion in awarding it. Purdue v. State, 

51 N.E.3d 432, 436 (Ind. Ct. App. 2016).

Discussion and Decision

[10] “‘Accrued time’ means the amount of time a person is imprisoned or confined.” 

Ind. Code § 35-50-6-0.5(1). A convicted person is entitled to have any accrued 

time counted against his sentence, along with any other credit time. Id. at (2) 

(“credit time” includes accrued time, good time credit, and education credit); 

I.C. § 35-50-6-1(a). “‘Imprison’ means to confine in a penal facility . . . ,” I.C. § 

35-31.5-2-166(1), and “‘[p]enal facility’ means . . . any . . . facility for 

confinement of persons under sentence[.]” I.C. § 35-31.5-2-232. “Confinement” 

is without statutory definition for these purposes.

[11] “[S]ubstantial control . . . less than incarceration can constitute” confinement in 

the sense of imprisonment. Capes v. State, 634 N.E.2d 1334, 1335 (Ind. 1994)

(holding pretrial home detention entitles pretrial detainee to accrued time 

against sentence), overruled by Franklin v. State, 685 N.E.2d 1062, 1064 (Ind. 

1997), overruled by Purcell v. State, 721 N.E.2d 220, 223–24 (Ind. 1999). If a 

person is “shut up or restrain[ed] . . . of his liberty” “under the control” of law 

enforcement or corrections authorities, he may be “confined” or “imprisoned”

within the meaning of the statutory language. Id. (quoting State by Kahn v. 

Woodward, 123 Ind. 30, 23 N.E. 968, 969 (1889)). However, we note that 

Hickman has cited no authority, and we find none, holding that a person was 
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“confined” or “imprisoned” during a placement at a halfway house and thus 

entitled to accrued time.

[12] Home detention is confinement and entitles the detainee to accrued time, I.C. § 

35-38-2.5-5(e); I.C. § 35-38-2.6-6(b); Senn v. State, 766 N.E.2d 1190, 1199 (Ind. 

Ct. App. 2002), as is work release. Senn, 766 N.E.2d at 1203. Daily reporting 

probation, by contrast, affording a probationer nearly the same degree of 

freedom of movement, autonomy, and privacy as living at liberty, does not 

involve “the type of freedom restrictions that deserve credit time.” Reed v. State, 

844 N.E.2d 233, 225 (Ind. Ct. App. 2006). A halfway house has been held to be 

a “penal facility” within the meaning of the definition cited above, Roll v. State, 

473 N.E.2d 161, 163–64 (Ind. Ct. App. 1985) (affirming conviction for 

trafficking with an inmate), but not every halfway house is a penal facility. 

Oswalt v. State, 749 N.E.2d 612, (Ind. Ct. App. 2001) (affirming denial of 

accrued time for time served in halfway house, distinguishing halfway house in 

Roll).

[13] Our decisions have found the following factors relevant in determining whether 

a person is confined or imprisoned in a placement and thus earns accrued time: 

whether the placement was requested by the person as a condition of probation 

or was otherwise voluntary, Oswalt, 749 N.E.2d at 615; Dixon v. State, 685 

N.E.2d 715, 718 (Ind. Ct. App. 1997); the degree of freedom of movement 

enjoyed by the person, Reed, 844 N.E.2d at 225; Oswalt, 749 N.E.2d at 615;

Dixon, 685 N.E.2d at 718; the degree of direct supervision over the placement 

exercised by the Department of Correction, a court, or another state actor;
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Oswalt, 749 N.E.2d at 614 (distinguishing Roll, 473 N.E.2d at 163); Dixon, 685 

N.E.2d at 718; and the degree of autonomy and privacy enjoyed by the person 

in the conduct of his everyday life. Reed, 844 N.E.2d at 225; Oswalt, 749 N.E.2d 

at 614.2

[14] In this light, we conclude that Hickman was not confined or imprisoned during 

his time at Grace House. First, it does not appear from the record that the 

Grace House placement was involuntary. It is true that participation in reentry 

court was required of Hickman as a condition of his probation, Appellant’s 

App. pp. 37, 39, and that the Grace House placement was part of the reentrycourt program. Id. at 11. Hickman asserts further that, “[a]s part of his required 

participation in reentry court, Hickman was ordered to stay at Grace House,” 

Appellant’s Br. at 12 (emphasis added), but he provides no record citation in 

support of this assertion, and we find no support for it in the record. In other 

words, while Hickman has shown that participation in reentry court was 

required of him, he has not shown the same to be true of his placement at Grace 

House. Reentry court is a flexible tool. It may be that Grant County reentry 

court offers its participants a range of options for successful completion, or 

 

2 We have also looked to whether absconding from the placement exposes the person to criminal liability for 

escape, Oswalt, 749 N.E.2d at 614, but in general this begs the question. “Escape” is defined as flight from 

“lawful detention . . . ,” I.C. § 35-44.1-3-4, and “lawful detention” means inter alia “detention in a penal 

facility[.]” I.C. § 35-31.5-2-186(3). As noted above, “‘[p]enal facility’ means . . . any . . . facility for 

confinement of persons under sentence[,]” I.C. § 35-31.5-2-232, and it is precisely the meaning of 

“confinement” that is to be determined here.
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tailors its programs with input from its participants. We will not speculate in 

Hickman’s favor when it is his burden on appeal to show reversible error below.

[15] Second, Hickman raises the fact that his freedom of movement was restricted 

by a curfew and by a requirement that he “be at Grace House unless he had 

signed out for work or group meetings or to see his probation officer[.]” 

Appellant’s Br. at 12. We note that the latter assertion is not fully supported by 

the record. Hickman’s probation officer and case manager testified that 

Hickman “was supposed to sign out, um, to go to, uh, daily schedule, um, at 

the Grace House, to go to work or groups or come see me[.]” Tr. p. 19. 

Testimony that Hickman was “supposed to sign out” if he wished to leave for 

certain listed purposes is not testimony that Hickman was prohibited from 

leaving for any purposes but those listed. Id.

[16] As to the curfew itself, we do not deny that a curfew may be a substantial 

imposition on a person’s liberty. However, Hickman’s does not appear to have 

been such. There is no record of enforcement of the curfew against Hickman, 

save for the curfew violations appearing much later as one of several predicates 

for the State’s petitions to revoke. Moreover, the curfew could be modified for 

cause: Hickman’s probation officer and case manager testified that, if reentrycourt participants “have to work second shift, third shift—we have no problem 

with that. It’s just to keep leisure time [supervised or restricted].” Tr. p. 23.

[17] In any event, whatever restrictions were placed on Hickman’s liberty in name 

were apparently not very zealously enforced in fact. Hickman’s probation 
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officer and case manager testified that, for some period, Hickman “was just out, 

um, doing whatever he wanted to do.” Tr. p. 19. Hickman was able simply to 

disappear from reentry-court supervision for two months and even then, after the 

State filed its first unsuccessful petition to revoke his participation, continued to 

enjoy participation in the program. This is not the life of a prisoner or even a 

home detainee.

[18] Finally, Hickman has not made any showing as to the degree of supervision 

over him by state actors or as to the degree of autonomy and privacy he enjoyed 

in conducting his life at Grace House. As noted above, the degree of 

supervision by Grace House and corrections or court staff appears to have been 

quite loose, and Hickman has not presented evidence that Grace House should 

be considered a state actor in this context. Other than the movement restrictions 

discussed above, Hickman has not presented any evidence at all of restrictions 

on his autonomy and privacy at Grace House. To the extent that Hickman was 

able to patronize bars, smoke marijuana, freely lie about his employment, and 

disappear for two months while participating in reentry court, participation 

appears to have left him quite at liberty.

Conclusion

[19] Hickman has not persuaded us that the trial court’s conclusion that he was not 

confined or imprisoned while living at Grace House and participating in reentry 

court was clearly against the facts and circumstances before it. The court 

therefore did not err in denying Hickman accrued time against his sentence, and 

its judgment is affirmed.
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[20] Affirmed.

Kirsch, J., and Altice, J., concur.