Case Name: Ronald Chris FOSTER a/k/a Ron Chris Foster v. STATE of Mississippi
Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Mississippi
Decision Date: 2007-05-31
Citations: 961 So. 2d 670
Docket Number: No. 2005-KA-01938-SCT
Parties: Ronald Chris FOSTER a/k/a Ron Chris Foster v. STATE of Mississippi.
Judges: SMITH, C.J., CARLSON, DICKINSON AND RANDOLPH, JJ., CONCUR. DIAZ, P.J., DISSENTS WITH SEPARATE WRITTEN OPINION JOINED BY GRAVES, J. EASLEY AND LAMAR, JJ., NOT PARTICIPATING.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 961
Pages: 670–674

Head Matter:
Ronald Chris FOSTER a/k/a Ron Chris Foster v. STATE of Mississippi.
No. 2005-KA-01938-SCT.
Supreme Court of Mississippi.
May 31, 2007.
Rehearing Denied Aug. 16, 2007.
Michael R. Farrow, Columbus, Steve Wallace, attorneys for appellant.
Office of the Attorney General by John R. Henry, attorney for appellee.

Opinion:
WALLER, Presiding Justice,
for the Court.
¶ 1. We vacated the death sentence of Ronald Chris Foster pursuant to the United States Supreme Court's decision in Roper v. Simmons, and directed the Circuit Court of Lowndes County to resen-tence Foster to life in prison without the possibility of parole under Miss.Code Ann. § 99-19-107 (Rev.2000). The circuit court complied with that directive. On appeal, Foster challenges the applicability of section 99-19-107 and argues that we erred in not resentencing him under the 1991 version of Mississippi's capital murder statute, which would require a sentence of life with the possibility of parole. Because Foster's case is procedurally barred, and because we properly applied Miss.Code Ann. § 99-19-107 to Foster's case, the order from the circuit court is affirmed.
FACTS
¶ 2. Ronald Chris Foster was convicted in 1991 for capital murder with the underlying felony of armed robbery and was sentenced to death. He was seventeen years old at the time of the offense. We affirmed his conviction and sentence on direct appeal. Foster v. State, 639 So.2d 1263 (Miss.1994). Foster subsequently brought a motion for post-conviction relief, arguing that his diminished mental capacity made the imposition of the death penalty unconstitutional pursuant to the United States Supreme Court's decision in Atkins v. Virginia, 536 U.S. 304, 122 S.Ct. 2242, 153 L.Ed.2d 335 (2002). We addressed those claims in Foster v. State, 848 So.2d 172 (Miss.2003), and directed the circuit court to conduct an Atkins hearing on the issue of Foster's mental retardation.
¶ 3. In the wake of the United States Supreme Court's decision in Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. 551, 125 S.Ct. 1183, 161 L.Ed.2d 1 (2005), which held that the application of the death penalty against juvenile offenders violated the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments, we granted a motion by the State of Mississippi to withdraw our mandate for an Atkins hearing, vacated Foster's death sentence, and directed the Lowndes County Circuit Court to sentence Foster to life without the possibility of parole under Miss.Code Ann. § 99-19-107. Foster v. State, 2005 Miss. LEXIS 476 (Miss.2005); 95-DR-00750-SCT. Foster did not respond to the State's motion for resentencing and did not file a motion for reconsideration after it was granted. After the case was remanded to the circuit court, Foster filed a motion for a new sentencing hearing, alleging that this Court's order imposed an impermissible ex post facto sentence. The circuit court denied Foster's motion, finding that it had no discretion to consider the propriety of Foster's claim. Foster then appealed both this Court's final judgment and the denial of his motion for a sentencing hearing.
DISCUSSION
¶ 4. On appeal, Foster argues that his sentence constitutes an impermissible ex post facto punishment since the only sentencing options available under Miss.Code Ann. § 97-3-21 (1991) at the time of sentencing were death or life with the possibility of parole. He further argues that Miss.Code Ann. § 99-19-107, which states that if the death penalty is deemed unconstitutional, we must amend a defendant's sentence to life without the possibility of parole, is not applicable because Roper v. Simmons did not deem all applications of the death penalty unconstitutional, but only those imposed on juvenile offenders.
¶ 5. The State responds that Foster is procedurally barred from bringing an appeal to this Court's resentencing order, since he did not file a response to the State's motion to resentence, and that the application of Miss.Code Ann. § 99-19-107 presents no ex post facto problem, since the statute was passed on July 1, 1982, years before Foster's original sentencing.
I. WHETHER FOSTER IS PROCEDURALLY BARRED FROM CHALLENGING HIS SENTENCE.
¶ 6. The trial court was correct in noting that it had no discretion to consider Foster's ex post facto claim. The execution of orders issued by this Court is a purely ministerial act, and lower courts have no authority to alter or amend them. See, e.g., Miss. Comm'n on Judicial Performance v. Sanders, 708 So.2d 866, 874 (Miss.1998). Instead, Foster's claim should have been raised in a response to the State's motion to this Court under Miss. R.App. P. 27(a), or, in the alternative, in a motion for reconsideration of a motion under Miss. R.App. P. 27(h), or in a motion for rehearing under Miss. R.App. P. 40, after we granted the State's motion. His failure to do so bars his claim. In the alternative, his claim is without merit.
II. WHETHER THE APPLICATION OF MISS. CODE ANN. § 99-19-107 CONSTITUTES AN EX POST FACTO PUNISHMENT.
¶ 7. Foster first asserts that, after his death sentence was vacated, the only option available to this Court was the imposition of a sentence of life with the possibility of parole under the version of the capital murder statute in effect at the time the crime was committed. See Miss.Code Ann. § 97-3-21 (1991). He argues that no statute in effect at the time authorized a sentence of life without parole, and that the sentence therefore constitutes an unconstitutional ex post facto punishment under Article 3, Section 16 of the Mississippi Constitution and Article 1, Section 10 of the United States Constitution. This contention misstates the applicable law. At the time of he committed the crime, Foster was equally subject to Miss.Code Ann. § 99-19-107 (Rev.2000), amended in 1982, which states that:
In the event the death penalty is held to be unconstitutional by the Mississippi Supreme Court or the United States Supreme Court, the court having jurisdiction over a person previously sentenced to death shall cause such person to be brought before the court and the court shall sentence such person to imprisonment for life, and such person shall not be eligible for parole.
Where this statute governs a defendant's sentence, it plainly authorizes a sentence of life without parole. Therefore, the only question is whether the United States Supreme Court's prohibition on the execution of juvenile offenders falls within the scope of this statute.
¶ 8. The language of the statute is clear; it intends to provide for an alternative sentence for a person whose death sentence has been deemed unconstitutional. This Court has previously addressed the scope of section 99-19-107 in Abram v. State, 606 So.2d 1015 (Miss.1992). In Abram, this Court held that the statute was applicable "for that event when either this Court or the United States Supreme Court makes a wholesale declaration that the death penalty in general, and/or our own statutory death penalty scheme in particular, is unconstitutional." Abram, 606 So.2d at 1039. The "wholesale declaration" requirement set out in Abram is extraneous language that is unnecessary to the application of the statute. The statute provides that no one whose death penalty is ruled unconstitutional may receive parole. To the extent that Abram is inconsistent with the plain meaning of section 99-19-107, it is hereby overruled. Because Foster's death penalty was found unconstitutional by the United States Supreme Court's ruling in Roper, the application of section 99-19-107 is appropriate.
CONCLUSION
¶ 9. Foster's challenge to the application of section 99-19-107 to his case is barred because he failed to raise this issue before this Court before the remand for resen-tencing. Because this Court and the circuit court correctly applied Miss.Code. Ann. § 99-19-107 in resentencing Foster, and because application of the statute in no way constitutes an ex post facto punishment, our order resentencing Foster to life in prison without the possibility of parole is affirmed.
¶10. CONVICTION OF CAPITAL MURDER AND SENTENCE OF LIFE IMPRISONMENT IN THE CUSTODY OF THE MISSISSIPPI DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS WITHOUT THE POSSIBILITY OF PAROLE, AFFIRMED.
SMITH, C.J., CARLSON, DICKINSON AND RANDOLPH, JJ., CONCUR. DIAZ, P.J., DISSENTS WITH SEPARATE WRITTEN OPINION JOINED BY GRAVES, J. EASLEY AND LAMAR, JJ., NOT PARTICIPATING.