Title: Ronnie Roddy v. State of Arkansas
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: CR99-254
State: Arkansas
Issuer: Arkansas Supreme Court
Date: September 28, 2000

ARKANSAS SUPREME COURT NOT DESIGNATED FOR PUBLICATION PER CURIAM SEPTEMBER 28, 2000 RONNIE RODDY Appellant v. STATE OF ARKANSAS Appellee CR 99-254 APPEAL FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF JACKSON COUNTY, (NO. CR 98-32), HONORABLE HAROLD S. ERWIN, JUDGE AFFIRMED Ronnie Roddy pleaded guilty to aggravated robbery and was sentenced to a term of thirty years in the Arkansas Department of Correction. Within ninety days of the entry of the judgment and commitment order, Roddy filed a petition to withdraw his plea pursuant to Arkansas Criminal Procedure Rule 26.1 (1997). He alternatively styled the petition as a prayer for postconviction relief pursuant to Ark. R. Crim. P. 37. He claimed that relief was warranted because the ineffectiveness of his trial counsel prevented him from making a knowing and intelligent waiver of his right to a jury trial. After a hearing, the circuit court entered written findings of fact and conclusions of law that denied relief. Roddy now appeals that order. We find no error and affirm. Roddy was charged with aggravated robbery on January 29, 1998. On February 5, 1998, he pleaded guilty to the charge and the judgment and commitment order was entered on that date. Although the State initially made an offer of forty years' imprisonment in exchange for plea, Roddy followed the advice of his attorney and rejected the offer. He decided instead to plea directly to the court. The judgment and commitment order reflected that the presumptive sentence, taking into account the severity of the offense and Roddy's lack of a prior criminal record, was 120 months, or ten years in the Arkansas Department of Correction. During the plea hearing, however, the State recommended that the court sentence Roddy to forty years' imprisonment. The trial court sentenced Roddy to a term of thirty years' imprisonment, and a report that was filed with the judgment and commitment order reflected that the trial court departed from the presumptive sentence because the aggravated robbery was "committed in a manner that exposed risk of injury to others." The circuit court's order does not expressly state whether it treated Roddy's pleading as a motion to withdraw the plea under Rule 26.1 or a petition for postconviction relief under Rule 37. To the extent that Roddy's pleading was a motion for withdrawal of his plea pursuant to Rule 26.1, it was untimely. A motion to withdraw a guilty plea under Rule 26.1 is untimely when filed after sentencing and entry of judgment. Johninson v. State, 330 Ark. 381, 953 S.W.2d 883 (1997). Accordingly, in order to reach the merits of Roddy's appeal, we must treat the circuit court's order as a denial of relief under Rule 37. Seek v. State, 330 Ark. 833, 957 S.W.2d 709 (1997). In his petition, Roddy contended that he was entitled to relief because of the ineffectiveness of his defense attorney. Specifically, he alleged that his counsel represented to him that if he entered a plea of guilty to the court, he could expect to receive a sentence of ten years. Roddy also alleged that his attorney prepared the judgment and commitment order, and that prior to the plea hearing, Roddy reviewed the document and saw that the presumptive sentence in his case would be 120 months. Roddy next alleged that his counsel was ineffective because he failed to advise him about the existence of Ark. Code Ann. § 16-93-611, which provides that offenders who are convicted of Class Y felonies, including aggravated robbery, must serve seventy percent of their sentences before becoming eligible for parole. Lastly, Roddy alleged that his attorney wasineffective because he failed to request a pre-sentence report or otherwise conduct an adequate investigation of Roddy's background. According to Roddy, a proper investigation would have revealed that he graduated from high school as a "straight A" honor student, that he had no prior criminal record, and that he had come from a broken home, facts that Roddy argued could have mitigated his "draconian" thirty-year sentence. When a defendant pleads guilty, the only claims cognizable in Rule 37 proceedings are those which allege that the plea was not made voluntarily and intelligently or was entered without effective assistance of counsel. State v. Herred, 332 Ark. 241, 964 S.W.2d 391 (1998) We will not reverse the trial court's findings granting or denying postconviction relief absent clear error. Id. The rule for evaluating ineffective-assistance-of-counsel claims in cases involving guilty pleas appears in Hill v. Lockhart, 474 U.S. 52 (1985). In that case, the Supreme Court held that the "cause and prejudice" test of Strickland v. Washington, 466 U.S. 668 (1984), applied to challenges to guilty pleas based on ineffective assistance of counsel. The Court further held that in order to show prejudice in the context of a guilty plea, the petitioner must show that there is a reasonable probability that, but for counsel's unprofessional errors, he would not have pleaded guilty and would have insisted on going to trial. Hill v. Lockhart, 474 U.S. at 50; Buchheit v. State, 339 Ark. 481, 6 S.W.3d 109 (1999). We turn first to Roddy's allegation that his counsel performed deficiently when he led Roddy to believe that he would receive a ten-year sentence if he entered a guilty plea. His claim is not that such a representation was contrary to the law. See Hill v. Lockhart, supra. The presumptive sentence for aggravated robbery is ten years. Rather, it appears that the argument is that Roddy's counsel, Scott Nance, performed deficiently when he did not inform Roddy about the possibility that he could receive a greater sentence. We find no merit and affirm. Roddy testified during the postconviction hearing that the judgment and commitment order was shown to him before he entered his plea. The judgment and commitment order, which was prepared by his attorney prior to the plea hearing, reflected that the presumptive sentence was 120 months. Roddy also testified that he was told the presumptive sentence would be 120 months, and that his lawyer told him that he would probably be paroled after five years. He further stated, "(i)f I had thought I was in serious jeopardy of getting more than 10 years I would not have entered a plea of guilty." Roddy's attorney, Scott Nance, denied that he told Roddy that he would serve ten years. Nance testified that he advised Roddy to reject the State's offer of a negotiated plea because he thought Roddy could get a lighter sentence from the trial judge. Nance stated that while he thought pleading to the court would yield a lighter sentence, he made no specific representation of what the sentence would be. Nance also testified that while he did discuss the "statutory amount" of the sentence for aggravated robbery, he did not discuss the sentencing guidelines, or the presumptive sentence, with Roddy. In its order, the circuit court did not expressly find that there was a conflict in the testimony over whether Nance told Roddy that he could expect to receive a ten year sentence. The circuit court nevertheless credited Nance's testimony and found that Nance "testified that he did not tell defendant that he would receive a ten year sentence.' The court then concluded as a matter of law that Roddy failed to show that Nance's representation was ineffective. Citing Johninson v. State, supra; and Seek v. State, supra, the circuit court further concluded that "there was no plea agreement, and the fact that defendant hoped for, or even expected a lighter sentence, is not grounds for withdrawing the plea." We must affirm the ruling of the circuit court because it is not clearly erroneous. Catlett v.State, 331 Ark. 270, 962 S.W.2d 313 (1998). The circuit court resolved the conflict between Nance and Roddy's testimony to find that Nance never told Roddy to expect a ten year sentence. We will not revisit that finding because the circuit court is in the best position to judge the credibility of witnesses and to resolve any conflicts in that testimony. Lee v. State, 340 Ark. 504, 11 S.W.2d 553 (2000). We note, however, that Roddy's claim that he was told that he would receive the presumptive sentence of ten years is also belied by his signature on the plea agreement and his statements during the plea hearing. Although the offense listed is "robbery," rather than aggravated robbery, the plea agreement sets forth the statutory range of punishment as "10 to 40 years, or life." Roddy's signature also acknowledged the following clause in the plea agreement: Neither the Prosecuting Attorney, nor my attorney, nor the Court, nor anyone else has made any representations to me about being released from confinement sooner than the actual sentence that I will receive from the Court. I understand that I may have to serve the full sentence before I am released. No one has told me the date I am to be released from prison. Moreover, during the plea hearing, the State recommended a sentence of forty years, after which Roddy and the trial court had the following exchange: THE COURT: I'm 52. Now if I follow what he says, you won't even be eligible for parole until you are six years younger than me. In other words, you are standing here and within the next minute or two you're going to face your entire adult productive life on whether I say you get forty years or not. Do you realize that? RODDY: Yes, sir. *** THE COURT: Anybody told you the date you're supposed to get out of the penitentiary? RODDY: No, sir. As can be seen, Roddy was fully aware of the range of punishment for aggravated robbery, and the trial court clearly explained the length of the possible sentence in terms of the impact that it will have on Roddy's life. Roddy also expressly denied being told of the date he could expect to be released from prison. Under these circumstances, it was not clearly erroneous for the circuit court to deny relief on this claim. Roddy next argues that Nance performed deficiently when he failed to inform Roddy that a conviction for aggravated robbery would warrant the application of Ark. Code Ann. § 16-93-611 (Supp. 1997), which requires that prisoners convicted of Class Y felonies serve at least seventy percent of their sentences before becoming eligible for parole. This argument has no merit. An attorney has no constitutional duty to inform his client about the existence of the seventy percent rule, or the specifics of parole eligibility. Buchheit v. State, supra; see also Propst v. State, 335 Ark. 448, 983 S.W.2d 405 (1998). Roddy also claims that Nance provided ineffective assistance of counsel because he failed to conduct an adequate investigation into Roddy's background. According to Roddy, an adequate investigation would have revealed information that Nance could have used to argue for mitigation of his sentence. The State argues that this issue is procedurally barred because although it was raised in Roddy's petition, it was not ruled upon by the circuit court in its order. In his reply brief, Roddy argues that this issue should not be procedurally barred becauseRule 37.2(d) expressly prohibits petitions for rehearing. Specifically, he argues that the prohibition prevented him from seeking a ruling on the issue after the circuit court issued its order. Cases from this court, however, hold otherwise. In supplemental opinion upon denial of rehearing in Matthews v. State, 333 Ark. 701, 970 S.W.2d 289 (1998), we interpreted McClendon v. State, 293 Ark. 173, 735 S.W.2d 701 (1987) and held that the prohibition against petitions for rehearing in Rule 37.2(d) was limited to requests for the circuit court to reverse itself on issues already decided. Consequently, we also held that Rule 37.2(d) did not prohibit requests for the circuit court to modify its order to include an issue that was raised in the petition, yet omitted from the original order. See also Beshears v. State, 340 Ark. 70, 8 S.W.3d 32 (2000). Accordingly, Rule 37.2(d) cannot excuse Roddy's failure to obtain a ruling on this issue below. We must affirm. Affirmed.