Opinion ID: 848619
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: The Availability of a Life Sentence

Text: If the twenty-five points that were erroneously assessed under OV 3 were subtracted from defendant's score, defendant would fall within the II-B cell of the sentencing grid contained in M.C.L. § 777.61, which specifies a minimum sentence range of 162 to 270 months. After increasing the higher number by twenty-five percent in accordance with the second-offense habitual-offender statute, defendant's range becomes 162 to 337 months. Although the Legislature has provided sentencing grids that delineate the appropriate sentencing ranges for various combinations of OV and prior record variable (PRV) scores in M.C.L. §§ 777.61 through 777.69, it has not provided separate grids for sentences that are increased when a defendant is an habitual offender. In this case, the Court of Appeals determined that because defendant's upper minimum increased to 337 months by virtue of the habitual-offender statute, a life sentence was available. The Court of Appeals reasoned that other cells having an upper minimum of more than three hundred months offer the option of a life sentence, so the Legislature must have intended that any time an upper minimum is more than three hundred months, a life sentence is available. Because the Legislature chose not to provide sentencing grids governing habitual-offender sentences, the plain language of the habitual-offender sentencing guidelines statute governs. The relevant statute, M.C.L. § 777.21, states: (3) If the offender is being sentenced under section 10, 11, or 12 of chapter IX, determine the offense category, offense class, offense variable level, and prior record variable level based on the underlying offense. To determine the recommended minimum sentence range, increase the upper limit of the recommended minimum sentence range determined under part 6 for the underlying offense as follows: (a) If the offender is being sentenced for a second felony, 25%. Before applying the increase, defendant's upper minimum was 270 months. Two hundred seventy increased by twenty-five percent is approximately 337. Three hundred thirty-seven months is not life. I would conclude that if the Legislature had intended that a life sentence be an option, it would have so specified, either in the habitual-offender sentencing guidelines statutes or in a separate sentencing grid. As such, I would decline to write the word life into the sentencing grid cell at issue. The Court of Appeals arbitrarily used three hundred months as a harbinger that a life sentence was available. But it is not at all clear that three hundred months is the dispositive guiding factor because cell III-A, in which 270 months is the upper minimum, allows for a life sentence. A more rational explanation is that the Legislature included a life option where it believed that the combined OV and PRV scores merited it. For instance, when a defendant amasses one hundred or more points in OVs, a life sentence is an option, even where the upper minimum is less than three hundred months. In that cell, III-A, the range is 162 to 270 months or life. And in cell I-C, where the OV total is relatively low, zero to forty-nine points, and the PRV level is zero to twenty-four points, the sentence range is the same as that in the III-A cell, except that life is not an option. Thus, it appears that the availability of a life sentence is tied to the OV and PRV score totals, rather than the number of months represented by the upper minimum. Here, neither defendant's OV nor PRV score changed by virtue of increasing his upper limit pursuant to the habitual-offender sentencing guidelines statute. Therefore, because a life sentence is not an option for defendants having the OV and PRV scores reflected by cell II-B, absent an articulated upward departure, a life sentence is not available even if the upper minimum is increased to reflect a defendant's habitual-offender status. Thus, I would hold that in instances where a victim dies and homicide is an element of the sentencing offense, the proper score for OV 3 is zero points. Further, I would hold that if a defendant's upper minimum is increased pursuant to the habitual-offender sentencing guidelines statute, whether a life sentence is available depends on whether it is denoted in the legislative sentencing grids and not on the number of months in a defendant's upper minimum sentence. As such, I would reverse the decision of the Court of Appeals and remand this case to the trial court for the appropriate resentencing. WEAVER and MARILYN J. KELLY, JJ., concur.