Opinion ID: 1846890
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Lancaster: Factual and Procedural History

Text: Lancaster's underlying offense occurred on May 3, 1987, and he was given an incarcerative sentence followed by a specified period of probation. Due to the award of several types of gain time including Administrative Gain Time and Provisional Credits, Lancaster was released in 1991 to begin service of the probationary portion of his sentence. Lancaster violated his probation and it was revoked in 1994. Lancaster was then resentenced. At that time, Lancaster was given credit for his previously awarded incentive and basic gain time (because his offense occurred before October 1, 1989, the effective date of the amendment to the gain time forfeiture statutes providing for forfeiture of all gain time upon the revocation of probation, community control or Provisional Release). See §§ 944.28(1), 948.06(6), Fla. Stat. (1989); State v. Green, 547 So.2d 925 (Fla.1989)(concerning the need for statutory authority for gain time forfeiture), modified, Dowdy v. Singletary, 704 So.2d 1052 (Fla.1998). The significant fact for this case, however, is that Lancaster was not given credit for his previously awarded overcrowding gain time (Administrative Gain Time and Provisional Credits). He was not given credit because, in accordance with our decision in Tripp v. State, 622 So.2d 941, 942 n. 2 (Fla.1993), [2] overcrowding gain time was not included under the general rubric of gain time which an inmate was entitled to under our prior opinion in State v. Green, 547 So.2d 925 (Fla.1989). These decisions were rendered prior to the United States Supreme Court decision in Lynce. The Fourth District Court in its appeal of this case held that Lancaster had a vested right in the benefits of the Administrative Gain Time statute which was in effect at the time of the offense. Lancaster v. State, 656 So.2d 533 (Fla. 4th DCA 1995), quashed, 687 So.2d 1299 (Fla.), vacated, ___ U.S. ___, 118 S.Ct. 37, 139 L.Ed.2d 5 (1997). On review of that decision, we found conflict [3] between the Fourth District's decision in Lancaster and our decision in Orosz v. Singletary, 655 So.2d 1112 (Fla.1995), superseded by 693 So.2d 538 (Fla.1997)(on rehearing). We quashed the Fourth District's decision explaining that it had misinterpreted our decision in Orosz and the holdings in several other cases. See Lancaster, 687 So.2d at 1300; see also Art. I, § 10, Fla. Const.; U.S. Const. art. I, § 10. We clarified that our holding in Orosz was narrow and only stood for the proposition that for a certain interval of time, the State lost its statutory authority to combine consecutive sentences into a single term (or overall sentence) for the purpose of awarding or forfeiting gain time. Lancaster, 687 So.2d at 1299. We further indicated that Orosz only applied to an inmate who: (1) committed an offense during the interval between July 1, 1978, and June 16, 1983; (2) was in service of a sentence at the time of the offense; (3) was given a sentence to run consecutively to the sentence for the previous offense; and (4) had completed the sentence for the previous offense before June 17, 1993. We also reaffirmed our position that overcrowding gain time was not subject to the Ex Post Facto Clause, citing to our decision in Calamia v. Singletary, 686 So.2d 1337 (Fla.1996). See also Lancaster, 687 So.2d at 1299-1300. It is clear that our previous opinion in this case consisted of two parts. The first part clarified the holding in Orosz and the second part reaffirmed our original decision in Calamia. Our opinion in Orosz was not based on ex post facto principles, but rather on statutes concerning the appropriate calculation of consecutive sentences. It is important to emphasize that the clarification of Orosz in our original Lancaster opinion is unaffected by this decision. Further, we expressly reaffirm that clarification. As noted, the second part of our decision in Lancaster held that there was no constitutional violation when inmates were not given credit for the Administrative Gain Time and Provisional Credits awarded during the incarcerative portion of their initial sentences (before their probation revocation) because such overcrowding gain time was not subject to the Ex Post Facto Clause. That part of our prior opinion is clearly affected by Lynce, as set forth below.