Opinion ID: 1290296
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Heading: The validity of the 60-Day Term of Incarceration as a Condition of Probation

Text: Under NRS 176.185(1), it is within the power of the trial court to suspend the execution of the sentence imposed and grant probation to the convicted person as the judge thereof deems advisable. In granting probation, the court may fix the terms and conditions thereof,  NRS 176.185(3), and is authorized to impose . . any conditions of probation or suspension of sentence. NRS 176.205. (Emphasis supplied.) Despite the ostensibly unlimited nature of the power granted to the trial court to set conditions, Creps argues that a term of incarceration in the county jail is beyond the power of the trial court to impose as a condition of probation. [3] Creps' challenge to the validity of the use of a short term of incarceration as a condition of probation is essentially twofold: first, that the imposition of such a condition impermissibly impinges upon the pardon and parole powers of the Executive Branch; and second, that even if no such constitutional conflicts arise from the imposition, a term of incarceration is so fundamentally inconsistent with the concept of probation as to have been beyond the scope of permissible conditions contemplated by the Legislature in enacting the sentencing scheme embodied in NRS Ch. 176. a. Creps bases his executive power conflict argument on the authority of our holding in State v. District Court, 85 Nev. 485, 457 P.2d 217 (1969). In that case, we held it to be beyond the trial court's original sentencing power to suspend the execution of a ten-year prison sentence and place the convicted defendant on three years probation, conditioned upon serving two years in the Nevada State Prison. Such a sentence, we held, constituted in effect a delayed parole, 85 Nev. supra, at 487, 457 P.2d 217, in derogation of the Legislature's specific allocation of the parole power to the Executive Branch. It was also suggested in State v. District Court that such a sentence might impinge upon the Executive's pardon power. 85 Nev. supra, at 487, 457 P.2d 217. Despite the broad language of State v. District Court, supra , [4] it is clear that the power to alleviate a sentence (probation/parole/commutation) and the power to vacate an underlying conviction (honorable discharge from probation/pardon) are to a large extent dually allocated by the Legislature pursuant to constitutional mandate between the judicial and Executive branches of state government in overlapping fashion. [5] In State v. District Court we merely held that there do exist certain situations in which the Legislature could not have intended, because the Constitution did not permit, that the judicial and executive commutation powers should overlap, certain situations in which the power to alleviate a sentence is committed exclusively to one branch. The parole power, we held in that case, was just such an exclusively-delegated power; once a person is incarcerated in the state prison and is subject to the power of the executive parole board, see, NRS 213.107-290, the power to alleviate the sentence rests entirely with the executive branch. [6] However when, as here, a convicted defendant is subjected as a condition of probation to a term of incarceration of sixty days in the county jail, there occurs no possible conflict with the exclusively-executive parole power such as existed in State v. District Court . First, in order to come within the scope of the executive parole power, a person must first have served at least one year in confinement. NRS 213.120. A term of incarceration of 60 days is thus not within those sentences the parole board has the power to touch. Further, while former NRS 176.190 (now 176.095) and NRS 213.110 (similarly codified after its amendment) both allowed the board of parole commissioners to grant parole to a person in the county jail, parole may now be granted only to persons confined in the Nevada state prison. See, S.O.N. 1969, Ch. 345, p. 598, A.B. 543 amending NRS 213.110. See also, Minutes, Senate Judiciary Committee, April 9, 1969, State Archives Book 30, p. 390; Minutes, Assembly Judiciary Committee, March 19, 1969, State Archives Book 22, p. 155. As stated in State v. District Court , the executive parole power comes into effect after incarceration in the state prison, and not before. 85 Nev. supra, at 488, 457 P.2d at 218. We conclude, therefore, that the imposition of a term of incarceration of sixty days in the county jail as a condition of probation does not represent a judicial intrusion into the exclusively-executive parole power. Moreover, to the extent that Creps is also subject during his term of incarceration to the executive commutation power under NRS 213.090, such overlapping commutation powers are clearly contemplated under the sentencing scheme set forth in Chapters 176 and 213 of the Nevada Revised Statutes and Article 5 of the Nevada Constitution. b. Creps finally argues that even if a 60-day term of conditional incarceration suffers from no constitutional infirmity, the use of incarceration as a condition is so fundamentally inconsistent with the concept of probation that we must conclude it to be beyond the scope of permissible conditions contemplated by the Nevada Legislature in enacting NRS 176.185 and 176.205. He has cited us to a series of recent cases in which the courts of other states have concluded that the condition should not be permitted unless specifically authorized by statute. State v. Harris, 251 N.W.2d 483 (Iowa 1977); State ex rel. St. Louis County v. Stussie, 556 S.W.2d 186 (Mo. 1977); State v. Marshall, 247 N.W.2d 484 (S.D. 1976); State v. Nuss, 190 Neb. 755, 212 N.W.2d 565 (1973); People v. Ledford, 173 Colo. 194, 477 P.2d 374 (1970); State v. Van Meter, 7 Ariz. App. 422, 440 P.2d 58 rev. den. (1968); White v. Burke, 43 F.2d 329 (10th Cir.1930). The propriety of the use of incarceration as a condition of probation has been much debated; we note the contrary line of cases upholding its use in the absence of statutory prohibition. State v. Jones, 327 So.2d 18 (Fla. 1976); State ex rel. Woodbury v. District Court, 159 Mont. 128, 495 P.2d 1119 (1972); Franklin v. State, 87 Idaho 291, 392 P.2d 552 (1964); Tabor v. Maxwell, 175 Ohio St. 373, 194 N.E.2d 856 (1963); Breeding v. Swenson, 240 Minn. 93, 60 N.W.2d 4 (1953); U.S. ex rel. Spellman v. Murphy, 217 F.2d 247 (7th Cir.1954); Moore v. Patterson, 203 S.C. 90, 26 S.E.2d 319, 147 A.L.R. 653 (1943). The power to suspend sentence and grant probation springs from legislative grant rather than from the inherent powers of the court. State v. District Court, supra ; State v. Abbott, 87 S.C. 466, 70 S.E. 6 (1911); but see, State v. Jones, supra . Thus the primary enquiry in determining the range of permissible conditions under Ch. 176 must be the original and continuing legislative intent as reflected in the language of the enacted legislation. Further, the particularly ameliorative nature of probation statutes compels a liberal interpretation of the discretionary powers conferred on the district courts, Franklin v. State, supra , especially when, as here, there exists no danger of judicial intrusion into exclusively-executive realms. See, State v. District Court, supra, 85 Nev. at 487, 457 P.2d 217. [7] Our analysis of the language and background of Ch. 176 reveals no compelling reason to conclude that the legislature intended to exclude incarceration from the range of permissible conditions of probation. First, the language of NRS 176.185 and 176.205, as originally enacted in 1951, [8] fails to reveal any legislative attempt to circumscribe or define the discretionary sentencing powers conferred on the district court. On the contrary, the legislative history of A.B. 207 reveals that the Probation Act was amended in the Senate specifically to exclude any legislative delineation of the options available to the district court, see Journal of the Senate, 1951, p. 343, [9] and to confer instead a broad and virtually unlimited discretion on the court to fashion sentencing dispositions according to the needs of the particular defendant. As enacted, A.B. 207 authorized the district court to grant probation ... as the judge ... shall deem advisable,  and conferred on the court full power to fix the terms and conditions thereof. See, NRS 176.185. [10] Further, the court is authorized to impose ... any conditions of probation. See, NRS 176.205. Clearly, such broad language compels no automatic exclusion of a short term of incarceration in the county jail from the range of alternatives available to the district court. Moreover, we do not believe the inclusion of a term of incarceration in the county jail within the set of permissible conditions available to the district courts under NRS 176.185 and 176.205 to run counter to any persuasive policy arguments advanced by courts in other jurisdictions. Creps cites us to many recent cases in which the argument is made that probation and incarceration of any sort or for any duration are fundamentally inconsistent concepts, the latter being both semantically inconsistent with the former, [11] and antithetical to its rehabilitative goals. [12] Even discounting the factual and other peculiarities of several of these cases, [13] we remain unconvinced by their logic. Whatever the semantic content of the term probation may once have been, [14] it can no longer be argued convincingly that probation necessarily involves an immediate release from incarceration. Through statutory amendment specifically to permit the imposition of incarceration as a condition of probation, [15] case law interpretation of statutes which, like NRS 176.185 and 176.205, do not specifically enumerate a list of permissible conditions, [16] and scholarly commentary, [17] probation has come to signify less a necessary and immediate release from custody than a carefully tailored program of rehabilitation, potentially involving a short term of incarceration, judicially fashioned to suit the needs and character of a particular convicted person. Moreover, we perceive no conflict between the essentially rehabilitative goals of the Nevada probation statutes and the use of a short term of incarceration as a condition thereof. That a short and definite term of confinement imposed as a condition of probation may have a substantial rehabilitative effect in certain cases has come to be widely recognized. See, Franklin v. State, supra, 392 P.2d 561-565, concurring and dissenting opinion. Significantly, both the A.B.A. Project on Minimum Standards for Criminal Justice; Sentencing Alternatives and Procedures (§ 2.4(a)(iii) Appr. Draft 1968) and the A.L.I. Model Penal Code (§ 6.02(3), alternative draft) specifically permit the imposition of a term of incarceration as a term of probation. The particular advantages in preserving its availability as a sentencing alternative are best described in one of the Workshop conclusions reached at the Seminar & Institute on Disparity of Sentences for the Sixth, Seventh, and Eighth Judicial Circuits, (1961), 30 F.R.D. 401, 445: Many judges thought [conditioning probation upon a term of incarceration under 18 U.S.C. 3651] an appropriate disposition ... because it combined the deterrent effect of imprisonment and achieved a `shock treatment' of defendants who are unaware of the seriousness of their offense, retaining the advantages of probation where longer incarceration would serve no useful purpose. See also, Franklin v. State, supra, 392 P.2d at 562. We believe that a short term of incarceration imposed as a condition of probation may in certain cases play a beneficial role in the rehabilitation of a convicted person, and that such a condition has a useful and proper place in the range of sentencing alternatives available to the district court under NRS 176.185 and 176.205. Affirmed.