Opinion ID: 2166096
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The Petitioner's Claim

Text: Because the petition was dismissed for a lack of jurisdiction, the trial court did not consider the merits of the claim. As indicated, the petitioner asserts that his sentence is illegal because the trial court ordered him to serve the convictions in this case concurrently to a sentence for which he was on parole when he committed the offenses. If true, the claim would render the judgments void even though the petitioner would not be entitled to release and might ultimately be subjected to an even greater sentence than his twenty-year term. The governing statute provides, in pertinent part, as follows: Any prisoner who is convicted in this state of a felony, committed while on parole from a state prison, jail or workhouse, shall serve the remainder of the sentence under which the prisoner was paroled . . . before the prisoner commences serving the sentence received for the felony committed while on parole. . . . Tenn.Code Ann. § 40-28-123(a) (2006); [1] see also Tenn. R.Crim. P. 32(c)(3)(A); Henderson v. State ex rel. Lance, 220 Tenn. 520, 419 S.W.2d 176, 177 (Tenn.1967) overruled on other grounds as stated in Summers v. State, 212 S.W.3d 251, 258 n. 6 (Tenn.2007). Recently, however, in Summers v. State , this Court held that [i]n the case of an illegal sentence claim based on facts not apparent from the face of the judgment, an adequate record for summary review must include pertinent documents to support those factual assertions. Summers, 212 S.W.3d at 261. We ruled that [w]hen such documents from the record of the underlying proceedings are not attached to the habeas corpus petition, a trial court may properly choose to dismiss the petition without the appointment of counsel and without a hearing. Id. Here, the petitioner has failed to attach any documentation to support his claim that he was on parole when he committed the offenses that resulted in the convictions at issue. While he asserts that there is circumstantial evidence suggesting that his sentence is illegal, the record in its current form does not support that contention. Under these circumstances, summary dismissal of the petition was appropriate.