Opinion ID: 1124385
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Karaman

Text: In Karaman, we acknowledged a narrow exception to the general rule depriving the court of authority to modify a sentence once it has been imposed and entered in the clerk's minutes. ( Karaman, supra, 4 Cal.4th at p. 352.) We must now decide whether the Karaman exception is broad enough to apply to probation revocation cases, thereby essentially eliminating the primary distinction between suspended imposition and suspended execution sentencing. In Karaman, the defendant pleaded guilty to robbery and admitted the accompanying allegation of personal firearm use. ( Karaman, supra, 4 Cal.4th at p. 340.) The probation officer assigned to the defendant's case indicated that he was ineligible for probation because the robbery involved firearm use. ( Id. at p. 341; see also § 1203.06, subd. (a)(1)(B).) The trial court sentenced the defendant to the lower term of two years for the robbery charge, plus a two-year enhancement for personal firearm use. ( Karaman, supra, 4 Cal.4th at p. 341.) The court contemporaneously ordered execution of the sentence stayed for one week to allow the defendant to take care of personal matters. ( Ibid. ) The court clerk formally entered the sentence and the one-week stay order in the court minutes. ( Ibid. ) After the brief stay expired, the trial court held another hearing on its own motion. ( Karaman, supra, 4 Cal.4th at pp. 341-342.) The court struck the enhancement for personal firearm use, modifying the defendant's sentence to a two-year term for robbery. ( Id. at p. 342.) The district attorney appealed, arguing that the court lacked jurisdiction to modify the defendant's sentence once the clerk had entered the judgment into the court minutes. ( Id. at pp. 342-343.) We disagreed. We noted that generally a trial court lacks jurisdiction to resentence a criminal defendant after execution of sentence has begun. ( Karaman, supra, 4 Cal.4th at p. 344.) We also acknowledged that a judgment for imprisonment ordinarily is deemed executed when a certified copy of the minute order or abstract of judgment is furnished to the officer whose duty it is to execute the probationary order or judgment.... (§ 1213; see Karaman, supra, 4 Cal.4th at pp. 344-345; In re Black (1967) 66 Cal.2d 881, 890 [59 Cal. Rptr. 429, 428 P.2d 293].) We explained that courts have no jurisdiction to increase a sentence after its formal entry into the court minutes. ( Karaman, supra, 4 Cal.4th at p. 350; see also People v. McAllister (1940) 15 Cal.2d 519, 526-527 [102 P.2d 1072].) We found no authority, however, forbidding a court from reducing a sentence previously imposed but temporarily stayed, if the sentence had not yet been executed by delivery of a commitment order. ( Karaman, supra, 4 Cal.4th at p. 350.) We observed that a statute vests the sentencing court with similar, postcommitment authority, within 120 days of the date of commitment on its own motion ... [to] recall the sentence and commitment previously ordered and resentence the defendant in the same manner as if he or she had not previously been sentenced, provided the new sentence, if any, is no greater than the initial sentence. (§ 1170, subd. (d).) We recognized that this section is an exception to the common law rule that the court loses resentencing jurisdiction when execution of sentence begins. ( Karaman, supra, 4 Cal.4th at pp. 351-352; see Dix v. Superior Court (1991) 53 Cal.3d 442, 455-456 [279 Cal. Rptr. 834, 807 P.2d 1063].) But we also noted that, As a practical matter, to require a trial judge (who desires to resentence a defendant whose sentence has been stayed) to delay resentencing until the actual commencement of the defendant's prison term generally would entail a considerable waste of time and expense. ( Karaman, supra, 4 Cal.4th at p. 352.) Our opinion concluded, where the sentence is to a term of imprisonment, the trial court retains jurisdiction, during the period a stay is in effect and at any time prior to execution of the sentence, to reconsider the sentence and vacate it or impose any new sentence which is not greater than the initial sentence, just as it may do so on its own motion pursuant to section 1170, subdivision (d), within 120 days after the court has committed the defendant to the prison authorities. ( Karaman, supra, 4 Cal.4th at p. 352.) Thus, we held in Karaman that, although the trial court imposed a sentence, which was entered into the court's minutes, the court did not lose jurisdiction to modify the defendant's prison term during the brief period when it stayed execution of the sentence at his request. Unlike the situation in Karaman, here we are concerned with the court's power to modify an imposed sentence, long ago final in terms of appealability, execution of which the court had suspended during a probationary period. Did Karaman change the sentencing ground rules in probation revocation cases? The Court of Appeal decisions considering this question are in conflict.