Opinion ID: 2567176
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: the statutory right of allocution in washington

Text: ¶ 6 This State has afforded defendants the right to allocute by statute since its inception. In re Pers. Restraint of Echeverria, 141 Wash.2d 323, 333-34, 6 P.3d 573 (2000). Former RCW 10.64.040 provided in part: When the defendant appears for judgment, he must be ... asked whether he h[as] any legal cause to show why judgment should not be pronounced against him. After the legislature passed the Sentencing Reform Act of 1981, [2] it repealed RCW 10.64.040 (Laws of 1984, ch. 76, § 33), which had already been superseded by former CrR 7.1(a)(1), 82 Wash.2d 1159-60 (1973). Echeverria, 141 Wash.2d at 334, 6 P.3d 573. Former CrR 7.1(a)(1) read in part: Before disposition the court ... shall ask the defendant if he wishes to make a statement in his own behalf and to present any information in mitigation of punishment. CrR 7.1 was rewritten in 1984 and recodified as CrR 7.2, 101 Wash.2d 1115-16 (1984). The allocution provision was deleted from the rules since allocution was covered in more detail in RCW 9.94A.110. Comment to CrR 7.2, 101 Wash.2d at 1116. RCW 9.94A.110 was recodified in 1999 as RCW 9.94A.500, but the allocution provision remained unchanged. ¶ 7 RCW 9.94A.500(1) states in relevant part: The court shall consider the risk assessment report and presentence reports, if any, including any victim impact statement and criminal history, and allow arguments from the prosecutor, the defense counsel, the offender, the victim, the survivor of the victim, or a representative of the victim or survivor, and an investigative law enforcement officer as to the sentence to be imposed. (Emphasis added.) ¶ 8 All three defendants claim that they were denied their right of allocution at their SSOSA revocation hearings because the sentencing judge failed to solicit their statements in allocution. They claim that RCW 9.94A.500, entitled Sentencing hearingPresentence procedures[,] is the source of this right. The statute states in relevant part: [t]he court shall ... allow arguments from ... the offender ... as to the sentence to be imposed. RCW 9.94A.500(1). This court has said that trial courts should scrupulously follow [the presentence procedures] by directly addressing defendants during sentencing hearings, asking whether they wish to say anything to the court in mitigation of sentence, and allowing `arguments from . . . the offender[s] . . . as to the sentence to be imposed.' Echeverria, 141 Wash.2d at 336-37, 6 P.3d 573 (emphasis added). Doing so unequivocally acknowledge[s] the right of allocution as a significant aspect of the sentencing process. Id. at 337, 6 P.3d 573. Whether the revocation court must perform the same inquiry as a sentencing court is the subject of these consolidated cases. ¶ 9 Sentencing hearings and a revocation hearing serve different purposes. It is at the sentencing hearing that the judge must decide whether or not to sentence the defendant to prison and, if so, what the appropriate duration of such confinement should be. It is at the sentencing hearing that the right of the accused to make a personal statement is vital. At a revocation hearing, the inquiry is different. The court has already decided to sentence the defendant to prison and for how long. At sentencing the defendant has an absolute liberty interest at stake, but at a revocation hearing the defendant's enjoyment of this liberty interest is conditioned upon complying with terms of the suspension imposed. ¶ 10 The text of the statute is limited to sentencing hearings. Unlike at a sentencing hearing, law enforcement representatives and victims are neither present nor invited to speak at a SSOSA revocation hearing. Compare RCW 9.94A.670(4) with RCW 9.94A.670(10). Thus, the need for allocution as a means of countering and contradicting these statements is absent at the revocation hearing. Allocution may, however, still serve an important function at a revocation hearing. While the defendant may have more at stake at the initial sentencing hearing, he still has a conditional liberty interest at stake at revocation. There is no reason to deny a defendant the opportunity to allocute at revocation since allowing a defendant a few moments of the court's time is minimally invasive. United States v. Barnes, 948 F.2d 325, 331 (7th Cir.1991).