Opinion ID: 2364396
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Issue: The district court correctly scored Williams' Washington convictions in 2001 and 2002 as person felonies when sentencing for Kansas identity theft convictions for offenses committed in 2005 and 2006.

Text: The calculation of criminal history score for out-of-state convictions is governed by K.S.A. 21-4711(e). It provides: Out-of-state convictions and juvenile adjudications will be used in classifying the offender's criminal history. An out-of-state crime will be classified as either a felony or a misdemeanor according to the convicting jurisdiction. If a crime is a felony in another state, it will be counted as a felony in Kansas. The state of Kansas shall classify the crime as a person or nonperson. In designating a[n out-of-state] crime as person or nonperson comparable offenses shall be referred to. If the state of Kansas does not have a comparable offense, the out-of-state conviction shall be classified as a nonperson crime. (Emphasis added.) We agree with the parties that K.S.A. 21-4018, which criminalizes identity theft and identity fraud, expresses the Kansas offense that is comparable to the Washington offense for which Williams was convicted and sentenced in 2001 and 2002. The complicator of the instant case is the change occurring in this statute between the time of Williams' Washington offenses and her 2007 sentencing in Kansas for offenses committed here. K.S.A. 21-4018 was enacted in 1998 and was originally a class A person misdemeanor. L.1998, ch. 179, sec. 1. In 2000, the legislature amended 21-4018 by increasing the severity to a level 7 person felony. L.2000, ch. 181, sec. 8. In 2005, the legislature again amended, this time reducing the severity to a level 8 nonperson felony. L.2005, ch. 131, sec. 2. The fundamental rule is that a statute operates prospectively unless its language clearly indicates that the legislature intended it to operate retroactively. State v. Hutchison, 228 Kan. 279, 287, 615 P.2d 138 (1980). An exception to the fundamental rule is that if the statutory change does not prejudicially affect the substantive rights of the parties and is merely procedural or remedial in nature, it applies retroactively. State v. Sutherland, 248 Kan. 96, 106, 804 P.2d 970 (1991). The 2000 and the 2005 amendments to the Kansas identity theft statute, K.S.A. 21-4018, altered substantive rights by modifying the severity of the punishment for a conviction by reclassifying the crimes as person and nonperson respectively. Therefore, each amendment operates prospectively only. See Sutherland, 248 Kan. at 106, 804 P.2d 970; State v. Sylva, 248 Kan. 118, 119, 804 P.2d 967 (1991). In sum, identity theft was a level 7 person felony in Kansas when Williams committed her Washington crimes, and was convicted and sentenced for them, in 2001 and 2002. While the parties agree that K.S.A. 21-4018 provides the comparable offense, they disagree on whether the 2000 version (person felony) or the 2005 version (nonperson felony) of the statute applies.