Court Opinion

ID: 9950845
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-14 20:11:53.029373+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:36:54.005729
License: Public Domain

[Cite as State v. Banville, 2024-Ohio-956.]

                                COURT OF APPEALS OF OHIO

                              EIGHTH APPELLATE DISTRICT
                                 COUNTY OF CUYAHOGA

STATE OF OHIO,                                      :

                 Plaintiff-Appellee,                :
                                                             No. 112965
                 v.                                 :

KENNETH BANVILLE,                                   :

                 Defendant-Appellant.               :

                                 JOURNAL ENTRY AND OPINION

                 JUDGMENT: AFFIRMED AND REMANDED
                 RELEASED AND JOURNALIZED: March 14, 2024

          Criminal Appeal from the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas
                             Case Nos. CR-22-677123-A

                                              Appearances:

                 Michael C. O’Malley, Cuyahoga County Prosecuting
                 Attorney, and Gregory M. Paul, Assistant Prosecuting
                 Attorney, for appellee.

                 Wegman Hessler Valore and Dean M. Valore, for
                 appellant.

SEAN C. GALLAGHER, J.:

                   Appellant Kenneth Banville appeals the sentence imposed in

Cuyahoga C.P. No. CR-22-677123-A. Upon review, we affirm the judgment of the
trial court, but remand with instructions for the trial court to issue a nunc pro tunc

sentencing entry that incorporates its consecutive-sentence findings.

              Appellant entered guilty pleas to 15 counts in this case, which

included charges of involuntary manslaughter, gross abuse of a corpse, tampering

with evidence, having weapons while under disability, corrupting another with

drugs, and other drug-related charges. The trial court held a joint-sentencing

hearing on June 28, 2023, at which appellant was sentenced in this case, as well as

in three other cases. The trial court imposed an aggregate sentence in this case of 14

years to 19.5 years. The sentence was ordered to run concurrent with the 9-year

aggregate sentence imposed in Cuyahoga C.P. No. CR-22-672644, but consecutive

with the 9-year aggregate sentence imposed in each Cuyahoga C.P. Nos. CR-19-

636305-A and CR-21-665107-A, which were run consecutive to each other.

Appellant timely appealed his sentence in this case.1

              Under his first assignment of error, appellant raises constitutional

challenges to the Reagan Tokes Law and the trial court’s imposition of an indefinite

sentence. We summarily overrule this assignment of error on the authority of State

v. Hacker, Slip Opinion No. 2023-Ohio-2535.

              Under his second assignment of error, appellant challenges the trial

court’s imposition of consecutive sentences. Appellant argues that the trial court

      1 We shall address only the case before us on appeal.   See State v. Tate, 8th Dist.
Cuyahoga Nos. 102776 and 102777, 2015-Ohio-5260, ¶ 2.
failed to make the properly supported findings and that the trial court failed to

incorporate any findings within the sentencing entry.

                 Pursuant to R.C. 2929.14(C)(4), to impose consecutive sentences, a

trial court must find that “the consecutive service is necessary to protect the public

from future crime or to punish the offender and that consecutive sentences are not

disproportionate to the seriousness of the offender’s conduct and to the danger the

offender poses to the public.” The trial court also must make at least one of the

findings set forth under R.C. 2929.14(C)(4)(a)-(c). “When imposing consecutive

sentences, a trial court must state the required findings as part of the sentencing

hearing” and “incorporate its statutory findings into the sentencing entry.” State v.

Bonnell, 140 Ohio St.3d 209, 2014-Ohio-3177, 16 N.E.3d 659, ¶ 29.

                 A review of the transcript reflects that the trial court made each of the

required statutory findings at the sentencing hearing. The trial court found as

follows:

      I do find that consecutive sentences are necessary to protect the public
      from future crimes and to punish the offender, and that consecutive
      sentences are not disproportionate to the seriousness of your conduct
      and truly to the danger that you pose to the public.

             Again, you committed these multiple offenses while you were
      awaiting sentencing. And as has been previously discussed, you have a
      criminal history which demonstrates that consecutive sentences are
      necessary to protect the public from future crimes. At least one or more
      of these courses of conduct and harm caused by these multiple offenses
      committed are so great or unusual that any single prison term for any
      of these offenses committed as part of a course of conduct would
      adequately reflect the seriousness of your conduct.

(Tr. 110-111.)
               Although appellant acknowledges that the requisite findings were

made, he argues that the findings were relevant to running the sentence “within this

case” consecutively and that the trial court went on to run the sentence consecutive

to two other cases without having made separate findings in this regard and without

having any information given about the other cases at the sentencing hearing.

Appellant fails to cite any authority to support this argument. A court of appeals

may disregard any assigned error that is unsupported by citation to caselaw or

statutes. State v. Tye, 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 111174, 2022-Ohio-2869, ¶ 25, citing

App.R. 12(A)(2) and 16(A)(7).2

               Nonetheless, as this court has previously recognized, “R.C.

2929.14(C) refers to ‘convictions of multiple offenses,’ but does not distinguish

between multiple counts in a single case and multiple counts in separate cases.”

State v. Alexander, 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 98762, 2013-Ohio-1987, ¶ 6, fn. 1; see

also State v. Rice, 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 102443, 2015-Ohio-3885, ¶ 11

(recognizing a trial court has authority to order a prison term to run consecutive to

a prison term in another case). Also, “[i]n order to impose any or all of the sentences

consecutively, the trial court was required to make findings, not multiple sets of

findings dependent on the source of the sentence imposed.” State v. Smith, 8th Dist.

Cuyahoga No. 112271, 2023-Ohio-3974, ¶ 17, citing State v. Jones, 171 Ohio St.3d

      2 Moreover, it is not the role of an appellate court to search for legal authority to

support an appellant’s argument. See State v. Quarterman, 140 Ohio St.3d 464, 2014-
Ohio-4034, 19 N.E.3d 900, ¶ 19, citing State v. Bodyke, 126 Ohio St.3d 266, 2010-Ohio-
2424, 933 N.E.2d 753, ¶ 78 (O’Donnell, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part).
496, 2022-Ohio-4485, 218 N.E.3d 867, ¶ 12.            “The plain language of R.C.

2953.08(G)(2) requires an appellate court to defer to a trial court’s consecutive-

sentence findings, and the trial court’s findings must be upheld unless those findings

are clearly and convincingly not supported by the record.” State v. Gwynne, Slip

Opinion No. 2023-Ohio-3851, ¶ 5.

               The record reflects that before imposing sentence, the trial court

considered the presentence-investigation report and the state’s sentencing

memorandum, which provided an overview of the facts underlying the charges in

each case. The trial court heard from the assistant prosecutor and from defense

counsel, who informed the court of mitigating factors. The trial court also heard

from the victim’s mother, the victim’s best friend, and the lead detective in the case,

as well as from appellant and appellant’s sister. The trial court was aware that

appellant had a history of drug-related convictions dating back to 2009. The record

shows that appellant was being sentenced on four cases before the court, and he

committed the crimes in this case while he was awaiting sentencing in another case.

In this case, appellant supplied the victim with fentanyl and caused her death. The

victim’s body sustained postmortem injuries. As the assistant prosecutor remarked,

the victim “was a person loved by many and discarded by [appellant] as little more

than a piece of trash.” (Tr. 76.) The state believed appellant dragged her corpse,

possibly with the assistance of another, from an apartment downtown to a drug

house in Slavic Village. A litany of letters and emails were sent to the court by those

affected by appellant’s criminal acts. After thoroughly reviewing the record before
us, we do not clearly and convincingly find that the record does not support the trial

court’s consecutive-sentence findings.

               Finally, as argued by appellant and conceded by the state, the trial

court failed to include any of the consecutive-sentence findings in the sentencing

entry. However, this does not warrant a reversal as requested by appellant. “A trial

court’s inadvertent failure to incorporate the statutory findings in the sentencing

entry after properly making those findings at the sentencing hearing does not render

the sentence contrary to law; rather, such a clerical mistake may be corrected by the

court through a nunc pro tunc entry to reflect what actually occurred in open court.”

Bonnell, 140 Ohio St.3d 209, 2014-Ohio-3177, 16 N.E.3d 659, at ¶ 30, citing State v.

Qualls, 131 Ohio St.3d 499, 2012-Ohio-1111, 967 N.E.2d 718, ¶ 15.

               For these reasons, the second assignment of error is overruled.

               In accordance with Bonnell, we remand this matter to the trial court

solely to issue a nunc pro tunc sentencing entry that incorporates its consecutive-

sentence findings.3

               Judgment affirmed; case remanded for the trial court to issue a nunc

pro tunc entry to bring the sentencing entry into compliance with the requirements

of Bonnell at ¶ 29-30.

      It is ordered that appellee recover from appellant costs herein taxed.

      The court finds there were reasonable grounds for this appeal.

      3 Nothing herein prevents the trial court from issuing a nunc pro tunc entry in the

other referenced cases that are not before us on appeal.
      It is ordered that a special mandate issue out of this court directing the

common pleas court to carry this judgment into execution.          The defendant’s

conviction having been affirmed, any bail pending appeal is terminated. Case

remanded to the trial court with instructions.

      A certified copy of this entry shall constitute the mandate pursuant to Rule 27

of the Rules of Appellate Procedure.

______________________
SEAN C. GALLAGHER, JUDGE

KATHLEEN ANN KEOUGH, A.J., and
EILEEN T. GALLAGHER, J., CONCUR