Court Opinion

ID: 9898223
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-11-14 19:29:15.608678+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:16:11.531843
License: Public Domain

Filed
                                                                                        Washington State
                                                                                        Court of Appeals
                                                                                         Division Two

                                                                                       September 19, 2023

      IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON

                                          DIVISION II
    STATE OF WASHINGTON,                                            No. 57142-1-II

                               Respondent,

          v.

    ANDRE L. BONDS,                                           UNPUBLISHED OPINION

                               Appellant.

         GLASGOW, C.J.— Andre Bonds was convicted of assault in the first degree in 2009.

His offender score of 11 included points for prior drug-related offenses: convictions for

unlawful possession of a controlled substance (simple possession) and for conspiracy to

deliver a controlled substance (conspiracy to deliver).

         In the wake of the Washington Supreme Court’s invalidation of the simple

possession statute in State v. Blake,1 Bonds sought resentencing for his assault conviction,

asking for his simple possession convictions to be excluded from his offender score. The

trial court vacated the simple possession convictions, but on resentencing for the assault

conviction, it added points from a conviction that had not been included in Bonds’s

offender score at his original sentencing hearing. Thus, Bonds’s recalculated score did not

change the 240-318 month standard sentencing range. The trial judge nevertheless reduced

1
    197 Wn.2d 170, 481 P.3d 521 (2021).
No. 57142-1-II

Bonds’s sentence to the minimum 240 months. The trial court found no valid basis for an

exceptional sentence below the standard range.

         Bonds appeals his new sentence. He argues for the first time on appeal that his

conspiracy to deliver conviction is constitutionally invalid and should not have been

included in his offender score. But even if Bonds were correct, his standard sentencing

range would remain the same, the trial court already sentenced him to the low end of the

standard range, and a change in offender score would not warrant revisiting an exceptional

sentence. We therefore need not reach the remaining issues. We affirm Bonds’s sentence.

                                               FACTS

                                          I. BACKGROUND

A.       2000 Conspiracy Conviction

         Tacoma police officers found a bag of cocaine on Bonds when they searched him incident

to an arrest. Bonds was originally charged with simple possession, but he ultimately pleaded down

to conspiracy to deliver a controlled substance in 2000. In his statement on plea of guilty, Bonds

made an Alford 2 plea, stating, “I am not pleading guilty because I am guilty; I am pleading guilty

[b]ecause I wish to take advantage of the prosecuting attorney’s recommendation and because if

this case went to trial there is a substantial likelihood of conviction.” Clerk’s Papers at 175. As a

result, Bonds was sentenced to six months, allowing him to serve his sentence in the county jail.

2
    North Carolina v. Alford, 400 U.S. 25, 91 S. Ct. 160, 27 L. Ed. 2d 162 (1970).

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No. 57142-1-II

B.     2009 Initial Sentencing for Assault Conviction

       In 2009, Bonds was convicted of assault in the first degree. His offender score of 11 points

included, among other convictions, a 1994 adult conviction for simple possession, 2 juvenile

convictions for simple possession, and the 2000 conviction for conspiracy to deliver. The standard

sentencing range was 240 to 318 months. The trial court sentenced Bonds to 276 months, near the

middle of the standard range.

                           II. 2022 RESENTENCING FOR ASSAULT CONVICTION

       In 2021, the Washington Supreme Court held in Blake that Washington’s strict liability

drug possession statute, RCW 69.50.4013, was unconstitutional. 197 Wn.2d at 195. In 2022, Bonds

was still serving his sentence for the 2009 first degree assault. He asked the trial court to vacate

his simple possession convictions in light of Blake, and he requested resentencing on the assault

conviction. The trial court vacated Bonds’s prior juvenile and adult convictions for simple

possession.

       At resentencing on the assault, the trial court excluded Bonds’s vacated adult possession

conviction and both vacated juvenile convictions from his offender score. The trial court also

added two and a half points for crimes committed before his 2009 assault but omitted from his

offender score at the original sentencing because the convictions were not obtained until 2010. In

sum, his offender score increased from 11 to 11.5, and was rounded back down to 11 for the

purposes of calculating the standard sentencing range. The standard sentencing range of 240-318

months did not change. Bonds’s counsel agreed with this scoring. Nobody discussed Bonds’s

conspiracy to deliver conviction, which was originally based on a simple drug possession charge.

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No. 57142-1-II

         Bonds asked the trial court to impose an exceptional sentence below the standard range or,

alternatively, a sentence at the bottom of the standard range. Bonds asked the court to consider

factors including Bonds’s work while incarcerated, his completion of a number of rehabilitation

programs, his strong community network of support, and the fact that the victim of the assault in

question was the aggressor in the altercation.

         The trial court imposed a sentence of 240 months, the bottom of the standard range. The

trial judge declined to impose an exceptional sentence downward, stating that he could not impose

an exceptional sentence based on the reasons Bonds offered.

         Bonds appeals his new sentence, raising for the first time that his prior conviction for

conspiracy to deliver should not have been included in his offender score because that conviction,

he argues, was constitutionally invalid.

                                            ANALYSIS

         Bonds concedes that recalculating his offender score without the conspiracy to deliver

conviction would not alter the standard sentencing range. Nevertheless, he contends that this court

should remand for resentencing so the trial court can reconsider imposing an exceptional sentence

with a lower offender score in mind. The State responds that where a miscalculated offender score

does not affect the standard sentencing range, the error is harmless. We agree with the State. Even

if Bonds were correct that his conspiracy to deliver conviction is invalid and should be excluded

from his offender score, he would not be entitled to resentencing where his standard sentencing

range would not change and the trial court already sentenced him to the low end of the standard

range.

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No. 57142-1-II

       Courts require resentencing when a miscalculated offender score affects the sentencing

range. State v. Kilgore, 167 Wn.2d 28, 41, 216 P.3d 393 (2009). When considering imposing an

exceptional sentence downward, courts may not consider a defendant’s lack of criminal history as

a mitigating circumstance because the offender score is part of the calculation of the standard

range. State v. Pascal, 108 Wn.2d 125, 137, 736 P.2d 1065 (1987).

       Bonds concedes that his standard sentencing range would not change if his offender score

were recalculated to exclude his conspiracy to deliver conviction because his offender score would

remain above 9. The trial court has already resentenced him at the bottom of the standard range.

       Additionally, the record clearly demonstrates that the trial court found no basis for an

exceptional downward departure from the sentencing range. Even if Bonds’s conspiracy to deliver

conviction were discounted, such a change to his criminal history could not be grounds for

imposing the exceptional sentence Bonds requests. A lack of criminal history cannot be considered

as a mitigating factor, so striking one conviction from his criminal history and offender score

cannot be grounds for an exceptional sentence.

                                          CONCLUSION

       Because Bonds’s offender score is the only thing that would change, and that cannot be a

basis for an exceptional sentence, the alleged error in his offender score is harmless. For these

reasons, we affirm Bonds’s sentence.3

3
  The State contends that the trial court should not have resentenced Bonds because doing so
granted him relief after the time bar for bringing a personal restraint petition had expired. But the
State also explains that it cannot ask for affirmative relief absent a cross appeal, which the State
did not bring, and thus, it cannot ask us to reverse Bonds’s new sentence. We decline the State’s
invitation to address this issue.

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No. 57142-1-II

        A majority of the panel having determined that this opinion will not be printed in the

Washington Appellate Reports, but will be filed for public record in accordance with RCW

2.06.040, it is so ordered.

                                                  Glasgow, C.J.
 We concur:

 Maxa, J.

 Price, J.

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