Court Opinion

ID: 9395636
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-05-18 15:11:05.725044+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:19:09.995357
License: Public Domain

[Cite as State v. Thomas, 2023-Ohio-1668.]

                              COURT OF APPEALS OF OHIO

                             EIGHTH APPELLATE DISTRICT
                                COUNTY OF CUYAHOGA

STATE OF OHIO,                                     :

                Plaintiff-Appellant,               :
                                                            No. 111703
                v.                                 :

JEFFERY THOMAS,                                    :

                Defendant-Appellee.                :

                               JOURNAL ENTRY AND OPINION

                JUDGMENT: REVERSED IN PART AND REMANDED
                RELEASED AND JOURNALIZED: May 18, 2023

         Criminal Appeal from the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas
                             Case No. CR-21-658493-A

                                             Appearances:

                Michael C. O’Malley, Cuyahoga County Prosecuting
                Attorney, and Gregory J. Ochocki, Assistant Prosecuting
                Attorney, for appellant.

                Cullen Sweeney, Cuyahoga County Public Defender, and
                John T. Martin, Assistant Public Defender, for appellee.

EILEEN A. GALLAGHER, P.J.:

                Plaintiff-appellant the state of Ohio appeals the sentence imposed on

defendant-appellee Jeffery Thomas for attempted felonious assault with a one-year
firearm specification. The state argues that the trial court improperly applied jail-

time credit to the mandatory prison term imposed on the firearm specification.

             For the reasons that follow, we reverse the trial court’s judgment, in

part, and remand the case for a limited resentencing, with instructions that the trial

court vacate the portion of Thomas’ sentence that applies jail-time credit to the

mandatory prison term imposed on the firearm specification and issue a new

sentencing journal entry that does not include a request to apply jail-time credit to

the mandatory prison term imposed on the firearm specification.

Factual Background and Procedural History

             On April 15, 2021, a Cuyahoga County Grand Jury indicted Jeffery

Thomas on three counts: one count of felonious assault with one-, three- and five-

year firearm specifications and notice-of-prior-conviction, repeat-violent-offender

and forfeiture-of-weapon specifications (Count 1); one count of having a weapon

while under disability with a forfeiture-of-weapon specification (Count 2) and one

count of improperly handling firearms in a motor vehicle with a forfeiture-of-

weapon specification (Count 3).

             The parties reached a plea agreement. Thomas pled guilty to an

amended     count   of   attempted    felonious   assault   in   violation   of   R.C.

2903.11(A)(2)/2923.02, a third-degree felony, with a one-year firearm specification

and a forfeiture-of-weapon specification (amended Count 1) and one count of having

a weapon while under disability in violation of R.C. 2923.13(A)(2), a third-degree
felony, with a forfeiture-of-weapon specification (Count 2).              In exchange for

Thomas’ guilty pleas, the remaining count was nolled.

                  On June 6, 2022, the trial court sentenced Thomas to an aggregate

prison term of four years. On Count 1, as amended, the trial court sentenced Thomas

to one year on the firearm specification to be served prior to, and consecutive with

36 months on the underlying offense. On Count 2, the trial court sentenced Thomas

to 24 months, to be served concurrently with the sentence imposed on Count 1.1 The

trial court credited Thomas with 430 days of jail-time credit.2

                  At the sentencing hearing, Thomas’ counsel made the following

request:

         I’m going to ask you a couple of things and I know this has been done
         before because of COVID. He’s got [a] firearm specification in 658493,
         and I believe these cases would have been resolved much sooner had
         we not been in the COVID situation. And I’d ask the Court to consider
         crediting the time that he served in the county jail, that year, towards
         that time. I think that’s fair and proper under the COVID
         circumstances, Judge.

                  The trial court addressed the request as follows during the sentencing

hearing:

         Due to the COVID pandemic and its effect on the criminal justice
         system, I will put in the journal entry, and I hope that the ODRC
         complies with this order, Mr. Thomas will receive credit that he spent
         in the county jail to be applied towards the mandatory one-year firearm
         specification.

         1
       The sentences were also ordered to be served concurrently with sentences
imposed in two other cases, CR-20-653007-A and CR-21-658838-A.
         2   The parties do not dispute the amount of jail-time credit credited by the trial
court.
             The state objected to the allocation of jail-time credit to the firearm

specification. Consistent with its statement at the sentencing hearing, in its June 7,

2022 sentencing journal entry, the trial court included a request that jail-time credit

be applied to the one-year firearm specification as follows: “Due to COVID

pandemic, court is requesting jail time credit to be applied to 1 year firearm spec.”

             The state sought leave to appeal pursuant to App.R. 5(C) and R.C.

2945.67. On August 27, 2022, this court granted the state’s motion for leave to

appeal. The state raises the following sole assignment of error for review:

      The trial court erred when it requested that defendant’s jail-time credit
      be applied to the portion of the sentence imposed for a firearm
      specification.

Law and Analysis

               The state argues that, pursuant to R.C. 2929.14(B) and the Ohio

Supreme Court’s decision in State v. Moore, 154 Ohio St.3d 94, 2018-Ohio-3227, 111

N.E.3d 1146, jail-time credit cannot be applied toward the portion of a sentence

imposed for a firearm specification. The state asks us to reverse the trial court’s

decision and remand the matter “for a limited resentencing hearing to vacate the

portion of Thomas’ sentence applying jail-time credit to the mandatory prison

sentence imposed for the firearm specification.”

              Thomas responds that the state’s appeal should be dismissed because

(1) the issue is not ripe for review unless and until the trial court grants Thomas

judicial release before Thomas serves “an actual one year in prison,” i.e., the length

of the mandatory term, and (2) we lack jurisdiction to hear this appeal because the
trial court did not “decide” to apply jail-time credit to the sentence imposed for the

firearm specification but only “request[ed]” that the Ohio Department of

Rehabilitation and Correction do so.

              This court recently addressed each of these same issues in full in State

v. Mims, 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 111780, 2023-Ohio-1044. For the reasons set forth

in Mims, we find that the issue is ripe for review, that we have jurisdiction to hear

this appeal and that the trial court’s sentence is contrary to law to the extent it

applies jail-time credit to the mandatory prison term imposed for the firearm

specification. Id. at ¶ 12-39.

              Because the trial court’s application of jail-time credit is contrary to

law, we sustain the state’s assignment of error.

               We reverse the trial court’s judgment, in part, and remand this matter

for a limited resentencing. On remand, the trial court is directed to vacate the

portion of Thomas’ sentence that applies jail-time credit to the mandatory prison

term imposed on the firearm specification and issue a new sentencing journal entry

that does not include a request to apply jail-time credit to the mandatory prison term

imposed on the firearm specification but instead applies that credit to the

underlying felony sentence. See id. at ¶ 41.

              Judgment reversed in part and remanded.

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

      The court finds there were reasonable grounds for this appeal.
      It is ordered that a special mandate issue out of this court directing the

Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas to carry this judgment into execution.

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

of the Rules of Appellate Procedure.

_________________________
EILEEN A. GALLAGHER, PRESIDING JUDGE

MICHAEL JOHN RYAN, J., and
SEAN C. GALLAGHER, J., CONCUR