Court Opinion

ID: 9392493
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-05-05 05:05:21.774521+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:18:46.241807
License: Public Domain

If this opinion indicates that it is “FOR PUBLICATION,” it is subject to
                 revision until final publication in the Michigan Appeals Reports.

                           STATE OF MICHIGAN

                            COURT OF APPEALS

PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN,                                     UNPUBLISHED
                                                                     May 4, 2023
               Plaintiff-Appellee,

v                                                                    No. 361243
                                                                     St. Clair Circuit Court
KEITH DAJUAN WILLIAMS,                                               LC No. 21-000094-FH

               Defendant-Appellant.

Before: M. J. KELLY, P.J., and SWARTZLE AND FEENEY, JJ.

PER CURIAM.

       Defendant pleaded guilty to one count of possession with intent to deliver less than 50
grams of heroin, MCL 333.7401(2)(a)(iv), and one count of possession with intent to deliver less
than 50 grams of cocaine, MCL 333.7401(2)(a)(iv). Defendant was sentenced, as a third-offense
habitual offender, MCL 769.11, to 3 to 40 years’ imprisonment for each conviction, to be served
concurrently. Defendant now appeals by leave granted.1 We affirm.

        On December 14, 2020, law enforcement executed a search warrant at the address of 903
Griswold Street, Port Huron, Michigan, after a month-long narcotics investigation had been
conducted of defendant and the residence. Upon entering the apartment, officers located
defendant, and two other residents, Anne-Marie Gill and Marvin Kern, Jr. Kern was interviewed
on scene and later released. The search of the residence yielded a dealer’s quantity of heroin,
cocaine, drug paraphernalia, and United States currency. Officers discovered a brown bag
containing a mixture of narcotics on the left side of a stairwell, which was located directly outside
of the apartment. Defendant and Gill were arrested, taken in custody, and subsequently
interviewed at the local sheriff’s office. Defendant asserted, during his interview with the police,
that he had been living in Detroit, and would only visit the Griswold apartment on occasion.

1
 See People v Williams, unpublished order of the Court of Appeals, entered June 8, 2022 (Docket
No. 361243).

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Defendant advanced that he had not been selling narcotics from that residence, and attributed the
$237 found on his person to working “odd jobs.”

        Following the preliminary examination, a pretrial hearing, and a motion hearing, defendant
accepted the prosecution’s plea agreement.               The sentencing information report (SIR)
recommended an assessment of 10 points for Offense Variable (OV) 19, MCL 777.49(c), because
defendant allegedly interfered with the administration of justice by lying to law enforcement in the
course of a criminal investigation. At sentencing, neither party objected to the information in the
presentence investigation report or the scoring of the guidelines, and the trial judge sentenced
defendant according to the Michigan Department of Correction’s (MDOC) recommendation.
Approximately six months after sentencing, defendant filed a motion for resentencing; he argued
that the trial court erred by assessing 10 points instead of 0 points for OV 19 because defendant
did not interfere with the administration of justice and was merely maintaining his innocence
following the officers’ successful narcotics raid. The prosecution responded that defendant
explicitly lied to the officers in an attempt to shift responsibility for the drug trafficking to the two
other Griswold residents, and he further attempted to hide the brown bag of narcotics in the
stairwell outside of the apartment itself to avoid police detection. The trial court denied
defendant’s motion and held that OV 19 was properly assessed at 10 points because defendant
took overt action to avoid being held accountable for his actions and ultimately lied to the police
despite being advised of his right to remain silent.

        Defendant now argues the trial court erred by assessing 10 points instead of 0 points for
OV 19 because defendant did not intend to hamper, hinder, or obstruct a police investigation by
asserting his innocence following the fruitful execution of the search warrant and his arrest.
Moreover, defendant asserts he was entitled to resentencing because the guidelines range would
change after the scoring error was corrected. We disagree.

        For issues pertaining to sentencing guidelines scoring on appeal, “the circuit court’s factual
determinations are reviewed for clear error and must be supported by a preponderance of the
evidence.” People v Hardy, 494 Mich 430, 438; 835 NW2d 340 (2013). “Whether the facts, as
found, are adequate to satisfy the scoring conditions prescribed by statute, i.e., the application of
the facts to the law, is a question of statutory interpretation, which an appellate court reviews de
novo.” Id.

        “[I]f a minimum sentence falls within the appropriate guidelines range, a defendant is not
entitled to be resentenced unless there has been a scoring error or inaccurate information has been
relied upon.” People v Francisco, 474 Mich 82, 88; 711 NW2d 44 (2006). “Offense variables are
properly scored by reference only to the sentencing offense except when the language of a
particular offense variable statute specifically provides otherwise.” People v McGraw, 484 Mich
120, 135; 771 NW2d 655, 664 (2009). The sentencing offense is defined as “the crime of which
the defendant has been convicted and for which he or she is being sentenced.” Id. at 122 n 3. The
instructions for scoring OV 19 are found in MCL 777.49, which requires the assessment of 10
points if “[t]he offender otherwise interfered with or attempted to interfere with the administration
of justice, or directly or indirectly violated a personal protection order.” MCL 777.49(c). “[T]he
plain and ordinary meaning of ‘interfere with the administration of justice’ for purposes of OV 19
is to oppose so as to hamper, hinder, or obstruct the act or process of administering judgment of
individuals or causes by judicial process.” People v Hershey, 303 Mich App 330, 343; 844 NW2d

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127 (2013). In scoring OV 19, a court may consider the defendant’s conduct after the completion
of the sentencing offense. People v Baskerville, 333 Mich App 276, 301; 963 NW2d 620 (2020).

        Defendant argues that his statements to the law enforcement on December 14, 2020,
addressing (1) defendant’s involvement in the sale of narcotics, (2) defendant’s current residence,
and (3) defendant’s source of income, were an attempt to maintain defendant’s innocence, and did
not interfere with the administration of justice. Defendant further advanced that while the trial
court premised its decision to deny his motion for resentencing by distinguishing his conduct from
the defendant in Hershey, defendant similarly did not intend to hamper, hinder, or obstruct the
judicial process.

         In Hershey, the defendant advanced that the trial court erred when it assessed 10 points for
OV 19 because his failure to comply with a court order that required him to pay child support, and
a violation of his probation terms, did not amount to an interference with the administration of
justice. Hershey, 303 Mich App at 342. This Court agreed with the defendant and noted prior
caselaw established that the following conduct constituted an interference or attempted inference
with the administration of justice: “providing a false name to the police, threatening or intimidating
a victim or witness, telling a victim or witness not to disclose the defendant’s conduct, fleeing
from police contrary to an order to freeze, [or] attempting to deceive the police during an
investigation.” Id. at 344. Comparatively, the defendant’s refusal to pay child support did not
impact the lower court’s ability to administer judgment in the applicable divorce and child support
proceedings, and the defendant’s parole violation did not prevent the lower court from entering a
judgment of sentence. Id. at 345. Ultimately, this Court held that because the preponderance of
the evidence did not support a finding that the defendant interfered with the administration of
justice, the trial court erred by scoring OV 19 at 10 points. Id. at 346.

        We conclude defendant’s statements to law enforcement constituted an attempt to deceive
the police during an investigation, and the context of defendant’s conduct is distinguishable from
the circumstances in Hershey. Defendant argues that his statements occurred after the criminal
investigation concluded much like Hershey when the defendant’s failure to pay child support
occurred after the lower court ordered him financially responsible. “[T]he circumstances described
in OV 19 expressly include events occurring after the completion of the sentencing offense,” and
“scoring OV 19 necessarily is not limited to consideration of the sentencing offense.” People v
Smith, 488 Mich 193, 195; 793 NW2d 666 (2010). Moreover, unlike a failure to pay child support
or a parole violation, which does not implicate other parties, defendant attempted to divert
suspicion and responsibility to the two other Griswold residents by denying his involvement in the
sale of narcotics and claiming he lived elsewhere. Defendant also asserted that he only stayed at
the Griswold apartment on occasion, but a local deputy, whose department was surveilling the
Griswold address for one month prior to executing the search warrant, testified that defendant was
living there for at least a week or two before the execution of the search warrant notwithstanding
the fact that defendant’s permanent address was in Detroit, Michigan. Providing false information
to a police officer during an investigation necessarily constitutes interference with the
administration of justice, Smith, 488 Mich at 201-202, and the trial court found a preponderance
of the evidence supported this conclusion.

       Defendant further argues the month-long investigation of defendant based on a suspicion
of narcotics trafficking, in addition to the fruitful execution of the search warrant, occurred before

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defendant’s statements and made it virtually impossible for defendant to impede an investigation
that was already complete or otherwise interfere with the administration of justice. Defendant
notes that this assertion is supported by the fact he was eventually bound over on the possession
charges and pled guilty. This Court has stated that interference “with the administration of justice
encompasses more than just the actual judicial process. Law enforcement officers are an integral
component in the administration of justice, regardless of whether they are operating directly
pursuant to a court order.” People v Barbee, 470 Mich 283, 287-288; 681 NW2d 348 (2004).
Additionally, attempts to deceive police that result in a hindrance of their investigation, even if
those efforts are unsuccessful, may be scored under OV 19. People v Ericksen, 288 Mich App 192,
204; 793 NW2d 120 (2010). Following the execution of the search warrant, officers recovered
heroin, cocaine, and various drug paraphernalia that demonstrated that someone in the Griswold
apartment was responsible for narcotics trafficking. Defendant’s statements following his arrest
are best characterized as “self-serving attempts at deception obviously aimed at leading police
investigators astray or even diverting suspicion onto others and away from him,” and onto Gill and
Kern, who were present at the scene when the raid occurred. Ericksen, 288 Mich App at 204.

        During the preliminary examination, the deputy noted that he saw only the defendant in
the stairwell outside the apartment before uncovering the bags of narcotics; the deputy saw the
defendant continuously peering out of the apartment and appeared to be conducting
countersurveillance. Moreover, the brown bag found in the stairwell immediately outside the
apartment contained the heroin and cocaine mixture that matched Gill’s description of how
defendant routinely packaged multiple types of narcotics. Based on this information, the trial
court could have reasonably inferred by a preponderance of the evidence that defendant attempted
to hide evidence of narcotics trafficking in the stairwell thereby hampering a criminal
investigation. See Hershey, 303 Mich App at 344 (stating that deceiving police investigators to
prevent incriminating evidence from being used throughout judicial process constitutes inference
with the administration of justice).

         Defendant argues that our Supreme Court has expressed concerns with the broad
application of OV 19 as Justice Markman argued in his dissent in People v Spangler, 480 Mich
947, 948 (2007) (MARKMAN, J., dissenting). In Spangler, the defendant was assessed 10 points
under OV 19 because he hid himself, and various drug paraphernalia, in a closet when the police
arrived at a house to investigate a crime committed by another individual. Id. While a 4 to 3
majority denied leave to appeal, Justice Markman opined, “[g]iven that it would be extraordinary
for a criminal perpetrator not to attempt to hide evidence of his or her crime or to make such crime
less detectable, it would seem that OV 19 would almost always be scored under the trial court’s
interpretation.” Id. While we recognize Justice Markman’s apprehensions about the scoring of
OV 19, we must follow published precedent. See Smith, 318 Mich App at 286 (hiding from the
police constituted an interference with the administration of justice because the act intended to
hinder the police investigation); see also Hershey, 303 Mich App at 344.

        Defendant maintains that characterizing his conduct as an attempt to interfere with the
administration of justice is equivalent to holding that anything a defendant does or says, short of
turning himself into law enforcement or making a full confession on the spot, warrants assessing
points under OV 19. As the trial court noted, under Miranda v Arizona, 384 US 436, 469; 86 S Ct
1602; 16 L Ed 2d 694 (1966), a defendant has a right to remain silent. It has long been established
that a Mirandized defendant will be held accountable for what he says, and those words may be

                                                -4-
used against him in a future proceeding. Id. In this particular circumstance, defendant chose to
lie to the police during the course of a criminal investigation and attempted to deceive the officers
into potentially believing that the two other residents were responsible for the drug operations out
of the Griswold apartment.

        Lastly, defendant argues his trial counsel’s failure to object to the improper scoring of OV
19, which resulted in a higher guidelines range, deprived defendant of his Sixth Amendment right
to the effective assistance of counsel. We disagree.

        “To preserve the issue of whether counsel rendered ineffective assistance, the defendant
must move for a new trial or evidentiary hearing in the trial court or move for remand on appeal.”
In re LT, ___ Mich App ___, ___; ___ NW2d ___ (2022) (Docket No. 356667); slip op at 3.
Defendant did not raise the issue of ineffective assistance of trial counsel at any point in the lower
court proceedings or move for remand on appeal; therefore, our review is “limited to mistakes
apparent on the record.” See People v Petri, 279 Mich App 407, 410; 760 NW2d 882 (2008)
(when a defendant does not move for a new trial or Ginther2 hearing, this Court’s review is limited
to the existing record).

        “Whether a person has been denied effective assistance of counsel is a mixed question of
fact and constitutional law.” People v Johnson, 293 Mich App 79, 90; 808 NW2d 815 (2011)
(quotation marks omitted), quoting People v LeBlanc, 465 Mich 575, 579; 640 NW2d 246 (2002).
“A judge must first find the facts, and then must decide whether those facts constitute a violation
of the defendant’s constitutional right to effective assistance of counsel.” Id. “This Court reviews
for clear error a trial court’s factual findings, while we review de novo constitutional
determinations.” Johnson, 293 Mich App at 90.

        “In order to prevail on a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel, the burden is on the
defendant to demonstrate that defense counsel’s performance fell below an objective standard of
reasonableness” and that deficiency prejudiced the defendant. People v Crews, 299 Mich App
381, 400; 829 NW2d 898 (2013). “Prejudice occurs if there is a reasonable probability that, but
for defense counsel’s error, the result of the proceedings would have been different.” An attorney’s
“[f]ail[ure] to advance a meritless argument or raise a futile objection does not constitute
ineffective assistance of counsel.” Ericksen, 288 Mich App at 201. Because the trial court
properly scored OV 19, any objection to the court’s assessment of points would have been
meritless. As a result, defendant’s counsel did not provide ineffective assistance by failing to
object to the scoring.

         Affirmed.

                                                              /s/ Michael J. Kelly
                                                              /s/ Brock A. Swartzle
                                                              /s/ Kathleen A. Feeney

2
    People v Ginther, 390 Mich 436; 212 NW2d 922 (1973).

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