Court Opinion

ID: 9692128
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 15:43:26.273106+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:19:30.796293
License: Public Domain

ELANA CUNNINGHAM WILLS, Justice, dissenting. Because I cannot agree that the circuit court had subject-matter jurisdiction of this action, I respectfully dissent. Cases are legion in Arkansas for the proposition that a trial court loses jurisdiction to modify or amend an original sentence once the sentence is put into execution. See, e.g., Gavin v. State, 354 Ark. 425, 125 S.W.3d 189 (2003) (citing Pike v. State, 344 Ark. 478, 40 S.W.3d 795 (2001); McGhee v. State, 334 Ark. 543, 975 S.W.2d 834 (1998); DeHart v. State, 312 Ark. 323, 849 S.W.2d 497 (1993); Jones v. State, 297 Ark. 485, 763 S.W.2d 81 (1989)). We have made clear that this is a loss of subject matter jurisdiction. Gates v. State, |17353 Ark. 333, 107 S.W.3d 868 (2003); Bagwell v. State, 346 Ark. 18, 53 S.W.3d 520 (2001).1  As noted by the majority, the appellant entered into a plea agreement with the State and sentencing was deferred until after the Appellant testified in Billy Green’s trial. After Billy Green’s trial, the Appellant was sentenced pursuant to the plea agreement and a judgment and commitment order was filed on May 27, 2004. The State later returned to the circuit court and filed a motion to vacate the judgment and commitment order, alleging a breach of the plea agreement. In my view, once the trial court put the Appellant’s sentence into execution by issuing the commitment order, it lost subject-matter jurisdiction to entertain the State’s motion to vacate the judgment. The majority concludes that “the trial court did not amend or modify Appellant’s sentence.” In my view the “vacation” of a sentence certainly amends or modifies it. In addition, the majority concludes that the circuit court, rather than amending or modifying the Appellant’s sentence, “simply enforced the terms of the plea agreement entered into by the parties” and that “Mpplying general contract principles to this case, the appropriate remedy is to vacate the breached plea agreement....” The majority does not indicate how [ isthis confers subject-matter jurisdiction on the circuit court. Subject-matter jurisdiction cannot be conferred by consent of the parties, State v. J.B., 309 Ark. 70, 827 S.W.2d 144 (1992) (citing Hargis v. Hargis, 292 Ark. 487, 731 S.W.2d 198 (1987); Venhaus v. Hale, 281 Ark. 390, 663 S.W.2d 930 (1984)), nor may it be waived. Vowell v. Fairfield Bay Community Club Inc., 346 Ark. 270, 58 S.W.3d 324 (2001); see also Servewell Plumbing v. Summit Contractors, 362 Ark. 598, 210 S.W.3d 101 (2005)(“Parties may by agreement consent to personal jurisdiction ... but subject-matter jurisdiction cannot be conferred merely by agreement of the parties.”); Moore v. Richardson, 332 Ark. 255, 964 S.W.2d 377 (1998); Douthitt v. Douthitt, 326 Ark. 372, 930 S.W.2d 371 (1996). The entry or enforcement of a plea agreement, therefore, does not confer subject-matter jurisdiction on a circuit court after the sentence has been put into execution. We are not the first state to grapple with this problem. For example, in Dier v. State, 524 N.E.2d 789 (Ind.1988), the Indiana Supreme Court concluded that a trial court was without jurisdiction to vacate a sentence and impose the original sentence where the defendant, whose original sentence was reduced pursuant to agreement with the State in exchange for his testimony against another defendant, later testified for the same defendant in the latter’s post-conviction proceeding. The trial court cited the State’s assertion that the defendant “committed fraud on the State and the court” and “breached his contract made with the State to the extent justice requires he not profit from his ignoble deeds.” The Indiana Supreme Court stated, however, that “[wjhatever merit there is to this contention |19fails to give jurisdiction to the trial court.” Id. at 790; see also Moore v. State, 686 N.E.2d 861 (Ind.App.1997) (reversing trial court’s vacation of defendant’s sentence after breach of plea agreement, relying on Dier, supra, and finding no “Indiana law which grants a trial court jurisdiction over a defendant after it pronounces sentence based upon the breach of a plea agreement”). In addition, in State v. Young, 188 Or. App. 247, 71 P.3d 119 (2003), a defendant was originally indicted for eight counts of murder, robbery and burglary. He pled guilty under a plea agreement to three of the murder charges and specifically agreed that if he breached the agreement, the State could try him on the remaining charges and that he would waive any double jeopardy or speedy trial issues. He later breached the agreement and the State prosecuted him on the remaining charges. He pled guilty to the remaining charges, but during the penalty phase, argued a lack of jurisdiction. The Oregon Court of Appeals held that the defendant was “correct that the trial court lacked authority to modify” the three executed murder sentences he had received, but that the court did have jurisdiction to impose separate sentences on the remaining charges. Finally, in People v. Collins, 45 Cal. App.4th 849, 53 Cal.Rptr.2d 367 (1996), the California Court of Appeals was faced with a juvenile defendant who pled guilty pursuant to a plea agreement to a single count of being an accessory to murder after the fact. The defendant agreed in the plea agreement to testify concerning the actions and criminal offenses of all persons involved in the murder and the agreement provided that a breach |Mwould render it null and void and result in reinstatement of the original charges. In return, the defendant was committed to the California Youth Authority for a term of five years. The State, following a series of events, later deemed the agreement to have been breached, and moved to set aside the plea agreement and sentence in order to resume the proceedings against the defendant. After the trial court granted the motion, the defendant entered a plea to the new indictments by the grand jury and received a prison sentence of twenty-one years. The defendant appealed, alleging both the absence of any specific statutory authorization for such a post-conviction motion by the State, and the lack of jurisdiction occurring after the original sentence had been put into execution. The California Court of Appeals first held that even absent a specific statutory procedure, California “state law supports the existence of remedial power to act upon a post-conviction petition brought by either the defendant or the prosecution to enforce the terms of a plea bargain agreement.” Id. at 863, 53 Cal.Rptr.2d 367. With regard to jurisdiction, the court held that the defendant was “estopped” from raising the court’s lack of jurisdiction to act. Although noting that “if a court is without jurisdiction no amount of consent or estoppel can bestow it,” the court held that the rule applies only to subject-matter jurisdiction, which the court found was present in the case before it. It is unclear on what basis the appellate court concluded that subject-matter jurisdiction existed in the California trial court. Arkansas law, however, is clear that subject-matter jurisdiction is lost after the sentence of a defendant has been put into execution. Gates, supra. While I agree with the ^majority that the Appellant should not be allowed to benefit from his breach of the plea agreement, I cannot conclude that the trial court had subject-matter jurisdiction of the State’s motion to vacate the sentence. This is a problem that calls out for a solution, either by way of a legislative amendment, a change in our rules, or the availability of the ancient writ of error coram nobis in this particular circumstance.2 Unfortunately, these remedies are unavailable on the current record. I must, therefore, respectfully dissent. HANNAH, C.J., joins.  . A sentence is placed into execution when the court issues a commitment order, unless the trial court grants an appellate bond or specifically delays execution of sentence on other valid grounds. See DeHart, supra. A limited exception to the loss of jurisdiction, not applicable here, is found at Ark.Code Ann. § 5 — 4—301(d) (Repl.2006), which empowers circuit courts to modify certain original sentences following probation revocation hearings.   . A writ of error coram nobis may provide a procedural means to vacate a plea and sentence, but this is an "extraordinarily rare remedy, more known for its denial than its approval.” Deaton v. State, 373 Ark. 605, 285 S.W.3d 611 (2008) (citing State v. Larimore, 341 Ark. 397, 17 S.W.3d 87 (2000)). This particular writ is “allowed only under compelling circumstances to achieve justice and to address errors of the most fundamental nature.” Id. (citing Pitts v. State, 336 Ark. 580, 986 S.W.2d 407 (1999) (per curiam)). A writ of error coram nobis is only appropriate when an issue was not addressed or could not have been addressed at trial because it was somehow hidden or unknown and would have prevented the rendition of the judgment had it been known to the trial court. Echols v. State, 360 Ark. 332, 201 S.W.3d 890 (2005). The writ was originally available in both criminal and civil cases, but has been abolished in civil cases in Arkansas. Ark. R. Civ. P. 60(k) (2008). In Larimore v. State, 327 Ark. 271, 279, 938 S.W.2d 818, 821 (1997), this court stated a "circuit court can entertain a writ of error coram nobis after appeal only if we grant permission.” In the present case, Green did not appeal his sentence. In Adler v. State, 35 Ark. 517, 525 (1880), the court noted that “[w]hether the circuit court, in the exercise of its common law powers, may issue the writs of error coram nobis, has not heretofore been decided by this court.” Upon consideration of the question and examination of the writ’s jurisprudence in Britain and the United States, the Adler court held, apparently even after execution of the sentence, that "[w]e think the circuit judge had power to issue the writ of error coram nobis, and upon the assignment of error in fact ... to cause a jury to be impannelled [sic] in term to try the issue." Id. at 530. However, it appears that the jurisdiction of trial courts to entertain writs of error coram nobis has been divested by adoption of a rule, beginning with Emerson v. Boyles, 170 Ark. 621, 280 S.W. 1005 (1926), that a trial court loses jurisdiction once a sentence has been executed. See also Hodge v. State, 320 Ark. 31, 894 S.W.2d 927 (1995); Howell v. Kincannon, 181 Ark. 58, 24 S.W.2d 953 (1930).