Court Opinion

ID: 9594290
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:28:41.935417+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:59:41.564427
License: Public Domain

Marilyn Kelly, J.
(concurring in part and dissenting in part). I concur in part and dissent in part.
Although defendant’s sentence should be affirmed, I would remand to strike any suggestion in the presentence report that defendant’s attack was not provoked. Moreover, I disagree with the new waiver rules created by the majority regarding challenges to inaccurate presentence reports and to disproportionate sentences.
At the guilty plea proceeding, after defendant pled guilty, defense counsel informed the court that the victims in the case may have taunted *507defendant prior to the stabbings. Defense counsel also stated that defendant had decided not to pursue a theory of self-defense, because the victims had not used deadly force.
The probation department then prepared a presentence investigation report (psir) to be used by the judge in fashioning a sentence. The report contained comments by the victims suggesting that defendant and his friends started the fight for no apparent reason. In a letter attached to the report, one victim contended that the attack was not provoked. The report also contained a section relating defendant’s version of the offense. Defendant asserted that the victims initiated the confrontation by shouting obscenities at him and at his friends. Defendant further asserted that he entered the fight only to save his two fifteen- or sixteen-year-old friends from the older, intoxicated college students.
At sentencing, defense counsel indicated that he and defendant had checked the presentence report for accuracy. Aside from several inconsequential changes, both defense counsel and defendant initially told the judge that they had no further factual challenges or corrections. However, during allocution, defense counsel urged the judge to consider as a mitigating factor that the victims had taunted defendant. The prosecutor retorted that the victims denied any provocation.
Although the trial judge recognized that a factual dispute existed regarding provocation, he opted not to resolve it. Rather, he concluded that, even if there were verbal provocation, it did not mitigate the severity of the crime. The judge noted that the victims never attacked defendant with a deadly weapon or put him in fear, and therefore, he had no excuse to stab them.
*508It’s true that the amount of provocation is at issue, but I have not heard anyone claim that Mr. Sharp was being attacked with a deadly weapon or was put into fear, and there is simply no excuse whatsoever to stab these young men.
Defendant contends that the trial court should have either granted his motion for resentencing or ordered an evidentiary hearing to resolve the conflicting stories over his alleged verbal provocation. MCR 6.425(D)(3) provides:
If any information in the presentence report is challenged, the court must make a finding with respect to the challenge or determine that a finding is unnecessary because it will not take the challenged information into account in sentencing. If the court finds merit in the challenge or determines that it will not take the challenged information into account in sentencing, it must direct the probation officer to
(a) correct or delete the challenged information in the report, whichever is appropriate, and
(b) provide defendant’s lawyer with an opportunity to review the corrected report before it is sent to the Department of Corrections.
In this case, the sentencing judge determined that it made no difference whether the victims verbally provoked defendant. Accordingly, there was no need for him to make a finding of fact, order an evidentiary hearing or grant defendant’s motion for resentencing. However, since the court did not take the disputed information into account in sentencing, any reference to an unprovoked attack should have been deleted from the presentence report. MCR 6.425(D)(3); People v Swartz, 171 Mich App 364, 379-381; 429 NW2d 905 (1988).
The majority holds that a defendant cannot challenge the accuracy of a presentence report at *509a motion for resentencing if he did not raise the issue at the original sentencing. I disagree.
First, our Supreme Court unanimously held in People v Walker1 that a defendant may challenge the scoring of the sentencing guidelines for the first time (1) at sentencing; (2) at a timely motion for resentencing; or (3) at a timely motion in this Court to remand for resentencing. Although Walker involved a challenge to the sentencing information report (sir), rather than the psir, the Court suggested that the two should be treated the same. For example, the Court stated that "the trial court shall resolve [a challenge to the guidelines] in the same fashion that it resolves any other dispute concerning the accuracy of information to be considered at sentencing.” Id., 267. It is unlikely that the Supreme Court would treat resolution of challenges to the psir and the sir the same, yet establish different preservation requirements.
Second, this Court has indicated on several occasions that challenges to the accuracy of information in the psir may be raised either at sentencing or at a motion for resentencing. For example, in People v Puckett2 we applied the Walker preservation requirements to a case involving a challenge to alleged inaccuracies in a psir. Also see People v Wiggins, 151 Mich App 622, 625-626; 390 NW2d 740 (1986), and People v Baldwin, 130 Mich App 653, 655; 344 NW2d 37 (1983). But see dicta in People v Maxson, 163 Mich App 467, 472, n 1; 415 NW2d 247 (1987).
Third, it is well settled that the use of inaccurate information at sentencing may violate defendant’s right to due process. US Const, Am XIV; Const 1963, art 1, § 17; People v Hoyt, 185 Mich *510App 531, 533; 462 NW2d 793 (1990), and cases cited therein. Given the constitutional magnitude of challenges to the psir, this Court should not casually find them waived, especially when raised in the trial court through a timely motion for resentencing. See People v Bettistea, 173 Mich App 106, 129; 434 NW2d 138 (1988). The majority position does not so much as provide for review in cases where failure to do so would result in a miscarriage of justice. See People v Weatherspoon, 171 Mich App 549, 557; 431 NW2d 75 (1988).
The majority relies on MCL 771.14(5); MSA 28.1144(5) as its reason not to "extend” the Walker rule to challenges to the accuracy of presentence reports. However, the statute merely provides that a party "may challenge, on the record, the accuracy or relevancy of any information contained in the presentence information report” at sentencing. See also MCR 6.425(D)(2)(b). It does not state that defendant is precluded from challenging information in the psir for the first time at a motion for resentencing; it does not state that a challenge "must” be raised at sentencing. In contrast, MCR 2.516(C) requires a specific objection to the court’s jury instruction before the jury retires for deliberations in order to preserve alleged instructional error for appeal.
The majority also is concerned that guilty plea cases will be "tried” at postsentencing hearings. However, where defendant has already pled guilty, no facts remain to be determined other than those contained in the presentence report. Moreover, where, as here, the trial court determines that the challenged information has no bearing on the sentence, an evidentiary hearing is not required. MCR 6.425(D)(3); Swartz, 379-381.
The application of the majority’s new waiver rule to this case is particularly troubling. Here, *511during each court appearance, defendant stated that he had been verbally taunted by the victims before the fight. It is obvious that defendant did not concoct the story about being taunted after and in reaction to his sentence. To require defendant at sentencing to use the magic words "I challenge that statement” in order to preserve an issue for a hearing on resentencing, elevates form over substance.
Lastly, I disagree with the majority’s dicta that would preclude a criminal defendant from raising mitigating factors to show a disproportionate sentence after allocution. The psir or trial record may reveal mitigating circumstances that trial counsel did. not verbalize during allocution. Often trial counsel will not raise every possible mitigating factor at sentencing, knowing the trial judge’s familiarity with the case. In this and other situations, defendant should not be barred from raising mitigating factors for the first time in a motion for resentencing before the trial court; and we should not be precluded from considering them on appeal.
The sentences should be affirmed but the case remanded for correction of the presentence report.

 428 Mich 261, 266; 407 NW2d 367 (1987).

 178 Mich App 224, 226-227; 443 NW2d 470 (1989).