Court Opinion

ID: 9763157
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 02:37:48.049745+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:39.601596
License: Public Domain

RENDLEN, Judge,
dissenting.
Though this is a postconviction proceeding, the majority treats the cause as if on direct appeal from the original criminal trial and mistakenly fails to address the specific claim raised by appellant in his Rule 24.035 motion. Appellant contends “his trial attorney was ineffective for failing to correct the trial judge, who at the close of the hearing on the guilty plea stated that under the law, he was ‘compelled to run sentences consecutively in these cases.’ ” Defense counsel was not required to so “correct” the trial judge, who accurately assessed his duty under the law extant at the time of sentencing in February 1986. It cannot be said that counsel was ineffective nor that his service to defendant, rendered the plea involuntary.
Appellant was sentenced on his guilty plea February 19, 1986, and at that time, the only Missouri cases construing the applicable statutes on the issue of consecutive sentencing for multiple simultaneous sex offenses were Eastern District cases, including State v. Toney, 680 S.W.2d 268 (Mo.App.1984), and Adams v. State, 688 S.W.2d 401 (Mo.App.1985), which squarely held consecutive sentencing was mandated under § 558.026.1 in such instances. State v. Webb, 737 S.W.2d 197 (Mo.App.1987), the first Western District case construing § 558.026.1 as urged by appellant, was not decided until October 7,1987. Counsel cannot be deemed ineffective for failing to prophesy reversals of positions and contrary statutory interpretation that may be announced in later years. Indeed, the Western District so held in the case of State v. Laney, 783 S.W.2d 425 (Mo.App.1989), which is directly apposite to the case at bar in that the appellant, sentenced before Webb was announced as the law in the Western District, claimed counsel was ineffective because § 558.026.1 was erroneously interpreted, and the Laney court correctly affirmed the trial court’s denial of the appellant’s 24.035 motion.
Further, if we condemn counsel for insufficient clairvoyance, Strickland v. Washington requires that in order to succeed on a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel, not only must counsel’s performance be substandard, but appellant must demonstrate that actual prejudice resulted, 466 U.S. 668, 687, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 2064, 80 L.Ed.2d 674 (1984), neither of which occurred in this case. Defendant was told that the law mandated consecutive sentences and on that information he pled guilty. Most certainly he would have seized the opportunity to so plead if lighter (concurrent sentences) punishment had been offered and was available under the law. Thus it cannot be said such error, if it were error, worked to his prejudice and rendered his plea involuntary.
*742Turning to the issue of statutory interpretation as presented here and in the companion case of State v. Burgess, 800 S.W.2d 748 (Mo. banc 1990) No. 72796, from the Eastern District, I would adopt the well-reasoned view of Eastern District and recognize that § 558.026.1 mandates consecutive sentencing. Section 558.026.1 provides the following:
Multiple sentences of imprisonment shall run concurrently unless the court specifies that they shall run consecutively; except that, in the case of multiple sentences of imprisonment imposed for the felony of rape, forcible rape, sodomy, forcible sodomy or an attempt to commit any of the aforesaid and for other offenses committed during or at the same time as that rape, forcible rape, sodomy, forcible sodomy or an attempt to commit any of the aforesaid, the sentences of imprisonment imposed for the other offenses may run concurrently, but the sentence of imprisonment imposed for the felony of rape, forcible rape, sodomy, forcible sodomy or an attempt to commit any of the aforesaid shall run consecutively to the other sentences. (Emphasis added.)
The question posed is whether a sentence on a conviction for a sex offense committed in conjunction with another sex offense must run consecutively to the other sentence. The Western District mistakenly ruled that to give the plain meaning to the phrase “other sentences” (the statute provides that the sentence for the sex offense shall run consecutively “to the other sentences”), those words must refer to offenses other than the sex offenses. State v. Webb, 737 S.W.2d 197, 201 (Mo.App.1987). The court reasoned from the following hypothetical:
A person is convicted of two counts of rape and two counts of sodomy for crimes occurring at the same time. If “other offenses” is construed to mean sex crimes, then to give any effect to the provision that the sentence for other crimes may run concurrently, the court could impose concurrent sentences on two or three of the counts. But under the cases which have construed this section, the sentences in this illustration would be required to run consecutively. Such interpretation rewrites the section to eliminate the possibility that the sentences for the “other offenses” may be concurrent. Id.
The Eastern District, addressing the issue some three years earlier, persuasively interpreted the statute, stating:
The phrase “for other offenses” is nowhere expressly defined and its plain meaning in the context of the statute is any offense other than the particular sexual offense which is referred to in the statute. Thus, even if the other offense is another sexual offense, the sentences must be served consecutively.
State v. Toney, 680 S.W.2d 268, 273-74 (Mo.App.1984). In the case of Adams v. State, 688 S.W.2d 401, 403 (Mo.App.1985), the court explained further:
Under this section (558.026.1), the sentencing court must impose consecutive sentences when a defendant is charged with a sex crime and a non-sex crime. When a defendant is charged with a sex crime and two or more non-sex crimes the sentencing court may make the non-sex crime sentences concurrent or consecutive to one another but must make these sentences consecutive to the sentence on the sex crime. When a defendant is charged with a sex crime and a second sex crime and one or more non-sex crimes the sentencing court must first determine whether the non-sex crimes are to be concurrent or consecutive to one another but must make the sentence on the non-sex crimes consecutive to the sentence on the other sex crime which must be consecutive to any other sex crime. We interpret the provisions of this section to isolate sex crimes so that the sentencing for such offenses will be more severe which results from consecutive sentencing for sexual offenses that occur during or at the same time as any other offenses whether a sex crime or a non-sex crime. It would therefore be illogical to construe this section to mandate consecutive sentences for rape and robbery and not rape and *743sodomy. If the opposite view were adopted then robbery in the discretion of the trial court may be punished more severely than sodomy when prosecuted in conjunction with a rape charge. We find that view inconsistent with the general requirement of § 558.026.1 RSMo Cum.Supp.1984 that sex crimes be punished more severely. This section removes from the trial court the option of sentencing sex crimes concurrently. Formerly § 558.026.1 Laws 1977, effective January 1, 1979, provided that multiple sentences on any crime would run concurrently unless the court designated consecutive sentences. Section 558.026.1 was amended by Laws 1980 to its present form and indicates the legislative intent for consecutive sentences for the sex crimes expressly mentioned in this section.
This carefully reasoned position is compelling and properly discerns the legislative intent. I find the statute unambiguous on its face; accordingly there is no occasion to employ the maxim that ambiguities must be resolved in favor of the accused, or even in favor of maximum discretion in the trial court.
As the findings and conclusions of the motion court are not clearly erroneous, I would affirm its ruling and leave intact appellant’s consecutive ten-year sentences.