Court Opinion

ID: 9587472
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:22:30.415493+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:50:11.211856
License: Public Domain

CARDINE, Justice,
dissenting.
I dissent. The trial court properly resen-tenced appellant in accordance with our mandate in Jones v. State, 771 P.2d 368 (Wyo.1989) (Jones I). A trial court must substantially comply with the mandate on remand. It may not address issues unnecessary to a decision on the mandated issues. Sanders v. Gregory, 652 P.2d 25, 26 (Wyo.1982). In this case, the trial court did not go beyond the scope of our mandate.
In Jones I, we held that credit was allowable against the maximum sentence and remanded “[i]n order that the trial court may exercise the full range of its sentencing authority * * Jones I, at 371. The trial court merely complied with the plain language of our opinion and now faces reversal a second time. The majority opinion says we did not mean “full range of its sentencing authority” when we said “full range of its sentencing authority.”
I would hold that Jones I means exactly what it says, i.e., that the trial court, in resentencing on remand, may exercise its full range of sentencing authority. Our refusal to abide by the language of our written opinion unjustifiably interferes with the trial court’s discretion in sentencing. See Kavanaugh v. State, 769 P.2d 908, 914-15 (Wyo.1989); Duffy v. State, 730 P.2d 754, 757-58 (Wyo.1986); Kallas v. State, 704 P.2d 693, 695-96 (Wyo.1985).
Perhaps only a Cassandra will be heard to mourn the neglected rule of stare deci-sis, but it is a sad day indeed when our declarations within the same case are subject to judicial revision. If we are unwilling to take seriously what we write, how can we expect others to take us seriously? At a minimum, we owe this trial judge an apology and an up-front admission that this time we made a mistake — we were wrong, he was right.
I would affirm.