Court Opinion

ID: 9955556
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-03-28 18:10:40.620987+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:15:05.530157
License: Public Domain

[Cite as State v. Dolman, 2024-Ohio-1175.]

                            IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF OHIO
                                SIXTH APPELLATE DISTRICT
                                    WILLIAMS COUNTY

State of Ohio                                          Court of Appeals No. WM-23-003

        Appellee                                       Trial Court No. 09CR00142

v.

Alan D. Dolman                                         DECISION AND JUDGMENT

        Appellant                                      Decided:   March 28, 2024

                                                *****

        Katherine J. Zartman, Williams County Prosecuting Attorney,
        for appellee.

        Alan D. Dolman, pro se.

                                                *****

        ZMUDA, J.

                                             I. Introduction

        {¶ 1} Appellant, Alan D. Dolman, appeals the September 26, 2022 order of the

Williams County Court of Common Pleas denying appellant’s motion to vacate or waive

court costs. For the reasons that follow, we affirm the trial court’s order.
                         A. Facts and Procedural Background

       {¶ 2} In 2010, appellant was convicted of six counts of illegal use of a minor in

nudity-oriented material or performance in violation of R.C. 2907.323(A)(1), a second-

degree felony; five counts of illegal use of a minor in a nudity-oriented material or

performance in violation of R.C. 2907.323(A)(3), a fifth-degree felony; and two counts of

endangering children in violation of R.C. 2919.22(B)(5), a second-degree felony.

       {¶ 3} On February 22, 2010, following a sentencing hearing, the trial court issued

a sentencing entry imposing several consecutive prison terms. In addition, the trial court

ordered appellant to “pay any restitution, all costs of prosecution, any court-appointed

counsel costs, and any supervision fees permitted.” The trial court noted in its sentencing

entry that it had considered “the record, oral statements, any victim impact statement, and

if applicable, any pre-sentence report prepared.”

       {¶ 4} On March 2, 2010, appellant filed a notice of appeal to this court. In his

appeal, appellant asserted eight assignments of error challenging several aspects of his

trial and sentence. On January 10, 2011, this court found all eight assignments of error

not well-taken and affirmed the trial court’s judgment. The Supreme Court of Ohio did

not accept appellant’s appeal for review.

       {¶ 5} Appellant has filed several motions since his direct appeal concluded.

Among these were two motions to convert court costs to community service, one filed on

April 25, 2011 and another filed on July 8, 2016. In support of his 2011 motion,

appellant argued that he could not afford to pay the costs on his prison income, and in

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2016, appellant argued that payment of the costs would place an undue burden on him.

On both occasions, the trial court denied appellant’s motions without hearing, and

appellant did not appeal either ruling.

       {¶ 6} On September 26, 2022, appellant filed the motion at issue in this appeal.

Appellant’s motion is styled as a “Motion to Vacate/Waive Court Cost pursuant to

§2303.23 or Waive Court Cost in lieu of Partial Payment Plan pursuant to

§2947.23(A)(1)(a) of the Ohio Revised Code.” In his motion, appellant requested that

the trial court either vacate his “court cost” due to dormancy and inability to pay or

permit appellant to make monthly payments. Within his motion, appellant specifically

claimed that as part of his sentence, he had been “ordered to pay restitution in the amount

of approximately $6,504.87 to wit $8,879.34 [sic] this day to incurring appellate fees.”

Appellant argued that he had no means to pay that amount and the judgment had become

dormant pursuant to R.C. 2329.07. Accordingly, appellant contended, the court should

find that the cost was uncollectible and vacate or waive the court costs. In support of his

motion, appellant filed an “affidavit of indigence.”

       {¶ 7} The trial court denied appellant’s motion without hearing and encouraged

the appellant to contact the clerk’s office to set up a payment plan. On October 18, 2022,

appellant filed a request for findings of fact and conclusions of law, and the trial court

denied the request on December 1, 2022. The trial court explained that R.C.

2947.23(A)(1)(a) requires a sentencing court to include the costs of prosecution in a

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sentence, and given the pleadings, the record, and the pre-sentence investigation report,

the sentencing court had met its obligation under R.C. 2929.19(B)(5).

       {¶ 8} The trial court’s record contains an invoice from the clerk’s office for

appellant’s case dated September 27, 2022. This invoice, which is eight pages long,

contains numerous entries for charges dating from 2009, with an invoice total of

$8,887.34. The entries contain various shorthand or abbreviated notations next to them,

with many charges containing the notation “clerk fees.” The last two entries on the

invoice were from September 26 and September 27, 2022, and these two entries together

were for $8.00. Accordingly, before appellant filed his motion on September 26, 2022,

appellant’s invoice total with the clerk’s office was $8,879.34, the amount cited by

appellant in his motion to vacate or waive court costs.

                                 B. Assignment of Error

       {¶ 9} Appellant timely1 appealed and asserts the following error for our review:

       Trial counsel [sic] abused its discretion when it failed to conduct any inquiry as to

       Appellant’s present or future ability to pay the amount of the sanction and its

       denial of appellant’s Motion to Vacate/Waive Court Cost.

1
  Appellant filed his notice of appeal on February 13, 2023 challenging the trial court’s
September 26, 2022 order. In a previous order, this court held that appellant’s notice of
appeal was timely filed pursuant to Civ.R. 58 and App.R. 4 because a notation of service
of the September 26, 2022 order was not made on the trial court’s appearance docket, and
therefore the time to appeal the judgment had not lapsed.

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                                   II. Law and Analysis

       {¶ 10} Although the assignment of error is framed generically, appellant alleges in

his brief that the trial court ordered him to pay $6,503.87, now $8,879.34 due to interest

and/or fees, as restitution as part of his sentence. Appellant points out that no separate

restitution hearing was held in his case, he was sentenced to a prison term of over 50

years and will be over 90 years old at the completion of his sentence, and appellant did

not have any significant financial assets at the time of his sentence. Appellant argues that

because a sentencing court must consider an offender’s ability to pay before imposing a

financial sanction and appellant does not have the ability to pay, the trial court abused its

discretion in ordering restitution and in denying appellant’s motion to vacate or waive

court costs.

       {¶ 11} The state responds that appellant’s assignment of error is barred by res

judicata because appellant’s appeal involves an issue—whether the trial court could have

ordered appellant to pay restitution—that could have been raised on direct appeal. The

state also contends that the trial court did consider appellant’s ability to pay when the

court ordered restitution in the amount of $6,503.87, pointing to the portion of the

sentencing entry in which the court noted its consideration of “the record, oral statements,

any victim impact statement, and if applicable, any pre-sentence report prepared.”

       {¶ 12} In his reply brief, appellant recharacterizes the amount he owes as costs of

prosecution, arguing that R.C. 2947.23 permits a court to waive, suspend or modify the

costs of prosecution at any time and therefore res judicata should not apply. Appellant

5.
also argues that R.C. 2947.23 requires a court to expressly consider an offender’s ability

to pay when considering a motion to vacate or waive court costs. In contradiction to his

arguments in his initial brief, appellant reasons that because the amount he owes was not

imposed as a financial sanction, the court’s imposition of the cost must not be intended to

punish, and therefore the court must consider the appellant’s ability to pay. Finally,

appellant argues that the judgment against him is dormant because it has existed for more

than 10 years and therefore the judgment is uncollectible and must be vacated.

       {¶ 13} Before we address appellant’s specific arguments, however, we note the

inconsistency in appellant’s characterizations of the amount he seeks to vacate or waive.

In his motions before the trial court and in his briefs in this appeal, appellant has referred

to the amount at times as cost of prosecution and at other times as restitution. The state

refers to the amount as restitution, apparently adopting appellant’s characterization in

appellant’s initial merit brief. In our review of the record, we have found only an invoice

from the clerk’s office containing several pages of charges. Each entry has a generic

short notation—most of which are “clerk fee”–from which we cannot determine the exact

basis or origin of the charges. More specifically, our review of the record also establishes

there is no trial court order imposing restitution, no entry of the court setting a specific

amount of restitution, and no reference to restitution at all except the trial court’s

sentencing entry requiring appellant to “pay any restitution.”

       {¶ 14} App.R. 16(A) requires an appellant to provide a statement of facts relevant

to the assignment of error and include appropriate references to the record. Appellant,

6.
“as the party asserting an error in the trial court, bear[s] the burden to demonstrate error

by reference to matters made part of the record in the court of appeals.” Kenwood

Gardens Assn., L.L.C. v. Shorter, 6th Dist. Lucas No. L-10-1315, 2011-Ohio-4135, ¶ 9,

citing Knapp v. Edwards Laboratories (1980), 61 Ohio St.2d 197, 199, 400 N.E.2d 384;

App.R. 9(B). “Appellate courts ‘are not obligated to search the record or formulate legal

arguments on behalf of the parties.’” State v. Boles, 6th Dist. Lucas No. L-19-1080,

2021-Ohio-363, ¶ 23, citing Risner v. Ohio Dep't of Nat. Res., Ohio Div. of Wildlife, 144

Ohio St.3d 278, 2015-Ohio-3731, 42 N.E.3d 718, ¶ 28. Although appellant is acting pro

se, he must follow the same procedural rules as other litigants. State v. Rickard, 6th Dist.

Lucas No. L-16-1043, 2016-Ohio-4755, ¶ 3.

       {¶ 15} Moreover, even if appellant had successfully established that the amount at

issue was imposed as restitution, as he characterizes the amount at issue in his initial

brief, his motion was untimely and is barred by res judicata. See State v. Craig, 6th Dist.

Wood No. WD-22-001, 2022-Ohio-3355, ¶ 17 (holding that the appellant’s attempt to

change his restitution amount after the conclusion of his direct appeal was an untimely

petition for postconviction relief and barred by res judicata).

       {¶ 16} And if we consider appellant’s contrary argument in his reply brief that he

was ordered to pay the amount at issue as the costs of prosecution and his motion in the

trial court was therefore a timely motion under R.C. 2947.23, appellant’s argument still

fails. A trial court’s order denying such a motion is reviewed under an abuse-of-

discretion standard, and a trial court is not required to consider the appellant’s ability to

7.
pay in imposing costs of prosecution under R.C. 2947.23. State v. Geren, 6th Dist. Wood

No. WD-14-029, 2015-Ohio-909, ¶ 6-7. Accordingly, appellant has not demonstrated

that the trial court abused its discretion in denying his motion.

       {¶ 17} Finally, appellant’s argument that the costs must be vacated due to

dormancy also fails. Again, because the record clearly establishes that the costs at issue

are court costs and not restitution, the rules of civil judgments apply. 2 See Strattman v.

Studt, 20 Ohio St.2d 95, 253 N.E.2d 749 (1969), paragraph six of the syllabus (holding

“[t]he duty to pay court costs is a civil obligation arising from an implied contract”).

Because an offender’s obligation to pay court costs is civil in nature, the laws regarding

dormancy apply to an order imposing court costs. See State v. Moore, 6th Dist. Huron

No. H-20-014, 2021-Ohio-1616 (affirming order reviving a dormant judgment imposing

court costs as part of an offender’s sentence). However, dormancy relates to whether a

creditor may execute on a judgment, not to the validity of the judgment itself. See Forg

v. Gammarino, 1st Dist. Hamilton No. C-050871, 2006-Ohio-6977, ¶ 9 (explaining that

“dormancy does not destroy the validity of the judgment”). Indeed, even after a

judgment becomes dormant, the creditor may bring an action to revive the judgment and

then execute on the judgment. See R.C. 2325.15. Accordingly, even if the appellant had

established that the amount at issue involved court-imposed costs and the judgment

imposing the costs is now dormant, the trial court did not err in denying appellant’s

2
 The rules of civil judgments do not apply to restitution, which is imposed as a financial
sanction. See R.C. 2929.11; R.C. 2929.18.

8.
motion to vacate the costs because whether the judgment is now dormant only affects

collectability not the validity of the judgment.

                                       III. Conclusion

         {¶ 18} Appellant’s assignment of error is found not well-taken. We therefore

affirm the September 26, 2022 judgment of the Williams County Court of Common

Pleas. Appellant is ordered to pay the costs of this appeal pursuant to App.R. 24.

                                                                         Judgment affirmed.

       A certified copy of this entry shall constitute the mandate pursuant to App.R. 27.
See also 6th Dist.Loc.App.R. 4.

Thomas J. Osowik, J.                               ____________________________
                                                             JUDGE
Gene A. Zmuda, J.
                                                   ____________________________
Myron C. Duhart, J.                                          JUDGE
CONCUR.
                                                   ____________________________
                                                             JUDGE

          This decision is subject to further editing by the Supreme Court of
     Ohio’s Reporter of Decisions. Parties interested in viewing the final reported
          version are advised to visit the Ohio Supreme Court’s web site at:
                   http://www.supremecourt.ohio.gov/ROD/docs/.

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