Court Opinion

ID: 9698843
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 20:01:13.898255+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:43.988276
License: Public Domain

GLASSMAN, Justice,
dissenting.
I must respectfully dissent. The court should review this sentence count by count. *23In North Carolina v. Pearce, 395 U.S. 711, 89 S.Ct. 2072, 23 L.Ed.2d 656 (1969), the United States Supreme Court limited the power of the sentencing court to increase a criminal defendant’s sentence after recon-viction following a new trial. The Court stated:
Due process of law, then, requires that vindictiveness against a defendant for having successfully attacked his first conviction must play no part in the sentence he receives after a new trial. And since the fear of such vindictiveness may unconstitutionally deter a defendant’s exercise of the right to appeal or collaterally attack his first conviction, due process also requires that a defendant be freed of apprehension of such a retaliatory motivation on the part of the sentencing judge.
In order to assure the absence of such a motivation, we have concluded that whenever a judge imposes a more severe sentence upon a defendant after a new trial, the reasons for his doing so must affirmatively appear.
Id. at 725-26, 89 S.Ct. at 2080-81. By its terms, Pearce does not forbid the imposition of a harsher sentence, only that the revised sentence “be based upon objective information concerning identifiable conduct on the part of the defendant occurring after the time of the original sentencing proceeding.” Id.
This court does not apply a “presumption of vindictiveness” because Keefe’s resen-tence, measured in the aggregate, includes the same length of imprisonment as did the original sentence. This means of assessing his sentence, however, offends both the Due Process Clause and the notions of fundamental fairness that underlie' it. Keefe was acquitted of attempted murder, unquestionably the most serious charge in the indictment. He can be neither retried for this offense nor reconvicted. This acquittal dramatically decreased the “package” of charged offenses and simple fairness mandates that the length of his imprisonment should reflect this change. Considered separately, his sentence for aggravated assault was sharply increased, and the presumption of vindictiveness must stand unless the sentencing court can point to untoward behavior that warrants this increase. By its own admission, however, the sentencing court acknowledged Keefe’s conduct to be that of a model prisoner.
The court here appropriates the rationale employed by the First Circuit in United States v. Pimienta-Redondo, 874 F.2d 9 (1st Cir.1989). This reliance is misplaced. In Pimienta-Redondo, the government originally charged each of the two defendants with two separate counts of possessing a controlled substance with intent to distribute. The trial court sentenced one defendant to five and the other to six years imprisonment for each count, with the sentences to run consecutively. On appeal, the circuit court held that the two counts, construed as separate offenses in a previous decision, could not be so construed under the peculiar jurisdictional facts of the case. Accordingly, the circuit court vacated one of the counts as to each defendant. On remand, the trial court resen-tenced the defendants to ten and twelve years respectively for the remaining count. Though the defendants received the same length of sentence upon remand, it is apparent that the same years were imposed for the same offense. These facts are far removed from those of the present case. Here, as a result of his appeal, Keefe was acquitted outright of the most serious charge for which he had received the most severe sentence.
As Pearce made clear, due process requires that a criminal defendant not be deterred from appealing his conviction because he is afraid of retaliation by the sentencing court. Such fear chills the exercise of the right of appeal. The court’s reasoning in support of an “aggregate package” rule contravenes this important principle. Accordingly, I would vacate the sentence imposed by the Superior Court and remand for resentencing.