Court Opinion

ID: 9693411
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 16:40:40.082261+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:19:46.080531
License: Public Domain

Beasley, J.
(dissenting). I respectfully dissent. I agree with the majority in holding that the trial court’s failure to advise defendant that the offense of armed robbery is not probationable requires the *31setting aside of the armed robbery plea.1 However, I do not agree that defendant’s guilty plea to felony-firearm need not be vacated since the guilty plea to that offense was taken in conformity with the court rules.
The felony-firearm statute provides in pertinent part:2
"(1) A person who carries or has in his possession a firearm at the time he commits or attempts to commit a felony, except the violation of section 227' or section 227a, is guilty of a felony, and shall be imprisoned for 2 years. Upon a second conviction under this section, the person shall be imprisoned for 5 years. Upon a third or subsequent conviction under this section, the person shall be imprisoned for 10 years.
"(2) The term of imprisonment prescribed by this' section shall be in. addition to the sentence imposed for the conviction of the felony or the attempt to commit the felony, and shall be served consecutively with and preceding any term of imprisonment imposed for the conviction of the felony or attempt to commit the felony.”
The statute can be applied only to augment or enhance a sentence imposed on the underlying offense.3 When the Legislature said that the sentence for the felony-firearm conviction "shall be in addition to the sentence imposed for the conviction of the felony or the attempt to commit the felony”, it did not intend that a sentence for felony-firearm could be imposed when there was no conviction of the underlying felony or if the conviction of the underlying felony is vacated._
*32In People v Lewis4 the Supreme Court held that a defendant charged with possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony and an underlying felony need not be convicted of the underlying felony in order that a conviction of the felony-firearm charge may stand. I do not believe that the Lewis decision is applicable where, as here, the convictions were based on guilty pleas and the underlying felony must be vacated because of a defect in the plea-taking procedure of that felony.
In the within matter, defendant’s plea-based conviction of possession of a firearm in the commission of an armed robbery cannot stand unless his plea-based conviction of the underlying felony remains intact. Since felony-firearm is a derivative offense, it cannot stand alone.5 I would distinguish this case from Lewis, supra: in Lewis, defendant was acquitted by a jury of the underlying felony count; here, defendant’s guilty plea to the underlying felony was vacated.
I would vacate defendant’s guilty plea to felony-firearm.

 GCR 1963, 785.7(1)©; People v Rogers, 412 Mich 669; 316 NW2d 701 (1982); People v Harrison, 117 Mich App 472; 324 NW2d 57 (1982), lv den 414 Mich 897 (1982).

 MCL 750.227b; MSA 28.424(2).

 See People v Walter Johnson, 85 Mich App 654, 670; 272 NW2d 605 (1978), modified on other grounds 411 Mich 50; 303 NW2d 442 (1981).

 People v Lewis, 415 Mich 443; 330 NW2d 16 (1982).

 An example of a civil cause of action that is derivative is a spouse’s suit for loss of consortium. If the injured spouse does not succeed in her cause of action against the alleged tortfeasor, the husband’s action for loss of consortium likewise must fail. See Jones v Slaughter, 54 Mich App 120, 124; 220 NW2d 63 (1974); Bias v Ausbury, 369 Mich 378, 381-382; 120 NW2d 233 (1963); Anno: Contributory negligence of spouse or child as bar to recovery of collateral damages suffered by other spouse or parent, 21 ALR3d 469, 471.