Court Opinion

ID: 9521364
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 02:03:23.659241+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:49:41.822249
License: Public Domain

Mr. JUSTICE SIMKINS dissenting: I concirr in the majority opinion insofar as it affirms the conviction. The record shows that on November 9, 1973, the presentence hearing was held and the defendant requested to be admitted to probation. In denying this request the trial judge stated: “There was a time some years back in this court when the then judges of the court had what amounted to an inflexible policy that any crimes involving physical violence, any crimes involving sexual violence, were simply not probationable, and the lawyers in that day didn’t even submit probation requests. The net effect of submitting a probation request at that time was only to increase the sentence of your client. This was a matter that was well understood by the bar of the Sixth Circuit. In recent years perhaps that policy has been relaxed somewhat, although personally I still subscribe to it. # * *” (Emphasis added.) He then imposed the sentence in question. If plain words import the meanings ordinarily attached to them this defendant’s sentence was increased by his request for probation, and if this be true it constitutes an abuse of judicial discretion which should not be countenanced by this court. I do not regard the statement in question as a statement of a new policy with which the trial judge did not agree “but * * * presumably followed.” In any event I am not content to speculate about the matter. I would affirm the conviction, but remand for resentencing before a different judge.