{ "id": 1217119, "name": "STATE of New Mexico, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Jack Brian SMITH, Defendant-Appellant", "name_abbreviation": "State v. Smith", "decision_date": "2000-10-23", "docket_number": "No. 20,446", "first_page": "738", "last_page": "741", "citations": [ { "type": "official", "cite": "129 N.M. 738" }, { "type": "parallel", "cite": "2000-NMCA-101" }, { "type": "parallel", "cite": "13 P.3d 470" } ], "court": { "name_abbreviation": "N.M. Ct. App.", "id": 9025, "name": "Court of Appeals of New Mexico" }, "jurisdiction": { "id": 52, "name_long": "New Mexico", "name": "N.M." }, "cites_to": [ { "cite": "276 S.C. 444", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "S.C.", "case_ids": [ 2155287 ], "weight": 3, "year": 1981, "pin_cites": [ { "page": "607" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/sc/276/0444-01" ] }, { "cite": "281 S.C. 205", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "S.C.", "case_ids": [ 2163271 ], "weight": 2, "year": 1984, "pin_cites": [ { "page": "331" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/sc/281/0205-01" ] }, { "cite": "101 N.M. 12", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "N.M.", "case_ids": [ 1586361 ], "weight": 2, "pin_cites": [ { "page": "19" }, { "page": "632" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/nm/101/0012-01" ] }, { "cite": "121 N.M. 111", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "N.M.", "case_ids": [ 1566678 ], "weight": 2, "year": 1995, "pin_cites": [ { "page": "114" }, { "page": "1382" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/nm/121/0111-01" ] }, { "cite": "1998-NMCA-014", "category": "reporters:neutral", "reporter": "NMCA", "case_ids": [ 17246 ], "weight": 3, "year": 1995, "pin_cites": [ { "page": "\u00b6 15" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/nm/124/0505-01" ] }, { "cite": "118 N.M. 410", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "N.M.", "case_ids": [ 1563451 ], "weight": 2, "year": 1994, "pin_cites": [ { "page": "414", "parenthetical": "acknowledging that a voluntary guilty plea ordinarily waives a defendant's right to appeal on any grounds other than jurisdictional unless a conditional plea agreement reserves the issue for appeal" }, { "page": "5", "parenthetical": "acknowledging that a voluntary guilty plea ordinarily waives a defendant's right to appeal on any grounds other than jurisdictional unless a conditional plea agreement reserves the issue for appeal" } ], "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/nm/118/0410-01" ] } ], "analysis": { "cardinality": 494, "char_count": 9579, "ocr_confidence": 0.716, "pagerank": { "raw": 8.557187850209887e-08, "percentile": 0.48816494706834257 }, "sha256": "7b981144b8dbf2f0ffb4e1e63946e2f9a260b406cdf86acd83e5189a1a834202", "simhash": "1:9136340c1f43ea33", "word_count": 1553 }, "last_updated": "2023-07-14T18:00:16.735179+00:00", "provenance": { "date_added": "2019-08-29", "source": "Harvard", "batch": "2018" }, "casebody": { "judges": [ "BUSTAMANTE and ARMIJO, JJ., concur." ], "parties": [ "STATE of New Mexico, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Jack Brian SMITH, Defendant-Appellant." ], "opinions": [ { "text": "OPINION\nKENNEDY, Judge.\n{1} Defendant Jack Brian Smith pled guilty to possession of a stolen vehicle and was sentenced by the trial court. He appeals the trial court\u2019s use of a 1985 South Carolina conviction to enhance his sentence by one year, claiming it was not a valid prior felony conviction that could serve as the basis for enhancing his underlying sentence under the New Mexico Habitual Offender Statute, NMSA 1978, \u00a7 31-18-17 (1993). We agree and reverse the one-year enhancement of Defendant\u2019s sentence.\nFACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY\n{2} Defendant was convicted in 1985 in South Carolina\u2019s Court of General Sessions of burglary and larceny. At the time, he was seventeen years old. The burglary was classified by South Carolina as a third degree, class F felony punishable by up to five years\u2019 imprisonment and the larceny was a misdemeanor. Defendant was sentenced to the Youthful Offender Division of the South Carolina Department of Corrections for an indefinite period of time up to six years, and this sentence was suspended in lieu of probation. In 1998 Defendant pled guilty in New Mexico to possession of a stolen vehicle. The trial court sentenced him to one year for the habitual offender enhancement and suspended the sentence on the underlying felony. This appeal followed.\nPRESERVATION AND STANDARD OF REVIEW\n{3} Defendant preserved his right to appeal the question of whether his 1985 South Carolina conviction was a valid prior felony conviction that could serve as the basis for enhancing his underlying sentence under the New Mexico Habitual Offender Statute in the explicit terms of his plea agreement. See Rule 12-216(A) NMRA 2000; State v. Hodge, 118 N.M. 410, 414, 882 P.2d 1, 5 (1994) (acknowledging that a voluntary guilty plea ordinarily waives a defendant\u2019s right to appeal on any grounds other than jurisdictional unless a conditional plea agreement reserves the issue for appeal).\n{4} Whether Defendant\u2019s 1985 South Carolina conviction is an effective prior felony for purposes of sentence enhancement under the New Mexico Habitual Offender Statute is a question of statutory construction, and is therefore a question of law subject to de novo review. See State v. Adam M., 1998-NMCA-014, \u00b6 15, 124 N.M. 505, 953 P.2d 40; State v. Rowell, 121 N.M. 111, 114, 908 P.2d 1379, 1382 (1995).\nDISCUSSION\n{5} According to New Mexico\u2019s Habitual Offender Statute, a \u201cprior felony conviction\u201d for acts committed outside New Mexico that may be used to enhance a defendant\u2019s sentence for subsequent criminal acts committed in New Mexico includes:\n(2) any prior felony for which the person was convicted other than an offense triable by court martial if:\n(a) the conviction was rendered by a court of another state, the United States, a territory of the United States or the commonwealth of Puerto Rico;\n(b) the offense was punishable, at the time of conviction, by death or a maximum term of imprisonment of more than one year; or\n(c) the offense would have been classified as a felony in this state at the time of conviction.\n{6} We have previously held that Subsection (A)(2) of Section 31-18-17 should be read as though the word \u201cand\u201d was inserted between subparagraphs (a) and (b). See State v. Harris, 101 N.M. 12, 19, 677 P.2d 625, 632 (Ct.App.1984).\nPart (b) of New Mexico\u2019s Habitual Offender Statute\n{7} First, we must determine whether \u201cthe offense[s] [were] punishable, at the time of conviction, by death or a maximum term of imprisonment of more than one year .\u201d Section 31-18-17(A)(2)(b).\n{8} Defendant was convicted and sentenced in accordance with the provisions of Chapter 19 of South Carolina\u2019s 1976 Code of Laws, addressing \u201c\u2018Correction and Treatment of Youthful Offenders.\u2019 \u201d South Carolina defined \u201cyouthful offenders\u201d as offenders between the ages of seventeen and twenty-five. Under the Youthful Offender Act, a youthful offender under the age of twenty-one could be sentenced to the custody of the department \u201cfor treatment and supervision pursuant to this chapter until discharged by the [Youthful Offender] Division, the period of such custody not to be in excess of six years.\u201d S.C.Code Ann., \u00a7 24-19-50(c) (1977). Youthful offenders under the age of twenty-one could also be given a suspended sentence like the one Defendant received, or \u201c[i]f the court shall find that the youthful offender will not derive benefit from treatment\u201d he could be given a sentence under any other \u201capplicable penalty provision.\u201d S.C.Code Ann., \u00a7 24-19-50(d). The purpose of South Carolina\u2019s Youthful Offender Act was \u201cto provide treatment and supervision designed to correct the antisocial tendencies of youthful offenders so as to protect the public.\u201d Craft v. State, 281 S.C. 205, 314 S.E.2d 330, 331 (1984); see also S.C.Code Ann., \u00a7 24-19-10(e) (1977) (providing identical definition of \u201ctreatment\u201d for purposes of Youthful Offender Act). As the South Carolina Supreme Court stated in 1981:\nThe legislature has determined that society\u2019s interest, the public safety and welfare, is best protected by extending the cloak of the [Youthful Offender] [A]ct to these offenders it deems most likely to profit from the act\u2019s rehabilitative purpose.\nState v. Johnson, 276 S.C. 444, 279 S.E.2d 606, 607 (1981). In furtherance of this policy, South Carolina chose to exclude convictions under the Youthful Offender Act from subsequent habitual offender proceedings.\n{9} For the South Carolina court to have imposed a criminal adult sentence of imprisonment, as opposed to a youthful offender sentence, it would have had to determine that Defendant was not amenable to treatment. Because the South Carolina court found Defendant amenable to treatment, the 1985 order placing him on probation was a \u201cyouthful offender\u201d sentence whose goal was rehabilitative in nature. Therefore, we hold that Defendant\u2019s conviction does not satisfy the provisions of part (b) of New Mexico\u2019s Habitual Offender Statute.\nPart (c) of New Mexico\u2019s Habitual Offender Statute\n{10} Next, we analyze whether Defendant\u2019s South Carolina offenses satisfy part (e) of New Mexico\u2019s Habitual Offender Statute. To satisfy part (e), the offenses \u201cwould have [to have] been classified as [ ] felon[ies] in this state at the time of conviction.\u201d Section 31-18-17(A)(2)(c). On the contrary, we find that Defendant\u2019s offenses would not have been felonies in New Mexico at the time he was convicted in South Carolina. The 1985 Children\u2019s Code defined a child as anyone under eighteen years old. See \u00a7 32-1-3(A). It defined a delinquent child as a child who had committed a delinquent act, which was an act generally designated as a crime if committed by an adult. See \u00a7 32-1-3(0) and (P). Had Defendant been convicted of burglary and larceny in New Mexico at the age of seventeen, both charges would have resulted in the sentencing of Defendant as a delinquent offender. See \u00a7 32-1-3(0) and (P). Delinquent offenders were subject only to juvenile sanctions under the New Mexico Children\u2019s Code. See id. Only when a person under eighteen was sentenced as an adult did \u201cthe determination of guilt at trial beeome[ ] a conviction for purposes of the Criminal Code\u201d which would include the Habitual Offender Statute. See NMSA 1978, \u00a7 32A-2-18(B) and (C) (1996). According to the 1985 Children\u2019s Code, Defendant could only have been treated as an adult if the children\u2019s court had transferred the proceedings to an adult district court after a hearing determining that Defendant was not amenable to treatment or rehabilitation as a child. See NMSA 1978, \u00a7 32-1-29 (1975).\n{11} A child sentenced as a delinquent offender under the 1985 New Mexico Children\u2019s Code was specifically deemed not to have been \u201cconvicted\u201d of a crime, and his disposition as a delinquent was generally inadmissible in subsequent proceedings. See NMSA 1978, \u00a7 32-1-33 (1972). As an aside, we note that the legislative directive that juvenile dispositions not be treated as \u201cconvictions\u201d for all purposes including habitual offender enhancement remains in effect, and thus the same result would occur under the version of the New Mexico Children\u2019s Code in effect today.\nA judgment in proceedings on a petition under the Delinquency Act ... resulting in a juvenile disposition shall not be deemed a conviction of crime ... nor shall it operate to disqualify the child in any civil service application or appointment. The juvenile disposition of a child and any evidence given in a hearing in ... court shall not be admissible as evidence against the child in any case or proceeding in any other tribunal whether before or after reaching the age of majority, except in sentencing proceedings after conviction of a felony and then only for the purpose of a presentence study and report.\nNMSA 1978, \u00a7 32A-2-18(A) (1993). Because Defendant\u2019s offenses would not have been treated as felonies if they had been committed in New Mexico, they do not satisfy part (e) of New Mexico\u2019s Habitual Offender Statute.\nCONCLUSION\n{12} For the reasons stated above, we reverse the one-year enhancement of Defendant\u2019s underlying sentence under the New Mexico Habitual Offender\u2019s Statute.\n{13} IT IS SO ORDERED.\nBUSTAMANTE and ARMIJO, JJ., concur.", "type": "majority", "author": "KENNEDY, Judge." } ], "attorneys": [ "Patricia A. Madrid, Attorney General, James O. Bell, Assistant Attorney General, Santa Fe, NM,. for Appellee", "Phyllis H. Subin, Chief Public Defender, Lisabeth L. Ocehialino, Assistant Appellate Defender, Santa Fe, NM, for Appellant." ], "corrections": "", "head_matter": "13 P.3d 470\n2000-NMCA-101\nSTATE of New Mexico, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Jack Brian SMITH, Defendant-Appellant.\nNo. 20,446.\nCourt of Appeals of New Mexico.\nOct. 23, 2000.\nPatricia A. Madrid, Attorney General, James O. Bell, Assistant Attorney General, Santa Fe, NM,. for Appellee\nPhyllis H. Subin, Chief Public Defender, Lisabeth L. Ocehialino, Assistant Appellate Defender, Santa Fe, NM, for Appellant." }, "file_name": "0738-01", "first_page_order": 772, "last_page_order": 775 }