LARRY O'CONNER; AND GERALDINE GLASS v. ROBERT A. SCHNEIDER
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RENDERED:
SEPTEMBER 26, 2003; 2:00 P.M.
TO BE PUBLISHED
Commonwealth Of Kentucky
Court of Appeals
NO. 2000-CA-001480-MR
LARRY O'CONNER; AND
GERALDINE GLASS
APPELLANTS
APPEAL FROM FRANKLIN CIRCUIT COURT
HONORABLE WILLIAM L. GRAHAM, JUDGE
ACTION NO. 00-CI-00421
v.
ROBERT A. SCHNEIDER
APPELLEE
OPINION
REVERSING AND REMANDING
** ** ** ** **
BEFORE:
DYCHE, JOHNSON, AND McANULTY, JUDGES.
JOHNSON, JUDGE:
Larry O’Conner, the Offender Information
Supervisor for the Kentucky Department of Corrections (KDOC),
and Geraldine Glass, the Offender Records Administrator for the
KDOC, have appealed from an order entered by the Franklin
Circuit Court on May 15, 2000, which ordered them to credit
Robert A. Schneider with 730 days toward the completion of his
Kentucky prison sentences for the time he served in an Ohio
corrections facility on Ohio convictions.
Having concluded that
the circuit court erred by granting Schneider such credit, we
reverse and remand.
On February 24, 1992, following Schneider’s guilty
plea to the felony charges of burglary in the third degree1 and
receiving stolen property over $100.00,2 he was sentenced by the
Kenton Circuit Court to two, five-year prison sentences to run
concurrently.
The sentences were probated for a period of five
years, but Schneider’s probation was subsequently revoked on
February 23, 1993, and he was ordered to serve the two, fiveyear sentences concurrently.
On March 9, 1994, following
Schneider’s guilty plea to the felony charge of escape in the
second degree,3 he was sentenced by the Fayette Circuit Court to
a one-year prison sentence, which was ordered to run
consecutively with his prior sentences.
On October 17, 1994,
following Schneider’s guilty plea to the felony charges of
receiving stolen property over $300.00,4 wanton endangerment in
the first degree,5 and two counts of criminal possession of a
1
Kentucky Revised Statutes (KRS) 511.040.
2
KRS 514.110. The current version of the statute provides that the offense
is a Class D felony when the value of the property is $300.00 or more.
3
KRS 520.030.
4
KRS 514.110.
5
KRS 508.060.
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forged instrument in the second degree,6 he was sentenced by the
Kenton Circuit Court to four, five-year prison sentences to run
concurrently with each other, but consecutively with his prior
sentences.
To summarize, as of October 17, 1994, Schneider had
received Kentucky sentences requiring him to serve 11 years in
prison.
Schneider was granted parole from prison on May 24,
1996.
On November 14, 1996, a preliminary parole revocation
hearing was held, and the parole board made a finding that
Schneider had violated the terms of his parole.
Following the
hearing Schneider was placed in a holding cell, but he escaped
later that day.
Just three days later, on November 17, 1996, Schneider
was arrested in Cincinnati, Ohio, on new felony charges.
On
January 2, 1997, following Schneider’s guilty plea to charges of
failing to comply with an order or signal of a police officer
with a gun specification,7 having weapons while under a
disability,8 and carrying concealed weapons,9 he was sentenced by
the Hamilton County (Ohio) Court of Common Pleas to three, oneyear prison sentences to run concurrently with each other.
6
7
KRS 516.060.
Ohio Revised Code (ORC) 2921.331.
8
ORC 2923.13.
9
ORC 2923.12.
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However, Schneider’s conviction with gun specification resulted
in him receiving an additional one-year sentence that the trial
court ordered to run consecutively with the other three
sentences, for a total Ohio sentence of two years.
The Ohio
trial court also stated that Schneider’s Ohio sentences were to
“run concurrently to any sentence now being served or to be
served in the State of Kentucky.”
Schneider was then confined
in an Ohio corrections facility and began serving his two-year
Ohio sentences.
On September 23, 1997, a jury in Kenton Circuit Court
found Schneider guilty of escape in the second degree10 and as
being a persistent felony offender in the first degree (PFO I).11
On October 10, 1997, the Kenton Circuit Court followed the
jury’s recommendation and sentenced Schneider to prison for ten
years as a PFO I, as an enhancement of a 2 1/2-year-sentence for
the escape conviction.
The trial court ordered this ten-year
sentence to run consecutively with Schneider’s prior Kentucky
prison sentences, which totaled 11 years, thereby giving
Schneider Kentucky prison sentences totaling 21 years.
After Schneider was sentenced in Kenton Circuit Court,
he was returned to Ohio to finish serving his two-year sentence
on the Ohio convictions.
10
KRS 520.030.
11
On November 17, 1998, after Schneider
KRS 532.080(3).
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completed his prison term in Ohio, he was returned to Kentucky
and confined in the Kenton County Jail pending his transfer to a
designated correctional facility.
On January 6, 1999, Schneider
was transferred to the correctional complex in LaGrange,
Kentucky.
When the KDOC calculated Schneider’s time to be
served in Kentucky, it gave Schneider no credit toward the
completion of his Kentucky sentences for the two years he had
served in Ohio for his Ohio sentences.
On March 30, 2000, Schneider filed a pro se petition
for a writ of mandamus in Franklin Circuit Court.
Schneider
claimed that the time he served in prison in Ohio should be
credited toward the completion of the Kentucky sentences, which
totaled 21 years.
On May 15, 2000, the circuit court agreed
with Schneider and ordered that he be given credit for 730 days
toward the completion of his Kentucky sentences.
This appeal
followed.12
The appellants argue that the circuit court erred as a
matter of law when it ordered the KDOC to give Schneider 730
days credit toward the completion of his Kentucky sentences for
the time he served in Ohio pursuant to the Ohio sentences.
We
agree.
12
On February 26, 2001, we granted the appellants’ motion to hold this appeal
in abeyance pending the final disposition by our Supreme Court of Kassulke v.
Briscoe-Wade, Ky., 105 S.W.3d 403 (2003). The decision in Kassulke was
rendered on March 20, 2003, it became final on June 12, 2003, and we granted
the parties leave to file supplemental briefs.
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The facts of Kassulke are similar to facts of the case
at bar.
Cynthia Briscoe-Wade was on parole from a ten-year
Kentucky prison sentence when she was convicted of a felony in
Missouri.
A Missouri trial court sentenced Briscoe-Wade to
prison for five years for that conviction and ordered the
sentence to run concurrently with her prior sentence in
Kentucky.
After serving 21 months in prison in Missouri,
Briscoe-Wade was returned to Kentucky.
Briscoe-Wade sought
habeas corpus relief in Shelby Circuit Court, arguing that the
time she served in Missouri should be credited toward the
completion of her prior Kentucky sentence.
In reversing this
Court, which had affirmed the Shelby Circuit Court’s order that
such credit be given, our Supreme Court stated:
[W]e hold that, under KRS 439.344, KDOC
properly denied custody credit to [BriscoeWade] for the time she spent incarcerated in
Missouri. KRS 439.344 states that "[t]he
period of time spent on parole shall not
count as part of a prisoner's maximum
sentence except in determining parolee's
eligibility for a final discharge from
parole as set out in KRS 439.354." Our
predecessor applied this provision as
written and, in an opinion addressing a
statutory predecessor to KRS 439.344 that
granted the Parole Board discretion as to
whether the period of time spent on parole
was to be credited towards the underlying
sentence, the Court was persuaded by the
view "that time served by the appellant in a
federal prison while technically on parole
from the state penitentiary . . . should not
be considered as creditable parole time." As
[Briscoe-Wade's] parole was not revoked
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until after she was returned to Kentucky,
the time she spent incarcerated in Missouri
under her Missouri sentence, but on parole,
did not count towards her Kentucky sentence
[footnotes omitted].13
Similarly, Schneider was on parole when he was
arrested and subsequently convicted of felony charges in Ohio.
Since Schneider’s parole was not revoked until August 13, 1997,
pursuant to Kassulke and the statutes applied therein, the time
Schneider spent incarcerated in Ohio, beginning on the date he
was arrested on November 17, 1996, up until the time his parole
was revoked on August 13, 1997, does not count toward the
completion of his Kentucky sentences.
We also hold that Schneider is not entitled to credit
toward the completion of his Kentucky sentences for any time
served in Ohio after his parole was revoked on August 13, 1997.
In Anglian v. Sowders,14 this Court stated:
Accepting for the sake of argument that an
opportunity to serve sentences [imposed by
separate sovereigns] concurrently involves a
constitutionally protected liberty interest,
the action of the parole board did nothing
to deprive the appellant-petitioner of such
an opportunity since he had none. If the
parole board had chosen to hold an immediate
hearing and had revoked parole, then under
KRS 439.430(3) appellant-petitioner would
have still been deemed a "fugitive from
justice" until he could be taken into
custody under the parole violation warrant
and it was not possible to take him into
13
Kassulke, 105 S.W.3d at 408.
14
Ky.App., 566 S.W.2d 789, 790-91 (1978).
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custody under that warrant so long as he
remained within the custody of the federal
authorities.
Although the issue presented in Anglian was slightly
different than the issue currently before us, Anglian stands for
the proposition that before a parolee can be given credit for
time served on a Kentucky sentence after his parole has been
revoked, the parolee must be within the custody of Kentucky.
In
the instant case, from the time Schneider was arrested in Ohio
on November 17, 1996, up until the time he completed his twoyear Ohio sentences, Schneider was at all times within the
custody of Ohio pursuant to the Interstate Agreement on
Detainers.15
Therefore, even though Schneider served
approximately one-half of his Ohio sentences after his parole in
Kentucky had been revoked, Schneider was not entitled to have
that time applied toward his Kentucky sentences since he
remained within the custody of Ohio.
Accordingly, Schneider was
not entitled to have any of the time served on his Ohio
sentences applied toward the completion of his Kentucky
sentences.
The Ohio trial court’s order that Schneider’s Ohio
sentences were to run concurrently with his Kentucky sentences
15
See Houston v. Commonwealth, Ky.App., 641 S.W.2d 42, 45 (1982) (holding
that under the Interstate Agreement on Detainers, an Indiana prisoner held in
a Kentucky jail while facing charges in Kentucky remained “in the custody of”
Indiana, and was therefore not entitled to credit on his Kentucky sentence
for his time served in the Kentucky jail).
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has no effect upon the running of the Kentucky sentences.
In
Kassulke, supra, Briscoe-Wade argued that since the Missouri
trial court had ordered her Missouri sentence to run
concurrently with her Kentucky sentence, she was thus entitled
to have the time she spent incarcerated in Missouri credited
toward the completion of her Kentucky sentence.
Our Supreme
Court rejected this argument, stating:
[T]he only way that the Missouri trial
court's order for a concurrent sentence
could have been given its intended effect
was if Missouri tendered, and Kentucky
accepted, custody of [Briscoe-Wade].
Kentucky and Missouri are separate
sovereigns, and Kentucky is not required to
extend any full faith and credit to
Missouri's decision to run its sentence
concurrently -- i.e., Kentucky could render
the sentences de facto consecutive by
refusing to accept transfer of custody -and, accordingly, Kentucky cannot be
required to give full faith and credit to
Missouri's order by applying [BriscoeWade’s] custody credit from Missouri against
her Kentucky sentence [footnotes omitted].16
Similarly, while the Ohio trial court had the
authority to order Schneider’s Ohio sentences to run
concurrently with his Kentucky sentences, the Ohio court order
does not require Kentucky to run Schneider’s Kentucky sentences
concurrently with his Ohio sentences.
Therefore, Schneider was
not entitled to have any of the time served under his Ohio
16
Kassulke, 105 S.W.3d at 409-10.
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sentences applied toward the completion of his Kentucky
sentences.
Accordingly, we reverse the order of the Franklin
Circuit Court and remand this matter for further proceedings
consistent with this Opinion.
ALL CONCUR.
BRIEF FOR APPELLANT:
BRIEF FOR APPELLEE:
Keith Hardison
Frankfort, Kentucky
Robert A. Schneider, Pro Se
Eddyville, Kentucky
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