WATHEN E. VIERS, Ill V. COMMONWEALTH OF KENTUCKY
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RENDERED: AUGUST 23,200l
TO BE PUBLISHED
2000-SC-0486-DG
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A P P E L L A N T
WATHEN E. VIERS, Ill
V.
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ON REVIEW FROM COURT OF APPEALS
1998-CA-29 18-M R
BULLITT CIRCUIT COURT NO. 92-CR-57
COMMONWEALTH OF KENTUCKY
APPELLEE
OPINION OF THE COURT BY JUSTICE JOHNSTONE
REVERSING AND REMANDING
Appellant, Wathen E. Viers, III, was convicted of first-degree trafficking in a
controlled substance and second-degree persistent felony offender. He was sentenced
to twenty years’ imprisonment. The judgment credited Viers with 981 days of prior jail
time. Three and one-half years later, the trial court entered an amended judgment that
stripped Viers of all his jail time credit. Viers challenged the trial court’s jurisdiction to
enter the amended judgment. The trial court concluded that it had jurisdiction to amend
the judgment as a “clerical error” under RCr 10.10 and rejected the challenge. Viers
then appealed this ruling to the Court of Appeals, which ultimately affirmed the trial
court. We conclude that the amended judgment involved a judicial error rather than a
clerical error and, therefore, reverse.
The Court of Appeals believed that Cardwell v. Commonwealth, Ky., 12 S.W.3d
672 (2000) compelled it to affirm the trial court. In Cardwell, the defendant was
convicted of second-degree manslaughter and fourth-degree assault and was
sentenced to a total of ten years’ imprisonment. Id. at 673. At sentencing, the trial
court ordered that this ten-year sentence was to be served consecutively to a five-year
sentence Cardwell had received as a result of two convictions in an unrelated case. Id.
But the written judgment failed to provide that the ten-year sentence was to be served
consecutively to the other five-year sentence. Id. About eight months after the entry of
the written judgment, the trial court entered an amended judgment that specifically
provided that the ten-year sentence was to be run consecutively to the previous fiveyear sentence. Id. at 674.
In Cardwell, we held that the entry of the amended judgment was permissible as
a correction of a clerical error under RCr 10.10. Id. at 675. In so holding, we noted that
the amended judgment did no more than correct the judgment to accurately reflect the
oral judgment pronounced by the trial court at sentencing. Id. at 674. Thus, Cardwell
merely holds that the incorrect reduction of an oral judgment to writing is a clerical error,
which can be corrected under RCr IO. 10 when the record unmistakably reveals what
the oral judgment was. The error in this case is far removed from the one in Cardwell.
In the case at bar, the sentence imposed at sentencing -- including the jail time
credit -- is clearly and accurately reflected in the subsequent written judgment. The
amended judgment, which takes away all jail time credit, is inconsistent with the oral
judgment rendered at sentencing. Thus, Cardwell does not provide authority for the
trial court’s action. Further, we do not believe that the error committed in this case was
a clerical error within the meaning of RCr 10.10.
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The trial court calculated the jail time credit based on information contained in
the pre-sentence report. Apparently -- though it is not clear from the record -- the report
failed to indicate that Viers had been in jail while serving a federal sentence. After this
oversight came to its attention, the trial court amended the judgment on the basis that it
had no authority to give jail credit for time spent serving a federal sentence. See KRS
532.120(3). Thus, there was no error in reducing the oral judgment to writing. Rather,
the error, if any, arose in the compilation of information for the pre-sentence report.
Nonetheless, because the trial court had no discretion in the allocation of jail time
credit, the Court of Appeals concluded that the error was not the product of judicial
reasoning and determination and, thus, was a clerical error under Cardwell.
On review, the question of whether an error is “judicial” or “clerical” turns on
whether the amended judgment embodies the trial court’s oral judgment as expressed
in the record. See Presidential Estates Apartment Associates v. Barrett, 917 P.2d 100,
103 (Wash. 1996). If it does, then the error is clerical in that the amended judgment
either corrects language that is inconsistent with the oral judgment, or supplies
language that was inadvertently omitted from the oral judgment. See u t 104. f
B id. at i
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does not, then the error must be judicial. In this case, the amended judgment does not
embody or reflect the oral judgment of the trial court as revealed in the record.
Rendering a judgment based on incomplete or false information is not a clerical
error. “An error in the rendition of judgment is judicial error.” H. E. Butt Grocer-v Co. v.
m, 955 S.W.2d 384, 388 (Tex. App. 1997). In this case, the record clearly shows that
the original written judgment -- rather than the amended judgment -- accurately reflects
the oral judgment as rendered. “An incorrectly rendered judgment cannot be altered
when the written judgment precisely reflects the incorrect rendition.” Id. Therefore, we
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hold that the trial court erred in amending its judgment as the correction of clerical error
under RCr 10.10.
For the reasons set forth above, we reverse the Court of Appeals and remand
this case to the Bullitt Circuit Court with directions to vacate its amended judgment that
took away Viers’ jail time credit.
All concur.
COUNSEL FOR APPELLANT:
Fred R. Radolovich
513 South Fifth Street
Louisville, KY 40202
COUNSEL FOR APPELLEE:
A. 9. Chandler III
Attorney General of Kentucky
Ian G. Sonego
Assistant Attorney General
Criminal Appellate Division
Office of the Attorney General
1024 Capital Center Drive
Frankfort, KY 40601-8204
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