JOSHUA LEVESQUE
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA
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The appellate court affirmed the trial court's denial of postconviction relief. The appellant, who was seventeen when he committed murder and sentenced to fifty years, argued his sentence violated Miller v. Alabama. The court found his sentence was not a life sentence and thus Miller did not apply.
No, Miller v. Alabama does not apply to sentences that are not life sentences or the functional equivalent of life sentences. Therefore, the appellant's fifty-year sentence does not violate Miller.
[1] Miller v. …
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“resentencing is not required where a homicide defendant’s sentence is not a life sentence, a mandatory life sentence or a de facto life sentence.”
This quote establishes the court's interpretation of the Miller v. Alabama rule regarding when resentencing is required.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceAppellant pleaded guilty to second-degree murder for a crime committed at age seventeen and was sentenced to fifty years with a twenty-five-year manda…
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PER CURIAM.
Appellant challenges the trial court’s summary denial of his motion for postconviction relief filed pursuant to Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.800(a). We affirm.
Appellant was charged with first-degree murder for a crime he committed when he was seventeen years old. On March 25, 2004, Appellant pleaded guilty to the reduced charge of second-degree murder. Appellant was sentenced to fifty years in prison, with a twenty-five-year mandatory minimum term, to be followed by ten years of probation. Appellant argues that this sentence is unconstitutional because it violates Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460 (2012).
Appellant claims that he is entitled to resentencing because he was a minor at the time that he committed the offense and his sentence did not provide him with a review mechanism that allowed him the opportunity to demonstrate his maturity and rehabilitation to obtain early release. Appellant also argues that the length of his sentence is sufficient to warrant a sentence review at some point during his incarceration. However, we have held that under Miller “resentencing is not required where a homicide defendant’s sentence is not a life sentence, a mandatory life sentence or a de facto life sentence.” Wagner v. State, 285 So. 3d 412, 413 (Fla. 1st DCA 2019) (citing Davis v. State, 214 So. 3d 799 (Fla. 1st DCA 2017)). The Florida Supreme Court recently reached the same conclusion in Pedroza v. State, 291 So. 3d 541, 548 (Fla. 2020), in holding that Miller is not implicated unless the sentence “meets the threshold requirement of being a life sentence or the functional equivalent of a life sentence.”
Here, Appellant’s sentence for his homicide offense is not a life sentence, and his young age at the time of sentencing means that he has a reasonable probability of living long enough to be released. See Williams v. State, 197 So. 3d 569 (Fla. 2d DCA 2016) (holding that fifty-year sentence with a twenty-year mandatory minimum term was not a de facto life sentence). Thus, Appellant’s sentence is not unconstitutional, and he is not entitled to resentencing or a sentencing review.
AFFIRMED.
B.L. THOMAS, OSTERHAUS, and BILBREY, JJ., concur. _____________________________
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- Isiah Jermaine Corbett v. State, 277 So. 3d 638 (Fla. 4th DCA 2021)
- Damien Davis v. State, 214 So. 3d 799 (Fla. 1st DCA 2017)
- Williams v. State, 197 So. 3d 569 (Fla. 2d DCA 2016)