CLIFFORD L. KELLY, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE
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Kelly sought to correct an allegedly illegal sentence based on a scoresheet error in his plea agreement. The court held that scoresheet errors do not render a sentence illegal under Florida law, and the proper remedy is a plea withdrawal request, timely appeal, or rule 3.850 motion—not a rule 3.800(a) motion to correct illegal sentence.
A sentence is not rendered illegal by a scoresheet error, even if the error causes the sentence to exceed the guidelines range. Therefore, rule 3.800(a) motions are not the appropriate mechanism for challenging such sentences. The proper remedies are a plea withdrawal request, timely appeal, or a timely rule 3.850 motion.
[1] A sentence imposed pursuant to a plea agreement, even if based on an incorrect score sheet, is not an illegal sentence for the purposes of rule 3.800(a), Florida Rules of…
[2] Challenges to a sentence based on score sheet errors, when the sentence is part of a plea agreement, must be raised through a request to withdraw the plea, a timely appea…
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“the sentence imposed in that case was not rendered illegal because of a scoresheet error which caused it to exceed the guidelines range”
Establishes the controlling legal principle that scoresheet errors do not create illegal sentences
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceKelly entered a guilty plea that included agreement to a 200-point victim injury score on his guideline scoresheet. The trial court imposed a sentence…
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WOLF, Judge.
This case is before us pursuant to a Peremptory Writ of Mandamus which directs this court to rule on the trial court’s disposition of petitioner’s motion to correct an illegal sentence, pursuant to rule 3.800(a), Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure. We find the relief sought by the petitioner was not available pursuant to rule 3.800(a), Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure, and affirm the trial court’s disposition.
When this case was previously before this court, we remanded to the trial court for attachment of portions of the record which indicated that appellant agreed as part of his plea to the scoring of 200 points for victim injury on his guideline score-sheet. Kelly v. State, 578 So. 2d 342 (Fla. 1st DCA 1991). The opinion issued by this court did not expressly say that the case was reversed, nor did it specifically rule on the propriety of the defendant’s motion. Following that opinion, the circuit court did provide us with a transcript of the proceedings below. In the meantime, the appellant filed a number of motions indicating that the circuit court had not complied with our previous opinion. This court denied all the appellant’s motions by unpublished orders which indicated that the circuit court had, in fact, complied. These orders, however, did not directly rule on the trial court’s disposition of the original motion. It is on this basis that the supreme court issued the peremptory writ.
Since the time of our first opinion, both this court and the second district have addressed whether a sentence issued pursuant to a plea based upon an incorrect score-sheet constitutes an illegal sentence. In Gainer v. State, 590 So. 2d 1001 (Fla. 1st DCA 1991), this court held that the sentence imposed in that case was not rendered illegal because of a seoresheet error which caused it to exceed the guidelines range. Thus, a contention such as the one in this case is not properly raised pursuant to rule 3.800(a), Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure, which deals with correcting an illegal sentence. Judge v. State, 596 So. 2d 73 (Fla. 2nd DCA 1991). See also Gainer, supra.
The appropriate mechanism for seeking such relief is either a request to withdraw the plea, a timely appeal, or a timely motion filed pursuant to rule 3.850, Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure. This case is indistinguishable from the fact pattern identified in Gainer, supra, and Judge, supra. It is, therefore, unnecessary for us to reach the merits of appellant’s rule 3.800(a) motion, as such motion was not authorized.1
We therefore affirm.
BOOTH and ZEHMER, JJ., concur. . We would note, however, that if the sentence was imposed pursuant to a valid plea agreement, as it appears to have been from the trial court’s transcript and the docket sheet, then no error has occurred. See Sellers v. State, 578 So. 2d 339 (Fla. 1st DCA 1991).
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Cited By
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Skidmore v. State, 688 So. 2d 1014 (Fla. 3d DCA 1997)…upon an incorrectly calculated scoresheet during negotiations, the sentence is not illegal for the purposes of a 3.800 motion as long as it does not exceed the statutory maximum. McGuire v. State, 654 So. 2d 1305 (Fla. 5th DCA 1995); Kelly v. State, 599 So. 2d 727 (Fla. 1st DCA 1992); Gainer v. State, 590 So. 2d 1001 (Fla. 1st DCA 1991). This is because a plea bargain is a valid reason for a departure sentence. Jauregui v. State, 652 So. 2d 898 (Fla. 3d DCA 1995). The sentence of thirty years in this case doe…
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Nowlin v. State, 639 So. 2d 1050 (Fla. 1st DCA 1994)…illegal’ as a matter of law, for example, where the sentence imposed exceeds the statutory maximum sentence for the crime charged.” Rouse v. State, 601 So. 2d 281 (Fla. 1st DCA 1992), rev. denied, 604 So. 2d 487 (Fla.1992). See also, Kelly v. State, 599 So. 2d 727 (Fla. 1st DCA 1992). As Judge Altenbernd noted in Brown, a challenge to the adequacy of determining a factual basis for a plea is not an allegation that a sentence is illegal. This challenge goes rather to the voluntariness of the plea which will i…
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Loring Spencer Jones v. State, 635 So. 2d 41 (Fla. 1st DCA 1994)…of cases in which the sentence imposed can be described as truly ‘illegal’ as a matter of law, for example, where the sentence imposed exceeds the statutory maximum sentence for the crime charged.” The state also cited our opinion in Kelly v. State, 599 So. 2d 727 (Fla. 1st DCA 1992), for the proposition that Rule 3.800 is not the appropriate mechanism to challenge the legality of a prima facie legal sentence imposed pursuant to a plea bargain. In Kelly, this court determined, based on Gainer v. State, 590 S…
Previewing 3 of 6 citing cases — full citator treatment, depth of discussion, and citing context are member features.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceAuthorities Cited
- Judge v. State, 596 So. 2d 73 (Fla. 2d DCA 1991)
- Louie Anthony Sellers v. State, 578 So. 2d 339 (Fla. 1st DCA 1991)
- Fernandez v. Efigenia Nancy Fernandez, 578 So. 2d 339 (Fla. 3d DCA 1991)
- Gainer v. State, 590 So. 2d 1001 (Fla. 1st DCA 1991)
- Kelly v. State, 578 So. 2d 342 (Fla. 1st DCA 1991)