ROY LEE ALLEN, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE
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Allen was sentenced to forty years for probation violation for attempted first-degree murder, a first-degree felony with a thirty-year statutory maximum. The court reversed because the trial court used an incorrect 1991 scoresheet instead of the 1986 scoresheet applicable to Allen's crimes and imposed a sentence exceeding the statutory maximum.
The trial court's forty-year sentence is reversed because it exceeds the statutory thirty-year maximum for attempted first-degree murder and because the court used an incorrect 1991 scoresheet instead of the 1986 scoresheet that should have applied to offenses committed in 1986. The case is remanded for resentencing under the correct sentencing guidelines.
[1] A defendant must be resentenced using the sentencing guidelines scoresheet in effect at the time the offenses were committed.
[2] A trial court cannot impose a guidelines sentence beyond the statutory maximum for offenses committed prior to 1994.
Previewing 2 of 4 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“Because Allen committed his offenses in 1986, the trial court should have utilized the sentencing guidelines scoresheet then in effect, not a 1991 scoresheet.”
Establishes that the scoresheet in effect at the time of the offense, not at the time of sentencing, must be used.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceAllen committed burglary with battery, armed robbery, and two counts of attempted first-degree murder on June 11, 1986. He was originally sentenced in…
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DAVIS, Judge.
Allen challenges the forty-year sentence imposed when he violated his probation for attempted first-degree murder. Because the trial court sentenced Allen in excess of the statutory maximum and used an incorrect scoresheet to do it, we reverse and remand for resentencing within the correct guidelines.
The State’s amended information charged Allen as follows: Count I — burglary with a battery; Count II — armed robbery (with a tire iron); Counts III & IV — two counts of attempted first-degree murder (also with a tire iron). The offenses occurred on June 11, 1986. At Allen’s original sentencing, the trial court sentenced him to twenty years’ incarceration, concurrent, on counts I through III, and to five years’ probation on Count IV. When Allen violated his probation in 1993, the trial court revoked his probation and placed him on two years’ community control, followed by fifteen years’ probation.
In June 1999, he violated his probation, and the trial court sentenced him to forty years’ incarceration, with credit for time served. At that revocation hearing, the State and the defense agreed that the trial court had used the wrong scoresheet at the original sentencing in 1987. The State argued that, after considering Allen’s violation of probation, the “correct” 1991 scoresheet allowed a permitted range of seventeen to forty years. The State maintained that. the forty-year sentence was appropriate given the generous gain time provisions governing offenses occurring in 1986. The trial court agreed.
However, because Allen committed his offenses in 1986, the trial court should have utilized the sentencing guidelines scoresheet then in effect, not a 1991 score-sheet. See Miller v. Florida, 482 U.S. 423, 107 S.Ct. 2446, 96 L.Ed.2d 351 (1987); Fennell v. State, 544 So. 2d 1017, 1018 n. 1 (Fla.1989). By 1991, the sentencing guidelines allowed permitted ranges, which had not yet been instituted in 1986. Accordingly, Allen must be resentenced using a correct scoresheet.
Furthermore, the trial court imposed a sentence outside the statutory maximum. Attempted first-degree murder is a first-degree felony with a thirty-year maximum. See §§ 782.04(l)(a); 777.04(4)(a), 775.082(3)(b), Fla. Stat. (1985). Because Allen committed this offense prior to 1994, the trial court could not impose a guidelines -sentence beyond the statutory maximum. See Mays v. State, 717 So. 2d 515 (Fla.1998). The forty-year sentence imposed on Allen is fundamental error. See Bain v. State, 730 So. 2d 296, 305 (Fla. 2d DCA 1999).
We reverse and remand for resentencing under the correct version of the sentencing guidelines.
PARKER, A.C.J., and CASANUEVA, J., Concur.
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Cited By
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Walker v. State, 776 So. 2d 948 (Fla. 2d DCA 2000)…. (1995) (stating that any revisions to the 1994 sentencing guidelines apply only to felonies committed on or after the effective date of the revisions); Miller v. Florida, 482 U.S. 423, 435-36, 107 S.Ct. 2446, 96 L.Ed.2d 351 (1987); Allen v. State, 771 So. 2d 1245 (Fla. 2d DCA 2000). Thus, if Walker was sentenced under the 1995 guidelines, his sentence is improper regardless of Heggs. Because the trial court found that Walker’s offense did not occur within the Heggs window, it did not attach any documents to…
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Nixon v. State, 787 So. 2d 84 (Fla. 2d DCA 2001)…’s objection; thus, this issue was properly preserved for appeal. For offenses committed prior to 1994, a trial court cannot impose a sentence in excess of the statutory maximum. See Mays v. State, 717 So. 2d 515 (Fla.1998). See also Allen v. State, 771 So. 2d 1245 (Fla. 2d DCA 2000). Applicable to this case, the [*85] statutory máximums are as follows: for a first-degree felony, thirty years, see § 775.082(3)(b), Fla. Stat. (1991); for a second-degree felony, fifteen years, see § 775.082(3)(c); and for a thir…
Authorities Cited
- Miller v. Florida, 482 U.S. 423 (U.S. 1987)
- Mays v. State, 717 So. 2d 515 (Fla. 1998)
- Bain v. State, 730 So. 2d 296 (Fla. 2d DCA 1999)
- Fennell v. State, 544 So. 2d 1017 (Fla. 1989)