STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLANT,
v.
STANLEY SCOTT LYONS, APPELLEE
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The State appealed a trial court's decision granting the defendant's Rule 3.800 motion to clarify that his ten concurrent sentences were coterminous. The appellate court reversed, holding that nothing in the plea record indicated the sentences were coterminous, and the defendant failed to establish this was an illegal sentence requiring correction.
The trial court lacked authority to grant the motion because nothing in the plea record indicated the sentences were coterminous, and the defendant failed to establish the sentences were illegal or that they failed to grant proper credit for time served as required by Rule 3.800(a).
[1] A trial court may correct a sentence at any time under rule 3.800(a) if it does not grant proper credit for time served.
[2] A defendant's motion seeking coterminous sentences may be denied if the plea colloquy contains no indication that the sentences were intended to be coterminous.
Previewing 2 of 3 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“rule 3.800(a) allows a court at any time to correct a sentence "that does not grant proper credit for time served."”
Establishes the scope of Rule 3.800 authority and that it could potentially apply to the correction sought.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceStanley Scott Lyons negotiated a plea of guilty in ten cases, resulting in twenty-year sentences in each case as a habitual offender, to run concurren…
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KLEIN, J.
Appellee negotiated a plea of guilty in ten cases which resulted in a twenty-year sentence in each case as a habitual offender, the sentences to run concurrently. The plea agreement provided he would receive a credit of 223 days for time served. In his rule 3.800 motion appellee contends that his sentences were also supposed to be “coterminous,” which would result in some of the sentences expiring on earlier dates than if they were not coterminous. Llerena v. State, 953 So. 2d 31 (Fla. 3d DCA 2007) (concurrent sentences do not necessarily start at the same time, and unless it is provided they are coterminous, they can expire on different dates.) Because gain time for some of defendant’s sentences is greater than others, if his sentences were coterminous he could be released earlier than if they were not coterminous. The trial court granted appel-lee’s rule 3.800 motion and clarified that his sentences were coterminous, and the state appeals.
The state first argues that the trial court was without jurisdiction to grant appellee’s 3.800 motion because this was not an illegal sentence; however, rule 3.800(a) allows a court at any time to correct a sentence “that does not grant proper credit for time served.” The rule could accordingly be used to make the type of correction appellant sought. The problem, however, is that there is nothing in this record, which contains all of the pertinent information about the plea, to indicate that these sentences were coterminous. Knight v. State, 832 So. 2d 172 (Fla. 3d DCA 2002) (because defendant’s plea colloquy contained no indication that his sentence was coterminous with any other sentence, his motion seeking that relief was denied.) Reversed.
HAZOURI and DAMOORGIAN, JJ., concur.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- Monroe v. State, 953 So. 2d 31 (Fla. 1st DCA 2007)
- Knight v. State, 832 So. 2d 172 (Fla. 3d DCA 2002)
- Drake v. The Pub. Health Tr. OF Dade Cnty., 832 So. 2d 172 (Fla. 3d DCA 2002)
- Llerena v. State, 953 So. 2d 31 (Fla. 3d DCA 2007)