Certiorari to the Colorado Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
Case No. 14CA2387
Attorneys for Petitioner: Cynthia H. Coffman, Attorney
General Brock J. Swanson, Assistant Attorney General
Attorneys for Respondent: The Noble Law Firm, LLC Antony
Noble
OPINION
HART,
JUSTICE
¶1
We granted certiorari to determine whether the trial court
plainly erred when it sentenced the defendant, Alfred
Sandoval, to an aggravated community corrections sentence
based on judicial fact-finding to which Sandoval did not
stipulate.[1] We find that it did.
¶2
In affirming the decision of the court of appeals, we hold
that Blakely v. Washington, 542 U.S. 296 (2004),
applies to a direct sentence to community corrections. We
further hold that it was plain error for the trial court to
sentence the defendant to an aggravated sentence to community
corrections without meeting Blakely's
requirements. We therefore remand for resentencing consistent
with this opinion.
I.
Facts and Procedural History
¶3
Alfred Sandoval was charged with first degree assault, a
class three felony, and possession of a weapon by a previous
offender, a class five felony. Sandoval entered into a plea
agreement to the reduced charge of felony menacing, a class
five felony, in exchange for dismissal of the original
charges. The plea agreement also provided that Sandoval would
not be sentenced to the Department of Corrections
("DOC"). It did not include any stipulation to
judicial fact-finding at sentencing.
¶4 At the sentencing hearing, the prosecutor argued for
a sentence to community corrections. The defense argued for a
sentence to probation. Neither party argued for a sentence of
any particular length. After stating that it would not
consider a sentence to probation, the court asked Sandoval to
explain what had happened during the underlying incident so
that it could determine the length of the community
corrections sentence. Sandoval explained:
I went over there to see if he could give me some money that
I lent him and stuff like that. He pulled out a gun, we got
into a little wrestle-around, a shot went off and I walked
out.
The
district court asked Sandoval a few follow-up questions and
then stated:
Well, obviously this case presents a situation of who to
believe. The victim isn't the most believable individual
because he gave several different stories. The
defendant's version, quite frankly, is no more credible.
So the Court is left with what the crime that was pled guilty
to is and some of the underlying facts, and the underlying
facts are that a person got shot, essentially got
knee-capped.
The Court does find that there are aggravating circumstances
in this case. Specifically, the Court notes that Mr. Sandoval
went to the victim's home, entered the victim's home
to collect what he describes as a debt, what the victim
describes as a drug debt. Quite frankly, given the statement
that the victim was high on methamphetamines, the Court finds
it credible that this was a drug debt that was being
collected.
A gun was produced. The victim says the defendant produced
the gun and shot him in the knee, which means that he
knee-capped him. The Court finds that in and of itself would
be aggravation, ...