Monday, March 21, 2005

Payton: Transfer denied in a non-Blakely Blakely case.

Payton v. State, Court of Appeals No. 02A03-0403-CR-139 (Ind. Ct. App. November 30, 2004) appears in the sidebar list of Indiana Blakely cases. I did not, apparently, post anything about the case when it came out; and that may be because the case does not explicitly apply Blakely, although it oddly mentions Blakely for the proposition that criminal history as a single aggravating circumstance can support an enhanced sentence. I suppose that was the court's back-handed way of saying Blakely didn't affect the case.

The criminal history mentioned by the Court of Appeals looks like it is pretty much down the middle of the prior conviction exception: "Payton has a criminal history consisting of two misdemeanor and four felony offenses, including a 1983 murder conviction, for which he has served time."

Under state law, see Ind. Appellate Rule 7(B), the Court of Appeals reduced Payton's sentence for impersonating an officer, several counts of sexual misconduct with a minor, and an habitual offender finding from 39 to 25 1/2 years.

The Supreme Court denied transfer in Payton on March 3rd.

So the only transfer action I'm finding is on cases involving criminal history, however one reads the prior conviction exception.

The roundup continues.

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