People v. Young
People v. Young
Opinion
*642 ¶ 1 Defendant, Nelson Young, was convicted of first degree murder ( 720 ILCS 5/9-1(a)(2) (West 2004) ). The circuit court of Morgan County sentenced him to serve a term of 40 years in prison, with 215 days of presentence custody credit, and also imposed certain fines and fees. Defendant subsequently filed a successive postconviction petition, which was dismissed on the State's motion. On appeal, defendant argued, inter alia , that the circuit court erred in failing to award him the correct amount of presentence custody credit as required by statute.
¶ 2 The appellate court declined to address defendant's claim for additional presentence custody credit.
¶ 3 I. BACKGROUND
¶ 4 In July 2005, defendant was charged with first degree murder ( 720 ILCS 5/9-1(a)(2) (West 2004) ) for the stabbing death of his girlfriend, Eva Marie Davis. After undergoing a fitness examination, defendant was found unfit to stand trial in December 2005. He was temporarily transferred to the Department of Human Services for treatment and, following a second fitness hearing, was found fit for trial in March 2006. Defendant was tried and convicted by a jury, and the circuit court sentenced him to serve 40 years in prison, with 215 days of presentence custody credit. The court also ordered him to pay court costs and a DNA analysis fee. Sometime thereafter, the clerk of the circuit court recorded additional fines against defendant that had not been imposed by the circuit court as part of his sentence.
*198
*643
¶ 5 On direct appeal, defendant argued that the circuit court erred in admitting other-crimes evidence. The appellate court rejected that claim and affirmed his conviction and sentence.
People v. Young
,
¶ 6 In April 2009, defendant,
pro se
, filed a petition for postconviction relief under the Post-Conviction Hearing Act ( 725 ILCS 5/122-1
et seq.
(West 2008) ), asserting that his trial counsel was ineffective based on his counsel's trial strategy, including decisions regarding the presentation of or objection to evidence and the failure to pursue defenses other than accident. The circuit court dismissed the petition as frivolous and patently without merit. See
¶ 7 In October 2014, defendant pro se filed a petition seeking postjudgment relief under section 2-1401 of the Code of Civil Procedure ( 735 ILCS 5/2-1401 (West 2014) ). In that petition, defendant alleged that his trial counsel was ineffective for failing to advise the circuit court of certain facts showing that he was unfit to stand trial. Defendant further asserted that his right to due process had been violated because he was unfit at the time of trial. As relief, defendant requested the court to order a psychological evaluation to determine whether he was fit at the time of trial.
¶ 8 The circuit court recharacterized the petition as a successive postconviction petition and advanced it to second-stage proceedings. 1 The court ultimately granted the State's motion to dismiss. Defendant sought reconsideration, contending, inter alia , that the circuit court erred by recharacterizing his petition as a successive postconviction petition without notifying him. In addition, defendant requested that the court vacate the dismissal and appoint counsel to represent him at the second-stage proceedings. The circuit court denied defendant's request for reconsideration.
¶ 9 On appeal, defendant raised three issues. First, he argued that the circuit court erred by recharacterizing his petition for relief from judgment as a successive postconviction petition without first admonishing him in accordance with
People v. Pearson
,
¶ 10 The appellate court agreed with defendant on the first two issues. Accordingly, the appellate court vacated the dismissal of his successive postconviction petition and remanded the case for proper admonishments in compliance with
Pearson
.
¶ 11 Defendant appeals to this court. Additional pertinent facts will be discussed in the context of the issues raised on appeal.
¶ 12 II. ANALYSIS
¶ 13 The central issue in this appeal is whether defendant's claim for presentence custody credit under section 5-4.5-100 of the Unified Code of Corrections (730 ILCS 5/5-4.5-100 (West 2014) ) is procedurally defaulted because it was asserted for the first time on appeal from postconviction proceedings. The determination of whether a claim is procedurally barred presents a question of law subject to
de novo
review.
People v. Thompson
,
¶ 14 As an initial matter, we address the appellate court's assessment of its jurisdiction to address defendant's claim for presentence custody credit. See
Thompson
,
¶ 15 Defendant argues that the appellate court erred in refusing to grant him an additional 183 days of presentence custody credit based on his failure to assert that claim in prior proceedings. The State responds that the appellate court properly declined to address the sentence-credit claim because it had been forfeited. 2
¶ 16 The Post-Conviction Hearing Act (Act) ( 725 ILCS 5/122-1
et seq.
(West 2014) ) provides a remedy to criminal defendants who claim that substantial violations of their federal or state constitutional rights occurred in the prosecutions
*645
*200
that resulted in their convictions. A postconviction proceeding is a collateral attack, not an appeal seeking review of the judgment. The purpose of a postconviction action is to permit inquiry into constitutional issues involved in the original trial that have not been, and could not have been, adjudicated previously upon direct review. Issues that were raised and decided on direct review are barred by the doctrine of
res judicata
, and issues that could have been presented on direct review, but were not, are procedurally defaulted.
People v. Taylor
,
¶ 17 In this case, it is uncontroverted that defendant's claim for additional presentence custody credit under section 5-4.5-100 has been forfeited. Defendant did not object to the presentence-credit calculation at the time of sentencing, in his initial posttrial motion, in his amended posttrial motion, or in the motion seeking a reduction of his sentence. The issue was not raised on direct appeal as plain error or as the basis for a claim of ineffective assistance of trial counsel, nor was it presented in a timely filed section 2-1401 petition. Defendant's initial postconviction petition did not assert the claim or allege that appellate counsel was ineffective for failing to present it on direct appeal. Finally, defendant did not include the claim in his successive petition, which is the subject of this appeal.
¶ 18 Defendant does not dispute that his custody-credit claim could have been raised in those proceedings. He argues, however, that his failure to assert the claim earlier is of no moment because a claim for presentence custody credit is immune to the rules of procedural default. In particular, defendant claims that the applicable statutory language and relevant Illinois jurisprudence permits the assertion of his claim on appeal from the dismissal of his successive postconviction petition.
¶ 19 In addressing defendant's argument, we must construe the language codified in the presentence custody credit statute (730 ILCS 5/5-4.5-100 (West 2014). The primary objective in construing a statute is to ascertain and give effect to the intent of the legislature. The most reliable indicator of legislative intent is the language of the statute, given its plain and ordinary meaning. A court must view the statute as a whole, construing words and phrases in light of other relevant statutory provisions and not in isolation. Each word, clause, and sentence of a statute must be given a reasonable meaning, if possible, and should not be rendered superfluous. In general, courts will not depart from the statute's plain language by reading into it exceptions, limitations, or conditions the legislature did not express.
People v. Casas
,
¶ 20 Section 5-4.5-100(b) of the Unified Code of Corrections provides, in pertinent part, as follows:
"the offender shall be given credit on the determinate sentence or maximum term and the minimum period of imprisonment for the number of days spent in custody as a result of the offense for which the sentence was imposed. * * *
*646 *201 The trial court may give credit to the defendant for the number of days spent confined for psychiatric or substance abuse treatment prior to judgment, if the court finds that the detention or confinement was custodial." 730 ILCS 5/5-4.5-100(b) (West 2014). 3
¶ 21 Defendant argues that, because section 5-4.5-100 provides that the grant of credit is mandatory and does not include any limitation restricting when credit requests may be asserted, claims for sentence credit under that provision are not subject to forfeiture. According to defendant, claims for presentence custody credit must be treated in the same manner as claims for
per diem
monetary credit under section 110-14 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of 1963 ( 725 ILCS 5/110-14 (West 2014) ). In support of this argument, defendant relies on
People v. Woodard
,
¶ 22 Both
Woodard
and
Caballero
addressed the viability of claims for
per diem
monetary credit that were raised for the first time on appeal.
Woodard
did so in the context of a direct appeal (
Woodard
,
¶ 23 In
Woodard
, the court noted that the right to monetary credit is mandatory and shall be granted "upon application" for it.
Woodard
,
¶ 24 In
Caballero
, the court initially found that a claim for the
per diem
monetary credit under section 110-14 is a statutory right that is not cognizable under the Act.
Caballero
,
¶ 25 In asserting that his custody-credit claim is not subject to procedural default, defendant points out that in cases decided after
Caballero
the appellate court has not been consistent in granting claims for presentence custody credit under section 5-4.5-100 that are raised for the first time on appeal. See
People v. Truesdell
,
¶ 26 In both
Caballero
and
Woodard
, the conclusion that a
per diem
credit claim could be asserted for the first time on appeal was specifically predicated on the fact that section 110-14 provided that the mandatory
per diem
credit is to be granted "upon application of the defendant" without any specified time limitation for that application.
Caballero
,
¶ 27 Defendant urges that to treat claims for presentence custody credit differently from
per diem
credit claims is unduly harsh because the entitlement to credit that will reduce the amount of time a prisoner is confined involves significant liberty interests-concerns that are not at issue in claims for monetary credit against fines. We acknowledge the logic underlying defendant's contention. However, our decision is grounded in the plain language of section 5-4.5-100 and the fact that the legislature has not included the "upon application" language that was deliberately included in the provision governing
per diem
monetary credit. See
People v. Williams
,
¶ 28 We next address defendant's argument that Illinois Supreme Court Rule 615(b) (eff. Jan. 1, 1967) permitted the appellate court to grant his claim for presentence custody credit despite the fact that it was raised for the first time on appeal from postconviction proceedings. See
e.g.
,
People v. Andrews
,
¶ 29 Defendant also argues that the appellate court should have addressed his statutory claim for presentence custody credit as a motion to correct the mittimus. See
e.g.
,
People v. Brown
,
¶ 30 That is not the circumstance presented here. Defendant does not, and cannot, assert that the mittimus is inaccurate in this case because the judgment entered by the circuit court granted him 215 days of presentence custody credit. The relief defendant seeks is not correction of the mittimus but, rather, amendment of the sentencing judgment to reflect the correct calculation of the amount of presentence custody credit to which he is entitled. See 735 ILCS 5/2-1801(a) (West 2014) (providing that a copy of the circuit court's judgment constitutes the mittimus). That is not something that can be accomplished by the appellate court on appeal from the dismissal of a successive postconviction petition that did not raise the claim.
¶ 31 As set forth above, we find no recognized exception that applies in this case to excuse the procedural default of the custody-credit claim. Consequently, the appellate court properly refused to grant the credit requested by defendant for the first time in his appeal from the dismissal of his postconviction petition. To the extent that the appellate court's decisions in Andrews , Brown , and Wren hold to the contrary, they are hereby overruled.
¶ 32 Defendant has argued, in the alternative, that this court should announce a new rule in this opinion to allow a defendant to seek correction of a miscalculation of presentence custody credit at any time and at any stage of proceedings. We decline defendant's request. The assertion of an error in sentencing credit is best resolved in the circuit court, where any factual disputes as to the proper amount of credit can be adjudicated. Moreover, in
People ex rel. Berlin v. Bakalis
,
¶ 33 As a second alternative argument, defendant requests that we exercise our supervisory authority to grant him the additional 183 days of presentence custody credit. The State does not oppose the request that we exercise our supervisory authority but asserts that granting the additional credit outright is inappropriate in this case. The State points out that an award of credit for time spent confined for psychiatric treatment prior to judgment is discretionary and may be granted if the *650 *205 circuit court finds that the detention or confinement was custodial. 730 ILCS 5/5-4.5-100 (West 2014). As a consequence, the State contends that this case should be remanded to the circuit court for a determination of the correct amount of credit to which defendant is entitled. We agree that this is a question best answered by the circuit court.
¶ 34 Accordingly, in the exercise of our supervisory authority ( Ill. Const. 1970, art. VI, § 16 ), we order the circuit court to address defendant's claim on remand and determine the amount of additional presentence custody credit to which he is entitled. In addition, we order the circuit court to appoint counsel to represent defendant at the proceedings on remand.
¶ 35 Finally, we address defendant's citation of our recent decision in
People v. Vara
,
¶ 36 In appealing the dismissal of his successive postconviction petition, defendant requested the vacatur of three fines recorded against him by the circuit clerk: the $50 court-finance assessment, the $10 medical-costs assessment, and the $25 violent-crime-victims-assistance assessment.
¶ 37 III. CONCLUSION
¶ 38 For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the appellate court is affirmed in part and vacated in part, and the cause is remanded to the circuit court for further proceedings as ordered by the appellate court and consistent with the views expressed herein.
¶ 39 Appellate court judgment affirmed in part and vacated in part.
¶ 40 Cause remanded with directions.
Chief Justice Karmeier and Justices Thomas, Kilbride, Garman, Burke, and Theis concurred in the judgment and opinion.
Although the petition was advanced to second-stage proceedings, the circuit court did not appoint counsel to represent defendant.
Throughout its brief, the State refers to defendant's petition as seeking relief under section 2-1401, as it was labeled and initially presented in the circuit court. However, the appellate court concluded that the trial court had recharacterized that document as a successive postconviction petition and remanded for the necessary Pearson admonishments, which would not be required or appropriate for a section 2-1401 petition. The State has not argued that the appellate court erred in its recharacterization determination or that the remand was improper. Accordingly, we address the issues presented here under the law governing postconviction proceedings.
At the time defendant was sentenced in 2006, presentence custody credit was governed by section 5-8-7 of the Unified Code of Corrections (730 ILCS 5/5-8-7(b) (West 2006) ). That section was repealed in 2009 and replaced by section 5-4.5-100. No relevant changes were made to the language or substance of the provisions.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- The PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Appellee, v. Nelson YOUNG, Appellant.
- Cited By
- 8 cases
- Status
- Unpublished