Reynolds v. State, Minn.Ct.App., 1/25/2016. Mr. Reynolds pleaded guilty to failure to register under the predatory offender registration statute. Three months after sentencing the trial judge amended the sentence to add a ten year conditional release term. Four years later Mr. Reynolds moved to vacate that conditional release term under Rule 27.03, subdivision 9 of the criminal rules. The trial judge treated the motion as a post conviction petition and denied it summarily as time-barred under the post conviction statute. The trial judge also addressed the merits of the request and concluded that because Mr. Reynolds was a "risk-level III offender" he was subject to the ten year conditional release term.
Rule 27.03, subdivision 9 does not have a limitations provision; quite the contrary: the district court "may at any time correct a sentence not authorized by law." The post conviction statute, on the other hand, has a two year limitations provision. The question of which to apply has vexed the courts ever since the legislature added the limitations provision to the post conviction statute:
The answer depends on the nature of Reynolds’s challenge. We have held that the two-year statutory time limit does not apply to or restrict motions “properly filed” under rule 27.03. Vazquez v. State, 822 N.W.2d 313, 318 (Minn. App. 2012). And a motion is properly filed under the rule if the offender challenges a sentence on the grounds that “the sentence is contrary to an applicable statute or other applicable law.” Washington v. State, 845 N.W.2d 205, 213 (Minn. App. 2014); see also Vazquez, 822 N.W.2d at 318 (holding that a challenge to a sentence based on the district court’s incorrect calculation of the offender’s criminal-history score was properly raised under rule 27.03); State v. Amundson, 828 N.W.2d 747, 751 (Minn. App. 2013) (holding the same for a challenge based on an unauthorized upward departure at sentencing). The supreme court has held that a challenge is not properly filed under rule 27.03 when it implicates more than simply the sentence and instead effectively challenges the validity of the underlying conviction or plea agreement. State v. Coles, 862 N.W.2d 477, 480–81 (Minn. 2015); see also Wayne v. State, 870 N.W.2d 389, 391–92 (Minn. 2015) (applying Coles and deeming the claim outside the rule because a victory would have entitled the claimant to “a new trial, not a reduced sentence”)
The state wanted the court to limit the "law" of "not authorized by law" to "laws enacted by the legislature.." The court of appeals rejected this miserly interpretation. Instead, the court stuck with the formula from the supreme court's opinion last year in State v. Coles, 862 N.W.2d 477 (Minn. 2015) which said that a challenge under Rule 27.03 is not proper when it implicates more than simply the sentence. So, Mr. Reynolds gets to stay in court.
Turning to the merits, while this appeal was kicking around the supreme court decided State v. Her, which held that a district court can impose a conditional release term based upon a defendant's status as a risk level II offender only if that defendant admits to that status or a jury finds it. It's a Blakely problem. So, on the merits of Mr. Reynold's challenge the district court got it wrong by imposing the conditional release term itself, never mind about the lack of notice and opportunity to be heard beforehand.
The court of appeals punts the case back to the trial court to figure out what relief is available to Mr. Reynolds. This likely includes a Blakely jury trial to determine his risk status. See State v. Hankerson, 723 N.W.2d 232 (Minn. 2006).
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