Browder v. State, Minn.Ct.App., 6/12/2017. A jury convicted Mr. Browder of aiding and abetting third degree criminal sexual conduct for helping another man rape a barely conscious woman. The trial court imposed a prison sentence and also imposed a ten year conditional release period. He challenged the conditional release period. Here's what the conditional release statute, Minn.Stat. 609.3455, subd. 6, says:
[W]hen a court commits an offender to the custody of the commissioner of corrections for a violation of section 609.342, 609.343, 609.344, 609.345, or 609.3453, the court shall provide that, after the offender has completed the sentence imposed, the commissioner shall place the offender on conditional release for ten years.
Mr. Browder said, hold on here, the conditional release statute, does not include aiding and abetting and so a court can't impose that conditional release. To drive home the point, he cites the predatory offender statute which does include aiding and abetting. So there.
The court of appeals has to wriggle around its literalist interpretation of statutes to keep Mr. Browder on conditional release. Here's how the court explains why he's subject to it:
[B]y its clear terms, the conditional-release statute is not limited to offenders imprisoned for violating the listed sex-misconduct statutes, but more generally reaches offenders imprisoned for a violation of any of those statutes.
See the difference there? Ouch.
Mr. Browder also challenged on separation of powers grounds the authority of the Sentencing Guidelines Commission to assign felony points to a felony turned misdemeanor. The court rejects this argument, essentially following Mr. Browder's lead of not having developed a cogent explanation for the assertion. Mr. Browder's pro se endeavors did not elucidate just why the Guidelines Commission could't do this and the court of appeals couldn't figure it out either.
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