Justia Montana Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Defendant pleaded guilty to felony theft pursuant to a plea agreement. Although both parties recommended that the district court follow the plea agreement in sentencing Defendant, the district court rejected the plea agreement and sentenced Defendant to the Department of Corrections (DOC) for ten years, with five years suspended. Defendant appealed, arguing, among other things, that the district court committed plain error and violated his due process rights by rejecting the plea agreement and failing to afford him the opportunity to withdraw his guilty plea. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the district court did not err when it rejected the plea agreement’s sentencing recommendation without giving Defendant the opportunity to withdraw his plea; and (2) Defendant’s trial attorney did not provide ineffective assistance. View "State v. Olson" on Justia Law

Rober Spoja represented Duste White regarding White’s probation revocation. The sentencing court sentenced White but did not mention whether the sentence was to be served concurrently with other sentences. White petitioned to correct his sentence. The court entered an amended re-sentencing order allowing him to serve his term concurrently with other sentences, resulting in an earlier discharge date. Believing he was incarcerated for fourteen months longer than his actual sentence, White retained Bryan Tipp to represent him in a civil action against Spoja and Spoja’s law firm. After Tipp discovered the sentencing court had not ordered concurrent sentences, Tipp moved successfully to dismiss the case without informing Spoja. Spoja subsequently filed a civil action against White, Tipp, and Tipp’s law firm. The district court dismissed Spoja’s claims. The Supreme Court (1) reversed the entry of summary judgment against Spoja’s attorney deceit claim, and the award of costs, as a trier of fact could find Tipp acted deceitfully and intended to do so; and (2) affirmed the dismissal of Spoja’s malicious prosecution claim and the award of summary judgment against his abuse of process claim. View "Spoja v. White" on Justia Law

Defendant pled guilty to forgery and issuing bad checks and received a deferred sentence. Defendant subsequently violated the conditions of his supervision. The district court imposed two consecutive commitments to the Department of Corrections, with all time suspended. The district court subsequently found that Defendant violated the terms of his probation and revoked Defendant’s suspended sentence. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) neither the relevant statutes nor due process require the State to produce independent evidence corroborating an offender’s admission of a violation of the conditions of his or her supervision; and (2) the district court did not violate Defendant’s right to confront adverse witnesses during the revocation hearing. View "State v. Macker" on Justia Law

Linda and Gerald Cintron gave Defendant a down payment of $180,000 and a promissory note to buy three five-acre lots from Defendant. The Cintrons never received title to the land, nor did Defendant refund the Cintrons’ money. Based on this incident, the State charged Defendant with felony theft by deception. Defendant entered a no contest plea to the charge in return for a six-year deferred sentence and a restitution obligation. After a restitution hearing, the district court imposed a total restitution in the amount of $164,861, which represented the $180,000 investment less the $125,000 Defendant had already paid, plus the Cintrons’ tax liability resulting from their use of their retirement accounts to raise the down payment, including an excise tax. The Supreme Court affirmed in part and reversed in part, holding (1) Defendant should not be required to make restitution for the income tax liabilities the Cintrons faced when they received restitution for the $180,000; but (2) Defendant may be required to pay restitution of the excise tax. View "State v. Cerasani" on Justia Law

Appellant pleaded no contest to arson, a felony. Appellant later moved to withdraw his no contest plea. The district court denied the petition, concluding that Appellant entered a knowing and voluntary plea and could not demonstrate that the offer of proof was insufficient or that his representation was ineffective. The district court's judgment was affirmed on appeal. Appellant subsequently petitioned for postconviction relief, alleging ineffective assistance of counsel and that the district court misinterpreted the arson statute. The district court denied the petition. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the district court did not err in its interpretation of the arson statute; and (2) Appellant was unable to prove that he was afforded ineffective assistance of counsel. View "Ellison v. State" on Justia Law

The State charged Defendant with fourth-offense driving under the influence of alcohol (DUI), a felony. As a basis for the charge, the State cited Defendant's three prior DUI convictions in Nevada. Defendant filed a motion to dismiss the felony charge, asserting that his second and third DUI convictions were premised on a Nevada statute that was not sufficiently similar to Montana's DUI statutes to constitute prior convictions for purposes of supporting a felony charge. The district court denied the motion. Defendant subsequently pled guilty to felony DUI, reserving his right to appeal the denial of his motion to dismiss. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the district court did not err by denying Defendant's motion to dismiss the felony DUI charge because Nevada's statute was sufficiently similar to Montana's DUI and DUI per se statutes to support Defendant's felony conviction under Montana law. View "State v. Calvert" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of vehicular homicide while under the influence, failure to stop immediately at the scene of an accident involving an injured person, and driving without a valid driver's license. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the district court did not err by limiting Defendant's cross-examination of the State's informant; (2) the district court erred when it prevented Defendant's expert forensic pathologist from testifying about matters not disclosed through discovery, but the error was harmless; and (3) the district court's decision to permit an undisclosed expert witness to testify for the State did not constitute reversible error. View "State v. Garding" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Defendant was convicted of two counts of attempted deliberate homicide. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the district court (1) correctly denied Defendant's motion for a new trial based on juror misconduct; (2) made an adequate inquiry into Defendant's ineffective assistance of counsel claim and took adequate precautions to ensure that Defendant knowingly and voluntarily waived counsel; (3) correctly employed a balancing test to conclude that Defendant was not deprived of his right to a speedy trial; (4) did not err by admitting evidence of Defendant's prior assault of his wife to rebut Defendant's character evidence; (5) did not plainly err in instructing the jury on mitigated deliberate homicide; and (5) did not improperly impose parole conditions. View "State v. MacGregor" on Justia Law

Defendant was convicted of felony burglary and misdemeanor criminal mischief. Defendant was sentenced to five years incarceration, all suspended. One of the conditions of Defendant's probation was that he not use or possess illegal drugs. The State later filed a petition to revoke Defendant's suspended sentence for, inter alia, driving under the influence of drugs and crushing up his medications and snorting them, rather than taking them as directed by a physician. Defendant moved for a continuance of his revocation hearing, explaining that a "substantial amount of discovery" had not yet been produced. The district court denied the motion. After a hearing, the district court ordered Defendant's sentence revoked. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that the district court did not abuse its discretion or violate Defendant's right to due process when it revoked Defendant's probation without requiring full disclosure of all evidence against him. View "State v. Sebastian" on Justia Law

After a jury trial, Appellant was convicted of theft and accountability to burglary. The Supreme Court reversed Appellant's conviction for theft and affirmed Appellant's conviction for accountability to burglary, holding (1) the district court did not err by instructing the jury on the theory of accountability when the State had not directly charged an accountability based offense; (2) Appellant's counsel's failure to object to an instruction on accountability that defined "purposely" as a conduct-based mental state rather than a result-based mental state caused no prejudice to Appellant; but (3) Appellant's counsel rendered ineffective assistance by failing to object to her theft conviction on the grounds that it violated Montana's statutory restriction on multiple charges. Remanded. View "State v. Tellegen" on Justia Law