Martinez v. People

542 P.3d 675

2024 CO 6

2024 CO 6

Arnold Roman MARTINEZ, Petitioner,

v.The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Respondent.

Supreme Court Case No. 22SC272

Supreme Court of Colorado.

February 5, 2024

Certiorari to the Colorado Court of Appeals, Court of Appeals Case No. 19CA1308

Attorneys for Petitioner: Megan A. Ring, Public Defender, Meredith K. Rose, Deputy Public Defender, Denver, Colorado

Attorneys for Respondent: Philip J. Weiser, Attorney General, John T. Lee, First Assistant Attorney General, Jessica E. Ross, Assistant Attorney General, Denver, Colorado

En Banc

JUSTICE HOOD delivered the Opinion of the Court, in which CHIEF JUSTICE BOATRIGHT, JUSTICE MÁRQUEZ, JUSTICE HART, JUSTICE SAMOUR, and JUSTICE BERKENKOTTER joined.

JUSTICE HOOD delivered the Opinion of the Court.

¶1 When the defendant, Arnold Roman Martinez, stole a bicycle from C.T.’s garage, C.T. jumped in his car and gave chase. As Martinez tried to complete his getaway on the bike, C.T. first drove parallel to him and then cut him off. Martinez hit the car. Fortunately, nobody got hurt. But when criminal charges against Martinez yielded a plea agreement, the district court ordered Martinez to pay over $2,000 in restitution for the damage to C.T.’s car.

¶2 Martinez challenged this order, asserting that the district court erred in finding that Martinez proximately caused the damage. On appeal, the parties disagreed about the appropriate standard of review, as did a division of the court of appeals. The majority reviewed the district court’s proximate-cause determination for an abuse of discretion, but Judge J. Jones specially concurred, arguing that the appropriate standard of review is clear error.

¶3 We hold that clear error is the appropriate standard of review for evaluating a district court’s determination of proximate cause for restitution. Accordingly, we conclude that the division erred by applying abuse-of-discretion review here. But applying the dear-error standard, we nonetheless affirm the division’s judgment that Martinez was obligated to pay restitution. Thus, we affirm on other grounds.

I. Facts and Procedural History

¶4 C.T. and his wife returned to their Boulder home one evening and left their garage door open. C.T.’s wife heard a noise in the garage and went to investigate. She screamed that a man, later identified as Martinez, was in the garage stealing C.T.’s bike.

¶5 As Martinez rode off on the bike, C.T. got in his car and went after him. (It was an expensive bike.) After several blocks, C.T. caught up with Martinez, drove parallel to him, and then turned in front of him, cutting him off. Martinez crashed into the front passenger-side fender of C.T.’s car. Martinez then got into another car and drove away. The bike was undamaged, but C.T.’s car was less fortunate.

¶6 The prosecution charged Martinez with second degree burglary and criminal mischief but dropped these charges as part of an agreement in which Martinez pled guilty in another case and agreed to pay restitution for the cost of repairing C.T.’s car in this case. The prosecutor sought $2,393.84. Martinez objected, claiming that he wasn’t the proximate cause of the damage and therefore didn’t owe restitution.

¶7 The district court granted the prosecution’s restitution request. It found that C.T. pulling his car in front of Martinez wasn’t an independent intervening cause that broke the chain of causation, reasoning that C.T.’s act was foreseeable and that Martinez participated in the collision. Consequently, the district court concluded that Martinez’s theft was the proximate cause of the damage to C.T.’s car.

¶8 A division of the court of appeals affirmed the restitution order. People v. Martinez, 2022 COA 28, ¶ 52, 511 P.3d 739, 748. The parties disagreed on the standard of review. Martinez claimed that the division should review the district court’s proximate cause determination as a sufficiency-of-the-evidence question subject to de novo review, while the prosecution claimed that the division should review for an abuse of discretion. The division majority agreed with the prosecution. Id. at ¶ 14, 511 P.3d at 742. In his special concurrence, however, Judge J. Jones stated that he would have reviewed for clear error. Id. at ¶ 60, 511 P.3d at 749 (J. Jones, J., specially concurring). Regardless of the standard applied, the division unanimously concluded that the district court didn’t err in finding that Martinez proximately caused the car’s damage. Id. at ¶¶ 31, 61, 511 P.3d at 745, 749–50.

¶9 We granted Martinez’s petition to review the division’s opinion.¹

II. Analysis

¶10 We first explain why the clear error standard should govern. In doing so, we note that abuse-of-discretion review of restitution orders is a relic from a bygone statutory era. We also reject Martinez’s claim that his challenge is one based on insufficiency of the evidence, which merits mixed-question review.

¶11 Having set the bar, we then explain how the district court cleared it. Because there is record support for the court’s factual finding that C.T. cutting off Martinez on the bike was not an independent intervening cause of the damage to C.T.’s car, there was no clear error here.

A. Proximate Cause for Criminal Restitution

[1] ¶12 We determine the applicable standard of review de novo. Howard-Walker v. People, 2019 CO 69, ¶ 22, 443 P.3d 1007, 1011. The standard we assign depends on the type of issue we confront. So, we must first consider how the legislature has instructed courts to calculate restitution.

[2, 3] ¶13 A defendant convicted of a felony offense must pay restitution for any pecuniary loss he proximately caused his victim. See § 18-1.3-602(3)(a), C.R.S. (2023). Proximate cause is any "cause which in natural and probable sequence produced the claimed injury." People v. Stewart, 55 P.3d 107, 116 (Colo. 2002) (quoting CJI-Crim., 9:10, 9(3) (1983)). Thus, "[u]nlawful conduct that is broken by an independent intervening cause cannot be the proximate cause of injury to another." Id. at 121. But "[t]o qualify as an intervening cause, an event must be unforeseeable and one in which the accused does not participate." Id.

[4] ¶14 A victim’s gross negligence can serve as an independent intervening cause. People v. Saavedra-Rodriguez, 971 P.2d 223, 226 (Colo. 1998). "Gross negligence is willful and wanton conduct, that is, action committed recklessly, with conscious disregard for the safety of others." Hamill v. Cheley Colo. Camps, Inc., 262 P.3d 945, 954 (Colo. App. 2011). With this framework in mind, we turn to how the division erred.

1. The Division Erred in Applying an Abuse-of-Discretion Standard

¶15 The division majority reviewed for an abuse of discretion. Martinez, ¶ 14, 511 P.3d at 742. It relied on case law that recognized courts’ discretion in determining the terms and conditions of restitution orders. See, e.g., People v. Henson, 2013 COA 36, ¶¶ 9–20, 307 P.3d 1135, 1137–39; People v. Reyes, 166 P.3d 301, 302 (Colo. App. 2007); accord Pierce v. Underwood, 487 U.S. 552, 558, 108 S.Ct. 2541, 101 L.Ed.2d 490 (1988) (identifying abuse of discretion as the appropriate standard for "matters of discretion"). But, as the special concurrence points out, these cases aren’t applicable because they predate the current statutory regime for determining restitution.

¶16 The abuse-of-discretion standard that Henson, Reyes, and their predecessors applied can be traced to Cumhuriyet v. People, 615 P.2d 724, 725–26 (Colo. 1980), which interpreted former section 16-11-204, C.R.S. (1973 & 1978 Repl. Vol. 8). Martinez, ¶ 55 n.1, 511 P.3d at 748 n.1 (J. Jones, J., specially concurring). That section said a court, "in its discretion," could impose "reasonably necessary" probation conditions, including restitution. § 16-11-204(1), (2)(e) (emphasis added). When this law controlled, it was appropriate for appellate courts to review decisions involving restitution for an abuse of discretion.

[5] ¶17 The General Assembly repealed section 16-11-204 in 2002, however, and replaced it with section 18-1.3-204(1)(a), C.R.S. (2023), which states that "[t]he court shall provide as [an] explicit condition[ ] of every sentence to probation … that the defendant make restitution." Ch. 318, sec. 2, § 18-1.3-204(1), 2002 Colo. Sess. Laws 1365, 1378 (emphasis added). Two years earlier, the General Assembly also passed then-section 16-18.5-103 (now section 18-1.3-603(1), C.R.S. (2023)), which provides that "[e]very order of conviction … shall include consideration of restitution." Ch. 232, sec. 1, § 16-18.5-103(1), 2000 Colo. Sess. Laws 1030, 1032 (emphasis added). These changes made restitution mandatory when proximate cause is established. See Walton v. People, 2019 CO 95, ¶ 13, 451 P.3d 1212, 1216 (" ‘Shall’ is mandatory unless there is a clear indication otherwise."). Thus, it no longer makes sense to apply abuse-of-discretion review.

¶18 But if not abuse of discretion, then what? Martinez urges de novo review, claiming that the problem is one of sufficiency of the evidence. We turn to that contention now.

2. Martinez Doesn’t Present a Sufficiency-of-the-Evidence Challenge

[6, 7] ¶19 Martinez alleges that he brings a sufficiency-of-the-evidence challenge, in which appellate courts review the record de novo. Clark v. People, 232 P.3d 1287, 1291 (Colo. 2010) (examining a sufficiency challenge outside the context of restitution). Although this court hasn’t weighed in on this issue in addressing restitution, multiple divisions of the court of appeals have reviewed true challenges to the sufficiency of restitution evidence de novo. See, e.g., People v. Moss, 2022 COA 92, ¶¶ 9–11, 520 P.3d 694, 696; People v. Dyson, 2021 COA 57, ¶ 15, 492 P.3d 1070, 1074; People v. Barbre, 2018 COA 123, ¶ 25, 429 P.3d 95, 99. This brings us to the crux of the issue: Does Martinez present a true sufficiency challenge?

[8] ¶20 To answer this question, we consider the challenge's substance, not its form. See Lucero v. People, 2017 CO 49, ¶ 26, 394...