Troupe v. State

903 S.E.2d 721

TROUPE

v.The STATE.

A24A0065

Court of Appeals of Georgia.

June 21, 2024

James Todd Mitchell, Austell, for Appellant.

Joshua Bradley Smith, Jared Tolton Williams, Augusta, for Appellee.

Land, Judge.

In April 2023, Michael Troupe was charged with felony offenses while serving a first offender probated sentence under OCGA § 42-8-60. In addition to pursuing the new charges, the State filed a petition for an adjudication of guilt and resentencing in the first offender case. See OCGA § 42-8-60 (d) (1) and (d) (2) (authorizing trial courts to enter an adjudication of guilt and resentence a first offender probationer who has violated the terms of his probation and/or been convicted of another crime during the period of his first offender sentence). Troupe entered into a negotiated plea with the State to resolve the new charges and their resulting impact on his first offender probation. Specifically, the parties agreed that Troupe would plead guilty to the new charges and be sentenced to a total of six years to serve plus a term of probation to be determined by the trial court, with that sentence to run concurrently with a six year revocation of his probation in the first offender case.

The trial court considered the parties’ agreement and rejected it, as it was entitled to do. At the same time it announced its rejection of the guilty plea, and without the benefit of a full hearing on the petition in the first offender case, the trial court proceeded to resentence Troupe to 25 years to serve in that case. When asked to explain the basis for the resentencing, the trial court unequivocally stated that its decision to resentence Troupe to serve more than four times the amount of time the parties agreed to was based on the fact that Troupe was a first offender who "has admitted his guilt with regard to [the new case] during the course of this hearing." In other words, the trial court used Troupe’s rejected plea agreement and its corresponding admission of guilt as the basis for resentencing in the first offender case. The question before us is whether the trial court was authorized to do that. We conclude that it was not and therefore reverse the trial court’s sentencing order.

We agree with Troupe that his resentencing was fundamentally unfair under the circumstances of this case, that the trial court erred by using his negotiated plea and its corresponding admission of guilt as the basis for that resentencing, and that the trial court’s order was supported by insufficient evidence. In this regard, the record shows that in April 2021, Troupe pled guilty to one count of making terroristic threats as a lesser-included offense of aggravated assault and one count of a Street Gang Terrorism and Prevention Act violation. Troupe was sentenced as a first offender to two concurrent five-year terms of probation. The trial court’s sentencing order specifically noted that "[u]pon violation of the terms of probation … the Court may enter an adjudication of guilt and proceed to sentence the Defendant to the maximum sentence as provided by law."

In April 2023, the State filed a petition for an adjudication of guilt and resentencing in the first offender case, alleging that Troupe had committed several new felony offenses in January 2023. The State later amended its petition to allege that Troupe had also committed additional felony offenses in May 2022.

The State entered into a negotiated plea agreement with Troupe to resolve the new charges arising from the May 2022 offenses; if approved by the trial court, this agreement would have also resolved the resentencing petition filed by the State in the first offender case.¹ The parties’ agreement specified that Troupe would plead guilty to the new charges and be sentenced to six years to serve, followed by a term of probation to be determined by the trial court, while at the same time having six years of his probation revoked in the first offender case, with that period of revocation to run concurrently with the six year sentence in the new case. In other words, Troupe agreed to admit his guilt and accept responsibility for the May 2022 offenses in return for a sentence of six years to serve followed by a period of probation to be determined by the trial court. The terms of the plea agreement were recorded on an acknowledgment and waiver-of-rights form, which was signed by Troupe, his counsel, and the State. This form makes it clear that Troupe’s guilty plea and corresponding admission of guilt were based entirely on the parties’ agreement to resolve these two matters pursuant to the terms described above.

The trial court held a hearing on May 4, 2023, at which Troupe appeared via video conference. At the beginning of the hearing, Troupe’s probation officer outlined the basis for the State’s position with respect to the first offender case and requested that the trial court revoke the balance of Troupe’s probation. While giving the trial court a summary of the expected evidence, the probation officer stated that two deputies had been subpoenaed to testify at the hearing. These deputies never testified, and no other evidence of Troupe’s alleged guilt was admitted for the trial court’s consideration.

After hearing from the probation officer, the trial court turned its attention to the parties’ plea agreement and conducted a Boykin² colloquy with Troupe. During this colloquy, Troupe admitted that he had signed the negotiated plea agreement form and understood its contents. The trial court asked the State to provide a factual basis for the new charges, and the State did so. Troupe’s counsel did not object to the factual basis for the plea and asked the trial court to accept the "negotiated resolution of this case."

The trial court rejected the plea agreement and announced, without the benefit of a full hearing on the first offender probation matter, that it was resentencing Troupe in that case to 30 years to serve. After being told that this sentence exceeded the statutory maximum for the charges, the trial court proceeded to sentence Troupe to the statutory maximum, 25 years to serve. While the trial court correctly recognized that its rejection of the plea agreement meant that Troupe was "without any sort of commitment or admission of guilt in that case" and that his "right to a jury trial on that charge [was] restored," it nonetheless used that rejected plea agreement and its corresponding admission of guilt as the sole basis for resentencing Troupe in the first offender case. The record shows that when asked for the "factual basis for the resentencing," the trial court responded that the "factual basis is he’s a first offender, and [Troupe] has admitted his guilt with regard to [the new charges] during the course of this hearing."

[1] Troupe argues that his resentencing was "fundamentally unfair" under the circumstances of this case, that the trial court erred by using his negotiated plea and its corresponding admission of guilt as the basis for that resentencing, and that the trial court’s order was supported by insufficient evidence. We agree.

[2–7] As a general rule, "[t]his court will not interfere with a [probation] revocation unless there has been a manifest abuse of discretion on the part of the trial court." (Punctuation and footnote omitted.) Dugger v. State, 260 Ga. App. 843, 843, 581 S.E.2d 655 (2003). The same is true of resentencing of first offenders who have violated the terms of their probation. Wright v. State, 279 Ga. App. 299, 299, 630 S.E.2d 774 (2006) (same standard of review applies in probation revocation and first offender revocation appeals); Camaron v. State, 246 Ga. App. 80, 82 (1), 539 S.E.2d 577 (2000) (resentencing of first offender who has violated terms of probation is "within the sound discretion of the trial court"). However, "the loss of liberty entailed by a probation revocation proceeding [or a resentencing of a first offender probationer] is a serious deprivation requiring that the probationer be accorded due process." (Citation, punctuation, and footnote omitted.) Meadows v. Settles, 274 Ga. 858, 860 (3), 561 S.E.2d 105 (2002).

Although such liberty is not the equivalent of that enjoyed by an ordinary citizen, it is greater than that enjoyed by one incarcerated for a crime. However this liberty may be restricted, it may not be terminated without the rudiments of procedural due process. What is at stake is not simply technical legal notions of what steps must be followed in a revocation hearing. Instead, there is involved a profound attitude of fairness between man and man, and more particularly between the individual and government.

(Citation and punctuation omitted.) Id. We review de novo the question of whether such a proceeding afforded the defendant due process. Dave v. State, 365 Ga. App. 1, 5 (3), 876 S.E.2d 882 (2022).

[8–10] "The requirements of due process are flexible and call for such procedural protections as the particular situation demands," (citation and punctuation omitted) Dave, 365 Ga. App. at 5 (3), 876 S.E.2d 882, and "[i]t is well-settled that a probationer facing revocation is not entitled to the full panoply of constitutional due process rights which attach to an accused in a criminal prosecution." (Citation and punctuation omitted.) Murphy v. State, 370 Ga. App. 738, 746 (2), 899 S.E.2d 307 (2024). But "where a probationer carries the burden of adducing independent evidence that reflects that his or her admission of probation violations was not knowing and voluntary, a reviewing court may determine whether fundamental fairness requires the reversal of the probation revocation." Meadows, ...