Williams v. U.S.

311 A.3d 308

Rodney C. WILLIAMS, Appellant,

v.UNITED STATES, Appellee.

No. 23-CO-0645

District of Columbia Court of Appeals.

Argued January 18, 2024

Decided March 14, 2024

Appeal from the Superior Court of the District of Columbia (1982-FEL-005231), (Hon. Michael K. O’Keefe, Trial Judge)

Paul Maneri, Public Defender Service, with whom Sarnia Fam and Mikel-Meredith Weidman, Public Defender Service, were on the brief, for appellant.

Eric Hansford, Assistant United States Attorney, with whom Matthew M. Graves, United States Attorney, and Chrisellen R. Kolb and John P. Mannarino, Assistant United States Attorneys, were on the brief, for appellee.

Before Blackburne-Rigsby, Chief Judge, and Easterly and Shanker, Associate Judges.

Blackburne-Rigsby, Chief Judge:

In 2016, the Council of the District of Columbia enacted the Incarceration Reduction Amendment Act ("IRAA"), which allows for persons serving a term of imprisonment for violations of the law they committed before they were 25 years old to seek modification of them sentence. Under the IRAA, defendants can move for subsequent sentence, modifications three years after the order on their previous application becomes final. In this appeal, we are asked to determine whether an order deciding an IRAA motion becomes final on the date of docketing of the trial court’s written order, or after the time for appeal has lapsed. Appellant Rodney C. Williams filed an initial IRAA application in 2018, which was denied in part by the trial court in 2019. Mr. Williams appealed to this court, which affirmed the trial court’s decision on October 6, 2021. In January 2023, more than three years after the trial court’s order on his initial application, Mr. Williams filed a notice of intent to file a second IRAA application. After initially ordering briefing on the matter, the trial court dismissed Mr. Williams’ second IRAA application as premature and, therefore, untimely. The trial court determined that the time for Mr. Williams to file his second IRAA application was not yet ripe because an order on an IRAA application does not become final until the filing of the appellate mandate, if the applicant appeals the order.

We disagree with the trial court and hold that an order on an IRAA application becomes final on the date of the trial court’s order on the application, regardless of whether or not the movant appeals the initial determination. Accordingly, we reverse the trial court’s decision and remand for further proceedings on Mr. Williams’ second, timely filed IRAA application.

I. Factual Background & Procedural History

Mr. Williams was incarcerated in 1982 for a series of crimes he committed when he was seventeen years old. In July 1983, Mr. Williams, who was 18 years old at the time, pled guilty to a series of offenses and was sentenced to 57-171 years of incarceration. Mr. Williams filed his first application to reduce his sentence under IRAA, D.C. Code § 24-403.03, in December 2018. Six months later, in June 2019, the Superior Court granted Mr. Williams’ application in part and denied it in part. The court reduced Mr. Williams’ sentence to a total of 54-162 years, making him immediately eligible for parole, but declined to modify his sentence to allow for immediate release. A month later, Mr. Williams filed a motion to reconsider the court’s ruling on his initial IRAA application, which was denied by the court in September 2019. On September 6, 2019, Mr. Williams appealed the Superior Court’s order on his IRAA motion. This court affirmed the trial court’s order two years later, issuing the mandate on October 6, 2021.¹ On January 25, 2023, Mr. Williams filed a Notice of Intent² to file a second IRAA application and, in March 2023, the Superior Court filed a briefing order in anticipation of Mr. Williams’ second IRAA application. Initially, Mr. Williams understood that he was to file his IRAA application on or before July 26, 2023, three years after the trial court order on his first motion. However, the Superior Court sua sponte ruled, on April 12, 2023, that Mr. Williams’ IRAA application would not be timely until October 6, 2024—three years after the appellate mandate affirming the denial of his first application. On June 9, 2023, Mr. Williams filed a motion to establish the timeliness of his second IRAA application. The Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia ("PDS"), as Amicus Curiae, filed a brief in support of Mr. Williams’ second IRAA motion. On July 7, 2023, the Superior Court denied Mr. Williams’ motion to establish timeliness and vacated the briefing order.

II. Discussion

[1] In response to constitutional imperatives,³ the D.C. Council enacted the IRAA in 2016 to give juvenile offenders, whose crimes may be more indicative of immaturity than malice, the chance to live life outside of prison if they demonstrate maturity. Williams v. United States, 205 A.3d 837, 846 (D.C. 2019). The IRAA provides all juvenile offenders a "meaningful opportunity to obtain release based on their diminished culpability and’ their maturation and rehabilitation." Id. The IRAA allows for a person to seek modification of their sentence if the violation(s) that led to their imprisonment were committed before they were 25 years old. D.C. Code § 24-403.03(b)(1). Defendants have up to three opportunities for relief. See D.C. Code § 24-403.03(d). Initially, the IRAA limited eligibility to individuals who were 18 years old or younger at the time of their offense and required a waiting period of five years between successive motions. D.C. Code § 24-403.03 (2017). In 2019, the IRAA was amended to reduce the waiting period to three years, D.C. Code § 24-403.03 (2019), and in 2021, the IRAA was amended to extend eligibility to individuals who committed crimes before they were 25 years old. D.C. Code § 24-403.03 (2021).

The IRAA states, in relevant part:

A defendant convicted as an adult of an offense committed before the defendant’s 25th birthday may file an application for a sentence modification under this section. The application shall be in the form of a motion to reduce the sentence. The application may include affidavits or other written material.

D.C. Code § 24-403.03(b)(1). After considering the relevant factors, "[t]he court shall issue an opinion in writing stating the reasons for granting or denying the application, but the court may proceed to sentencing immediately after granting the application" D.C. Code § 24-403.03(b)(4). Further (and relevant to the present appeal),

[i]f the court denies or grants only in part the defendant’s 1st application under this section, a court shall entertain a 2nd application, under this section no sooner than 3 years after the date that the order on the initial application becomes final. If the court denies or grants only in part the defendant’s 2nd application under this section, a court shall entertain a 3rd and final application under this section no sooner than 3 years following the date that the order bn the 2nd application becomes final. No court shall entertain a 4th or successive application under this section.

D.C. Code § 24-403.03(d) (emphases added).

At issue before us is whether an order on an initial IRAA application "becomes final" under the IRAA statute, D.C. Code § 24-403.03(d), when the trial court dockets its written order on the application or when the appellate process has run. We hold that an order on an IRAA application is final when the trial court issues its written order.

A. Standard of Review

[2–4] We review issues of statutory interpretation de novo. Hubb v. State Farm Mut. Auto, Ins. Co., 85 A.3d 836,839 (D.C. 2014) (citing Potter v. United States, 769 A.2d 143, 148) (D.C. 2001)). Guided by the "primary and general rule of statutory construction," Solon v. United States, 196 A.3d 1283, 1287 (D.C. 2018) (quoting Jeffrey v. United States, 892 A.2d 1122, 1128 (D.C. 2006)), we first look to see whether the statutory language is plain and truly unambiguous. United States v. Facon, 288 A.3d 317, 328 (D.C. 2023). "In determining the correct reading of statutory language, [this court] consider[s] statutory context and structure, evident legislative purpose, and potential consequences of adopting a given interpretation." In re G.D.L., 223 A.3d 100,104 (D.C. 2020). We analyze each method of statutory interpretation in turn.

B. Statutory Language

[5] We begin our analysis by reviewing the language of the IRAA statute. See Whitfield v. United States, 99 A.3d 650, 656 (D.C. 2014) (explaining "the primary rule of statutory construction that the intent of the lawmaker is to be found in the language that he [or she] has used." (internal quotation marks omitted)), We focus our analysis on the language of D.C. Code § 24-403.03(d), which states that "a court shall entertain" subsequent IRAA applications "no sooner than 3 years after the date that the order on the initial application becomes final." In this case, the trial court determined, to the contrary, that an order on the initial IRAA application "becomes final" upon the issuance of the mandate by the Court of Appeals, if an IRAA applicant appeals the trial court’s order, or at the expiration of the time to appeal, if the IRAA applicant does not appeal the trial court order. The government similarly-argues that the phrase "becomes final" indicates that the order is not inherently final but, instead, comes to be final at some later point in time. Mr. Williams argues that the plain text and context of subsection (d) are such that the order on the initial application "becomes final" when the trial court issues its final order on the merits of the motion, thereby starting the three-year waiting period. We agree with Mr. Williams.

"Finality is variously defined; like many legal terms, its precise meaning depends on context." Clay v. United States, 587 U.S. 522, 527, 123 S.Ct. 1072, 155 L.Ed.2d 88 (2003). Black’s Law Dictionary defines "final," in the context of a judgment, as "not...