State v. Healer
440 P.3d 404, 246 Ariz. 441 (2019)
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Rule of Law:
A court's authority on a limited remand to correct an unconstitutional juvenile life-without-parole sentence under Miller v. Alabama is confined to that specific sentence and does not extend to revisiting other lawful, consecutive sentences imposed as part of the original sentencing package.
Facts:
- In 1994, Joey Lee Healer, then sixteen years old, lived next door to his elderly neighbor.
- Healer robbed his neighbor.
- During the course of the robbery, Healer murdered his neighbor.
- Healer stole $200 and the victim's truck.
Procedural Posture:
- In 1994, a jury convicted Joey Lee Healer of first-degree murder and other offenses in an Arizona trial court.
- The trial court sentenced Healer to life imprisonment without the possibility of release for the murder, plus consecutive prison terms totaling 13.5 years for the other crimes.
- An Arizona Court of Appeals affirmed his convictions and sentences on direct appeal.
- In 2013, following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Miller v. Alabama, Healer filed a petition for post-conviction relief in the trial court.
- After several dismissals and appeals, the Arizona Supreme Court, applying Miller retroactively per Montgomery v. Louisiana, remanded the case to the trial court for a resentencing hearing on the murder conviction.
- On remand, the State stipulated that Healer should be resentenced on the first-degree murder conviction.
- The trial court resentenced Healer to life with the possibility of parole after twenty-five years for murder but affirmed the previously imposed consecutive sentences for the other counts, ruling it lacked authority to modify them.
- Healer appealed the trial court's resentencing decision to the Arizona Court of Appeals.
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Issue:
Does a trial court, when resentencing a juvenile offender's unconstitutional life-without-parole sentence for murder, have the authority to modify other lawful, consecutive sentences that were part of the original sentencing package?
Opinions:
Majority - Staring, Presiding Judge
No, a trial court's authority on a limited remand for resentencing under Miller v. Alabama is confined to correcting the unconstitutional life-without-parole sentence and does not extend to revisiting other legally imposed sentences. The Arizona Supreme Court's remand was for the limited purpose of addressing the natural life sentence in light of Miller and Montgomery v. Louisiana. Those Supreme Court precedents only address mandatory life-without-parole sentences for juveniles and do not require resentencing on other counts or altering their consecutive or concurrent nature. The trial court correctly concluded its authority was limited to the murder sentence, as a state can remedy a Miller violation simply by making the offender eligible for parole. Furthermore, the court rejected Healer's claim that the statute allowing for parole eligibility (A.R.S. § 13-716) was an unconstitutional ex post facto law, reaffirming its prior holding in State v. Vera that the law is remedial and does not disadvantage the offender. The court also declined to interpret the Arizona Constitution's cruel and unusual punishment clause more broadly than the federal Eighth Amendment, citing binding precedent from the Arizona Supreme Court.
Analysis:
This decision clarifies and narrows the scope of a trial court's authority during resentencing hearings mandated by Miller v. Alabama. It establishes that such a remand is a targeted remedy for a specific constitutional violation, not a plenary resentencing that reopens the entire sentencing structure. The ruling reinforces the finality of lawfully imposed sentences that are not directly implicated by the Miller/Montgomery line of cases. This precedent will likely constrain future defendants from using a Miller resentencing as an opportunity to challenge other, unrelated aspects of their original sentences, thereby limiting the scope of such proceedings to only the constitutionally infirm portion of the punishment.
