By Lily Guiney
Gongwer News Service
A split Court of Appeals panel ruled the sentences associated with the conviction of a Cheboygan man for a third offense of operating while intoxicated in 2020 and another conviction were disproportionate to the crimes committed but upheld the convictions themselves.
Judge Adrienne Young and Judge Daniel Korobkin were the majority in the published People v. Brcic (COA Docket Nos. 362727; 366230). They ruled the consolidated cases of Steven Russell Brcic, which originated from a 2020 drunk driving incident for which Brcic was sentenced to a minimum of 25 years incarceration and a prisoner in possession of a weapon charge received while Brcic awaited trial in the OWI case, were sentenced disproportionately by lower courts without apparent explanation.
“In both cases, we affirm Brcic’s convictions,” Young wrote. “However, because Brcic’s within-guidelines sentence for PPW is disproportionate and his OWI-3rd sentence, a sentence nearly four times the maximum minimum in the guidelines without adequate explanation, is also disproportionate, we vacate his sentences and remand for resentencing.”
Brcic received a lengthy sentence for OWI with the sentencing judge citing that he was a third-time offender. The sentencing judge also referenced other convictions within his record. The 25 to 50 years Brcic was sentenced represented a fourfold upward departure from the upper end of the minimum sentencing guidelines recommended range of 19 to 76 months.
The sentencing judge said that violent habitual offenders have 25-year minimum sentences.
“The analogy drawn by the trial court falls short. Although facts establishing that a defendant poses a risk to community safety in the future can, in appropriate cases, justify some departure from the guidelines, Michigan law also recognizes an important difference between conduct that carries a risk of harm and the actual commission of violence,” Young wrote. “Yet the trial court imposed a 25-year minimum sentence for Brcic’s OWI-3rd offense, implicitly equating the seriousness of Brcic’s high-risk but nonviolent habitual conduct to the seriousness of conduct committed by habitual violent offenders.”
A trial date for Brcic’s OWI case wasn’t set until the Department of Corrections sent a speedy trial notice in 2022 on his behalf informing the prosecution to do so by February 2023. A trial date was set for March 2023. The extended time between Brcic’s arrest and his trial was attributed by the prosecution to the COVID-19 pandemic and upheld by a judge when Brcic attempted to have the charges dismissed.
During the wait in county jail, Brcic incurred the additional conviction for prisoner in possession of a weapon during a mental health crisis incident in which he cut himself with a blade from a prison-issued razor, which he then disposed of in his cell toilet. A jury convicted him, and he was sentenced at the top of the recommended range of 14 to 58 months, receiving a sentence of 58 months to 25 years.
Once Brcic’s OWI case was tried and he was convicted, the trial court judge sentenced him to a collective 25 to 50 years. Brcic appealed the convictions and the sentences, arguing his right to a speedy trial had been violated and the sentences he received weren’t proportionate to the nonviolent, if repetitive, crimes he had committed.
“Brcic argues that he has overcome the presumption of proportionality for his within guidelines sentence for PPW and that the trial court failed to adequately consider mitigating factors,” the ruling said. “He further argues that his 25-year minimum sentence for OWI-3rd is disproportionate and that the reasons cited by the trial judge at sentencing for the departure were insufficient to justify that departure. We agree.”
Judge Matthew Ackerman, the third member of the COA panel evaluating Brcic’s appeal, concurred with the majority in part but authored a dissent arguing that Brcic’s status as a repeat offender, particularly in reckless drunk driving incidents, rendered the sentences proportionate.
Ackerman called the decision “the latest turn in a long-running tug-of-war between the judiciary and the Legislature over criminal sentencing.” He said prior decisions have undermined the Legislature in the name of discretion and undermined judicial discretion in the name of consistency.
“Lockridge, the most recent development, represented a compromise: The mandatory nature of the sentencing guidelines was struck down, reducing consistency in sentencing, but this freed trial courts to depart from the guidelines recommendation, subject only to deferential appellate review for abuse of discretion,” he wrote. “At the same time, and out of respect to the Legislature’s prerogative to craft social policy, the Court left the guidelines in place as presumptively proportional benchmarks. Today’s decision unsettles that balance by imposing new scrutiny on a reasonable upward departure, while also vitiating the ostensible presumption of proportionality a within guidelines sentence should enjoy. Because I would not further erode the Legislature’s effort to balance consistency and discretion, I respectfully dissent from the decision to vacate defendant’s sentences.”
Gongwer News Service
A split Court of Appeals panel ruled the sentences associated with the conviction of a Cheboygan man for a third offense of operating while intoxicated in 2020 and another conviction were disproportionate to the crimes committed but upheld the convictions themselves.
Judge Adrienne Young and Judge Daniel Korobkin were the majority in the published People v. Brcic (COA Docket Nos. 362727; 366230). They ruled the consolidated cases of Steven Russell Brcic, which originated from a 2020 drunk driving incident for which Brcic was sentenced to a minimum of 25 years incarceration and a prisoner in possession of a weapon charge received while Brcic awaited trial in the OWI case, were sentenced disproportionately by lower courts without apparent explanation.
“In both cases, we affirm Brcic’s convictions,” Young wrote. “However, because Brcic’s within-guidelines sentence for PPW is disproportionate and his OWI-3rd sentence, a sentence nearly four times the maximum minimum in the guidelines without adequate explanation, is also disproportionate, we vacate his sentences and remand for resentencing.”
Brcic received a lengthy sentence for OWI with the sentencing judge citing that he was a third-time offender. The sentencing judge also referenced other convictions within his record. The 25 to 50 years Brcic was sentenced represented a fourfold upward departure from the upper end of the minimum sentencing guidelines recommended range of 19 to 76 months.
The sentencing judge said that violent habitual offenders have 25-year minimum sentences.
“The analogy drawn by the trial court falls short. Although facts establishing that a defendant poses a risk to community safety in the future can, in appropriate cases, justify some departure from the guidelines, Michigan law also recognizes an important difference between conduct that carries a risk of harm and the actual commission of violence,” Young wrote. “Yet the trial court imposed a 25-year minimum sentence for Brcic’s OWI-3rd offense, implicitly equating the seriousness of Brcic’s high-risk but nonviolent habitual conduct to the seriousness of conduct committed by habitual violent offenders.”
A trial date for Brcic’s OWI case wasn’t set until the Department of Corrections sent a speedy trial notice in 2022 on his behalf informing the prosecution to do so by February 2023. A trial date was set for March 2023. The extended time between Brcic’s arrest and his trial was attributed by the prosecution to the COVID-19 pandemic and upheld by a judge when Brcic attempted to have the charges dismissed.
During the wait in county jail, Brcic incurred the additional conviction for prisoner in possession of a weapon during a mental health crisis incident in which he cut himself with a blade from a prison-issued razor, which he then disposed of in his cell toilet. A jury convicted him, and he was sentenced at the top of the recommended range of 14 to 58 months, receiving a sentence of 58 months to 25 years.
Once Brcic’s OWI case was tried and he was convicted, the trial court judge sentenced him to a collective 25 to 50 years. Brcic appealed the convictions and the sentences, arguing his right to a speedy trial had been violated and the sentences he received weren’t proportionate to the nonviolent, if repetitive, crimes he had committed.
“Brcic argues that he has overcome the presumption of proportionality for his within guidelines sentence for PPW and that the trial court failed to adequately consider mitigating factors,” the ruling said. “He further argues that his 25-year minimum sentence for OWI-3rd is disproportionate and that the reasons cited by the trial judge at sentencing for the departure were insufficient to justify that departure. We agree.”
Judge Matthew Ackerman, the third member of the COA panel evaluating Brcic’s appeal, concurred with the majority in part but authored a dissent arguing that Brcic’s status as a repeat offender, particularly in reckless drunk driving incidents, rendered the sentences proportionate.
Ackerman called the decision “the latest turn in a long-running tug-of-war between the judiciary and the Legislature over criminal sentencing.” He said prior decisions have undermined the Legislature in the name of discretion and undermined judicial discretion in the name of consistency.
“Lockridge, the most recent development, represented a compromise: The mandatory nature of the sentencing guidelines was struck down, reducing consistency in sentencing, but this freed trial courts to depart from the guidelines recommendation, subject only to deferential appellate review for abuse of discretion,” he wrote. “At the same time, and out of respect to the Legislature’s prerogative to craft social policy, the Court left the guidelines in place as presumptively proportional benchmarks. Today’s decision unsettles that balance by imposing new scrutiny on a reasonable upward departure, while also vitiating the ostensible presumption of proportionality a within guidelines sentence should enjoy. Because I would not further erode the Legislature’s effort to balance consistency and discretion, I respectfully dissent from the decision to vacate defendant’s sentences.”
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