State v. Donaldson, 355 P.3d 689

Erick Donaldson was convicted in 2002 of felony murder and sale of cocaine after consolidated trials; no party or judge requested a competency hearing during trial.
Donaldson appealed and lost (State v. Donaldson); he later filed two unsuccessful K.S.A. 60-1507 motions and a federal habeas petition, none raising competency issues.
In 2013 Donaldson filed a pro se motion to correct an illegal sentence under K.S.A. 22-3504, alleging he was incompetent at trial and that the trial court should have sua sponte suspended proceedings under K.S.A. 22-3302.
The district court summarily denied the motion; Donaldson appealed directly to the Kansas Supreme Court.
The central legal question was whether a K.S.A. 22-3504 motion may be used to challenge a conviction/sentence based on an alleged failure to comply with the competency statute.
The Supreme Court affirmed the denial, relying on its recent ruling in Ford and distinguishing prior cases where the trial court had ordered a competency determination.

Issue	Donaldson's Argument	State's Argument	Held
Whether failure to sua sponte suspend proceedings under K.S.A. 22-3302 rendered sentence illegal for lack of jurisdiction	Trial court should have sua sponte found reason to doubt competency; failure to suspend deprived court of jurisdiction, making sentence illegal	No statutory predicate finding was made, so duty to suspend never arose; sentence not illegal	Court: No jurisdictional defect — because judge never made the required "reason to believe" finding, K.S.A. 22-3302 was not triggered and the sentence was not illegal
Whether a K.S.A. 22-3504 motion to correct an illegal sentence is the proper vehicle to attack convictions based on alleged K.S.A. 22-3302 violations	K.S.A. 22-3504 may be used to assert the sentence is illegal due to lack of jurisdiction from competency-procedure failure	Ford controls: such errors are procedural, not jurisdictional; K.S.A. 22-3504 is not the proper remedy — K.S.A. 60-1507 (or direct appeal) is the route	Court: Affirmed Ford — a motion to correct an illegal sentence cannot be used to reverse a conviction based solely on an alleged K.S.A. 22-3302 violation; Donaldson’s motion properly denied

State v. Donaldson, 279 Kan. 694 (2005) (Donaldson's direct appeal affirming convictions)
State v. Davis, 281 Kan. 169 (2006) (held that when a court orders a competency determination, proceedings must be suspended and failure to do so can render sentence illegal)
State v. Murray, 293 Kan. 1051 (2012) (remanded for evidentiary hearing where trial court ordered competency determination but hearing did not occur)
State v. Trotter, 296 Kan. 898 (2013) (definition of "illegal sentence" under K.S.A. 22-3504)
State v. Pennington, 288 Kan. 599 (2009) (jurisdiction over appeals from motions to correct illegal sentence lies with the court that had jurisdiction of the original appeal)