State v. Roman, 35,604

Defendant Steven G. Roman was convicted of possession of a controlled substance; he appealed.
Trial evidence included Defendant’s admission of recent drug use and a syringe found on his person at arrest.
Defendant challenged admission of the statement and syringe under NMRA Rules 11-404 and 11-403 and raised sentencing issues (an allegedly illegal concurrent federal sentence and presentence confinement credit).
This Court issued two proposed dispositions: initially proposed affirmance; after Defendant’s motion to amend, it proposed remand for the illegal concurrent sentence but continued to propose affirmance on conviction and denial of relief on presentence credit.
The State does not oppose remand on the concurrent-sentence issue; Defendant concedes remand is proper for that issue.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Admissibility of Defendant’s admission of drug use (Rule 11-404/11-403)	Admission was admissible as a party-opponent statement, not character evidence	Statement was impermissible character/prior-bad-act evidence and should have been excluded under Rules 11-404 and 11-403	Affirmed: statement admissible as party-opponent admission; district court did not abuse discretion on 11-404/11-403 analysis
Admissibility of syringe found on Defendant (Rule 11-404/11-403)	Syringe is not character or prior-bad-act evidence and was properly admitted	Syringe should have been excluded as improper character/prior-bad-act evidence	Affirmed: syringe admissible; issue abandoned on appeal when Defendant failed to respond to second calendar notice
Illegal concurrent sentence (sentence ordered concurrent to federal sentence)	State implicitly concedes error; remand appropriate	Defendant agrees remand is proper to correct illegal concurrency	Reverse and remand for resentencing to remove/correct the illegal concurrent order
Presentence confinement credit	Not argued by State on appeal; district court record did not show entitlement	Defendant asks to raise credit at resentencing for judicial economy	Motion to amend denied on appeal; Court declined to resolve merits but court may consider the issue on remand or in habeas as appropriate

Hennessy v. Duryea, 124 N.M. 754, 955 P.2d 683 (1998) (in summary calendar cases, appellee must point out errors of fact or law)
State v. Johnson, 107 N.M. 356, 758 P.2d 306 (1988) (issues deemed abandoned when not responded to on summary calendar)
State v. Aragon, 127 N.M. 393, 981 P.2d 1211 (1999) (presumption of correctness for trial court rulings; appellant bears burden to show error)
Farmers, Inc. v. Dal Mach. & Fabricating, Inc., 111 N.M. 6, 800 P.2d 1063 (1990) (appellant must clearly demonstrate trial court error)