55 Mich. App. 121 | Mich. Ct. App. | 1974
Plaintiff, the Jackson County Prosecutor, filed an original complaint seeking an Order of Superintending Control requiring that the defendant Jackson County Circuit Judge, Gordon W. Britten, grant no credit for time spent in prison while awaiting trial when sentencing for prison escape, MCLA 750.193; MSA 28.390. Defendant Dersa is one of the more than 60 defendants sentenced by Judge Britten for prison escape who have been given credit against their sentences for that period of imprisonment between arraignment and sentencing.
Various panels of this Court have differed over the application of the statute providing sentence credit for pretrial incarceration, MCLA 769.11b; MSA 28.1083(2), to those cases in which a defendant who is already imprisoned for an unrelated offense commits yet another crime. One of these cases was interpreted by the defendant judge as requiring him to grant sentence credit to every defendant regardless of the nature of the crime subsequently committed. That decision has been reversed by People v Patterson, 392 Mich 83; 219 NW2d 31 (1974), in which it was held that the sentence credit statute cannot be construed as entitling a defendant to credit for time he was already obliged to serve under a prior sentence. Language in that opinion indicates that the matter is not discretionary:
"[C]redit cannot be granted for the pretrial incarceration of defendant serving a prison sentence arising from a prior crime.”
Patterson involved a subsequent crime other than prison escape. Where the subsequent crime has been committed in prison or while on escape from prison, sentence credit has generally been
Plaintiff is entitled to the relief sought. An Order of Superintending Control implementing this decision will issue.