State v. JonesState v. Jones
JOURNAL ENTRY AND OPINION
JUDGMENT: AFFIRMED
RELEASED AND JOURNALIZED: May 19, 2022
Appearances:
Michael C. O‘Malley, Cuyahoga County Prosecuting Attorney, and Brandon A. Piteo, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for appellee.
Lee Jones, pro se.
SEAN C. GALLAGHER, A.J.:
{¶ 1} Lee Jones appeals the denial of his motion to vacate a void judgment and sentence. For the following reasons, we affirm.
{¶ 2} Jones is a convicted serial rapist. State v. Jones, 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 105801, 2018-Ohio-850, ¶ 14. In 2016, he was serving a 50-year aggregate term
{¶ 3} Approximately five years later, the state filed a “supplemental response to request for discovery under Rule 16” attaching a notification from the Bureau of Criminal Investigation that “a preliminary association was made between Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation - Richfield specimen 14-306858 1.4.1F2 Sak+ and” another individual.1 The identification occurred in February 2019 from a search of Ohio‘s State DNA Index System, but the record does not provide any information as to the reason for the post hoc, supplemental discovery being filed years after the final convictions. See
{¶ 4} Nevertheless, Jones filed a motion to vacate a void judgment and sentence upon receiving the supplemental discovery, claiming the preliminary match of another individual on the unspecified DNA material was dispositive proof of his innocence with respect to both victims. In that motion, Jones expressly stated that the motion was not filed under Ohio‘s postconviction relief statute,
{¶ 5} Jones‘s claims with respect to the legal validity of the convictions are misplaced. In State v. Harper, 160 Ohio St.3d 480, 2020-Ohio-2913, 159 N.E.3d 248, and State v. Henderson, 161 Ohio St.3d 285, 2020-Ohio-4784, 162 N.E.3d 776, the Ohio Supreme Court held that “sentences based on an error, including sentences in which a trial court fails to impose a statutorily mandated term, are voidable if the court imposing the sentence has jurisdiction over the case and the defendant.” Henderson at ¶ 1; see also State v. Stewart, 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 109498, 2020-Ohio-6743, ¶ 5. If the error rendered the defendant‘s conviction voidable, the error cannot be corrected through a postconviction proceeding or through another form of collateral attack. Stewart at ¶ 5, citing Henderson at ¶ 43. If a conviction is considered void, a court possesses continuing jurisdiction to correct the sentence. State ex rel. Cruzado v. Zaleski, 111 Ohio St.3d 353, 2006-Ohio-5795, 856 N.E.2d 263, ¶ 19. Before the combination of Harper and Henderson (”Harper/Henderson“), Ohio followed an expanded notion of what constituted a void act; a sentence imposed in violation of law was considered void and subject to collateral attack in postconviction proceedings. Under Harper/Henderson, the Ohio Supreme Court returned to the traditional definition of void. Errors, other than challenging the trial court‘s subject matter jurisdiction, can only be corrected
{¶ 6} In this case, Jones unsuccessfully challenged his final conviction in a direct appeal, and his current claim of actual innocence does not challenge the trial court‘s subject matter jurisdiction over the underlying criminal action. As a result, our inquiry is limited. Jones has not identified any basis to claim that his conviction is void as defined by Harper/Henderson. App.R. 16(A)(7). Instead, Jones‘s claim rests upon the notion that newly discovered evidence potentially impacts proof of his guilt. Jones, however, pleaded guilty to the two rape convictions, admitting to the facts of his having committed the crimes. Nothing from the record demonstrates that Jones‘s plea was contingent on protestations of innocence as recognized under North Carolina v. Alford, 400 U.S. 25, 91 S.Ct. 160, 27 L.Ed.2d 162 (1970) (“while most pleas of guilty consist of both a waiver of trial and an express admission of guilt, the latter element is not a constitutional requisite to the imposition of criminal penalty“). Because Jones‘s convictions are not potentially void based on the arguments he presents, we must first categorize the arguments in order to determine the appropriate standard of review.
{¶ 7} Our inquiry begins under the notion that this case is not about the validity of the underlying proceeding leading to the conviction. It is about determining whether a trial court has continuing jurisdiction after entering the final entry of convictions to permit Jones to withdraw his guilty plea or otherwise reopen the underlying case. State v. Apanovitch, 155 Ohio St.3d 358, 2018-Ohio-4744, 121 N.E.3d 351, ¶ 38-41 (trial court lacked jurisdiction to consider the defendant‘s claim as being either a petition for postconviction relief or a motion for new trial under
{¶ 8} A defendant can invoke the trial court‘s limited jurisdiction to vacate a final conviction in several ways, including but not limited to, through (1) filing a motion to correct a void judgment; (2) filing a timely or successive petition for postconviction relief under
{¶ 9} Jones pleaded guilty to the two rape convictions, and as such, he cannot avail himself of an untimely or successive petition for postconviction relief, or a delayed motion for new trial under
{¶ 10} Further, Jones claims that he is innocent of the two rape charges because another person was identified by DNA testing of an unidentified sample of DNA material with respect to an unspecified case or victim. Under
{¶ 11} The supplemented discovery in this case also cannot be considered a product of testing performed under
{¶ 12} With limited options available to secure the trial court‘s continuing jurisdiction to substantively provide Jones relief through vacating the final convictions, and in light of Jones‘s focus on the validity of his guilty plea, the closest analogue upon which the trial court maintained continuing its jurisdiction is a
{¶ 13} “A motion to withdraw a plea of guilty or no contest may be made only before sentence is imposed; but to correct manifest injustice the court after sentence may set aside the judgment of conviction and permit the defendant to withdraw his or her plea.”
{¶ 14} Appellate review of the denial of a postsentence motion to withdraw a guilty plea occurs under the abuse-of-discretion standard of review. Straley at ¶ 15, citing State v. Smith, 49 Ohio St.2d 261, 361 N.E.2d 1324 (1977), paragraph two of the syllabus, and State v. Francis, 104 Ohio St.3d 490, 2004-Ohio-6894, 820 N.E.2d 355, ¶ 32. “A trial court is not required to hold a hearing on every postsentence motion to withdraw a guilty plea“; a hearing is only required “if the facts alleged by the defendant, accepted as true, would require that the defendant be allowed to withdraw the plea.” State v. D-Bey, 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 109000, 2021-Ohio-60, ¶ 57, citing State v. Norman, 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 105218, 2018-Ohio-2929, ¶ 16, and State v. Vihtelic, 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 105381, 2017-Ohio-5818, ¶ 11.
{¶ 15} In this case, Jones contends that the implication of another person through DNA matching demonstrably proves his innocence as to both rape convictions, which constitutes a manifest injustice sufficient to warrant the withdrawal of his guilty plea in this case. The trial court, however, was precluded from granting Jones relief.
{¶ 17} In Jones, 8th Dist. Cuyahoga No. 105801, 2018-Ohio-850, Jones‘s convictions for the two counts of rape were affirmed. The trial court, therefore, lacked the power to thereafter vacate the convictions. In addition, and solely for the
{¶ 18} There is no other basis upon which the trial court could have afforded Jones his requested relief. Jones‘s assignments of error are overruled.
{¶ 19} We affirm.
It is ordered that appellee recover from appellant costs herein taxed.
The court finds there were reasonable grounds for this appeal.
It is ordered that a special mandate issue out of this court directing the common pleas court to carry this judgment into execution.
A certified copy of this entry shall constitute the mandate pursuant to Rule 27 of the Rules of Appellate Procedure.
SEAN C. GALLAGHER, ADMINISTRATIVE JUDGE
MARY EILEEN KILBANE, J., and EMANUELLA D. GROVES, J., CONCUR