Washington v. Creekmore11/6/1989
re severe, and his helplessness was horrifying.
In State v. Oxborrow, supra, our Supreme Court upheld consecutive, maximum term sentences for theft, one for 5
years, the other for 10 years. The 15-year total was 15 times the upper end of the SRA standard range. Creekmore's sentence is only 3.75 times the upper end of his standard range.
In State v. Armstrong, supra, "a totally defenseless 10-month-old child" was twice injured by scalding. 106 Wash. 2d at 550. The defendant, in contrast to Creekmore, drove his victim to a hospital for treatment. Armstrong, at 548. He pleaded guilty to second degree assault and received a 5-year sentence -- five times the SRA standard range. Armstrong, at 549. On review, the court affirmed the sentence, based on the helplessness of the victim and the multiple assaults, although two other reasons were invalid. Armstrong, at 550-51. The court deferred to the trial court, which believed the crime "was not a routine second degree assault but rather a flagrant act of child abuse requiring severe punishment." Armstrong, at 552. The court also noted that the sentence was only one-half the statutory maximum. Armstrong, at 552 n.1.
Here, Creekmore caused extended pain and suffering. He callously ignored that suffering, and the result was death. Eli was totally helpless; not even his mother could help him. He was at the mercy of a man, his own father, whom he could not please, and who rather than recognizing the limits of Eli's abilities, punished those shortcomings with a painful and merciless death. The trial court, having given the matter months of thought, said:
Mr. Creekmore, to me, the murder of a child, especially a helpless, defenseless child, is by my way of thinking the most heinous crime that can be committed. . . . I don't know if we can prevent child abuse, but we have to try. I do know that we cannot tolerate child abuse. A society that does not prevent and/or tolerates child abuse is a society that is not civilized and is a society that is destined, as it should be, not to survive.
Given the mental and physical pain endured by Eli, our desire not to discount that suffering, and the trial court's firsthand knowledge of the facts, we find no abuse of discretion. The statutory maximum is life imprisonment. RCW 9A.32.050(2), 9A.20.021(1)(a). Creekmore's sentence
is less than the statutory maximum, and that is the only limit to the trial court's discretion in egregious cases. See Oxborrow, 106 Wash. 2d at 533; Armstrong, 106 Wash. 2d at 552 n.1.
Creekmore contends the trial court erred by considering the possibility of earned early release. See RCW 9.94A.150(1). This was improper, but the trial court in Fisher made the same error, and our Supreme Court nevertheless affirmed. See State v. Fisher, 108 Wash. 2d at 429 n.6. In State v. Dunaway, supra, our Supreme Court remanded after invalidating two of three reasons for an exceptional sentence, because "the great disparity, some 20 years, between the sentence imposed and the midpoint of the standard range" was "too great . . . to assume that the trial judge would still impose the same sentence". 109 Wash. 2d at 220. A like disparity, however, does not necessitate a remand "when we are satisfied that the judge would have imposed the same sentence absent the improper factor." State v. Drummer, supra at 760 (210-month disparity; record did not support finding that victim was particularly vulnerable).
We are satisfied the court would have imposed
Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 Washington DUI Attorneys
DUI Lawyers
|