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State v. Boskind5/24/2002
As amended August 28, 2002.
STATE OF VERMONT
v.
JETHRO S. BOSKIND
STATE OF VERMONT
v.
JOHN S. BOARDMAN
On Appeal from District Court of Vermont, Unit No. 2, Chittenden Circuit March Term, 2000 Brian L. Burgess, J. (98-470) Amy M. Davenport, J. (99-335)
Jane Woodruff, Department of State's Attorneys, Montpelier (98-470), and Lauren Bowerman, Chittenden County State's Attorney, Burlington (99-335), for Plaintiff-Appellee.
Robert Appel, Defender General, and William A. Nelson, Appellate Attorney, Montpelier (98-470), and Paul D. Jarvis of Jarvis and Kaplan, Burlington (99-335), for Defendants-Appellants.
Present: Amestoy, C.J., Dooley, Morse, Johnson and Skoglund, JJ.
The opinion of the court was delivered by: Amestoy, C.J.
In these consolidated cases, defendants appeal their enhanced convictions for driving while intoxicated. The appeals present four significant issues: (1) whether a defendant can challenge a prior conviction used to enhance a sentence when the challenge is based on a claim other than a violation of right to counsel; (2) when a defendant has a right to challenge a prior conviction the State intends to rely upon for sentence enhancement, whether the proper forum for exercising that right is the sentencing proceeding in district court or a post-conviction relief (PCR) proceeding in superior court; (3) when the appropriate remedy for a defendant's challenge to a predicate conviction is governed by the post conviction relief statute (13 V.S.A. § 7131), whether a defendant who challenges the prior conviction is "in custody under sentence" within the meaning of § 7131 when the defendant is no longer in custody for the conviction being challenged; (4) when a defendant challenges a prior conviction used for enhancement purposes on the basis of a failure to comply with V.R.Cr.P. 11, whether the burden of proof to demonstrate compliance shifts to the State where the defendant's evidence raises a substantial question about whether the defendant's plea to the challenged conviction was made in compliance with V.R.Cr.P. 11.
We hold that a defendant's right to challenge a prior conviction that the State intends to use to enhance a sentence is not limited solely to a claim that the conviction was obtained in violation of right to counsel. We further determine that the challenge must take place in superior court pursuant to Vermont's post conviction relief statute and that a defendant is "in custody under sentence" for purposes of invoking the jurisdictional requirement of § 7131 where the defendant is challenging his current sentence by attacking the constitutionality of a prior conviction used to enhance the defendant's current sentence. We also conclude that the burden of proof remains on the defendant where the defendant's challenge to the prior conviction is based upon a claim that the trial court did not comply with V.R.Cr.P. 11 in accepting defendant's plea to the challenged predicate conviction.
Accordingly, we affirm the enhanced sentences imposed upon the respective defendants and hold that defendants, should they challenge convictions on the basis of a claim that the trial court did not comply with V.R.Cr.P. 11, must do so pursuant to 13 V.S.A. § 7131 where they have the burden to show that the trial court did not substantially comply with V.R.Cr.P. 11 in their pleas and that this noncompliance prejudiced them.
In February 1998, defendants John Boardman and Jethro Boskind were each separately arrested for DUI and charged with
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