Opinion
NO. 2018-CA-001127-MR
03-06-2020
RONALD COPLEY APPELLANT v. COMMONWEALTH OF KENTUCKY APPELLEE
BRIEFS FOR APPELLANT: Ronald Copley, pro se Burgin, Kentucky BRIEF FOR APPELLEE: Andy Beshear Attorney General Matthew R. Krygiel Assistant Attorney General Frankfort, Kentucky
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED APPEAL FROM RUSSELL CIRCUIT COURT
HONORABLE VERNON MINIARD JR., JUDGE
ACTION NO. 07-CR-00121 OPINION
AFFIRMING
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BEFORE: CLAYTON, CHIEF JUDGE; K. THOMPSON AND L. THOMPSON, JUDGES. CLAYTON, CHIEF JUDGE: Ronald Copley appeals pro se from the Russell Circuit Court's order denying his request for an evidentiary hearing and motion for relief made pursuant to Kentucky Rules of Civil Procedure (CR) 60.02. Finding no error, we affirm.
BACKGROUND
On November 27, 2007, the Russell County grand jury indicted Copley for murder, wanton endangerment in the first degree, and burglary in the first degree stemming from an incident at Copley's home in which he shot and killed his wife, Pamela Copley.
On November 16, 2010, Copley entered a conditional guilty plea to murder, with the Commonwealth agreeing to dismiss the remaining charges. The trial court entered a judgment and sentence on plea of guilty on January 13, 2011 (the "Judgment"), in which Copley was sentenced in accordance with his plea agreement to twenty years' imprisonment. Copley's guilty plea was conditioned on his being able to appeal the denial of a pre-trial suppression motion. On direct appeal, the Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed the trial court's order denying Copley's motion to suppress.
Thereafter, in November of 2013, Copley filed a motion pursuant to Kentucky Rules of Criminal Procedure (RCr) 11.42 to vacate his sentence, claiming he received ineffective assistance of counsel. After an evidentiary hearing, the trial court denied his RCr 11.42 motion, which denial was ultimately affirmed by the Kentucky Supreme Court in a memorandum opinion of the Court rendered on April 19, 2017. Copley v. Commonwealth, No. 2015-SC-000584-DG, 2017 WL 6030675 (Ky. Mar 23, 2017).
On April 26, 2018, Copley filed a motion pursuant to CR 60.02(e) and (f). In the motion, Copley argued that he was entitled to serve only twenty percent, rather than eighty-five percent, of his sentence before he was parole eligible, as he claimed that he was a victim of domestic violence, pursuant to Kentucky Revised Statutes (KRS) 439.3402. The trial court denied Copley's CR 60.02 motion on June 25, 2018, finding that Copley's CR 60.02 motion was time-barred under the rule and that Copley had not met the standards for relief set forth in CR 60.02(e) or (f). This appeal followed.
ANALYSIS
a. Standard of Review
CR 60.02 motions are applicable to criminal cases pursuant to RCr 13.04 and may be used by criminal defendants to present additional issues not specifically available through direct appeals or RCr 11.42 motions. Gross v. Com., 648 S.W.2d 853, 856 (Ky. 1983). We review a trial court's denial of a CR 60.02 motion for an abuse of discretion. Partin v. Com., 337 S.W.3d 639, 640 (Ky. App. 2010), overruled on other grounds by Chestnut v. Com., 250 S.W.3d 288 (Ky. 2008). The test for abuse of discretion is whether the trial court's decision was "arbitrary, unreasonable, unfair, or unsupported by sound legal principles." Com. v. English, 993 S.W.2d 941, 945 (Ky. 1999) (internal citations omitted). Absent a "flagrant miscarriage of justice," we will affirm the trial court. Gross, 648 S.W.2d at 858.
b. Discussion
On appeal, Copley claims that the trial court committed reversible error by failing to hold an evidentiary hearing regarding his CR 60.02 motion and by denying his request for relief under CR 60.02. As previously discussed, CR 60.02 motions are limited to provide "special, extraordinary relief not available in other proceedings. McQueen v. Com., 948 S.W.2d 415, 416 (Ky. 1997). Particularly, CR 60.02 states the following, in relevant part:
On motion a court may, upon such terms as are just, relieve a party . . . from its final judgment, order, or proceeding upon the following grounds: . . . (e) the judgment is void, or has been satisfied, released, or discharged, or a prior judgment upon which it is based has been reversed or otherwise vacated, or it is no longer equitable that the judgment should have prospective application; or (f) any other reason of an extraordinary nature justifying relief.Again, relief under CR 60.02:
is an extraordinary and residual remedy to correct or vacate a judgment upon facts or grounds, not appearing on the face of the record and not available by appeal or otherwise, which were discovered after the rendition of the judgment without fault of the party seeking relief.Harris v. Com., 296 S.W.2d 700, 701 (Ky. 1956). Moreover, the Kentucky Supreme Court has stated that:
The purpose of CR 60.02 is to bring before a court errors which (1) had not been put into issue or passed on, and (2) were unknown and could not have been known to the moving party by the exercise of reasonable diligence and in time to have been otherwise presented to the court.Young v. Edward Technology Group, Inc., 918 S.W.2d 229, 231 (Ky. App. 1995) (citations omitted) (emphasis added).
In this case, we agree with the trial court that Copley has alleged no facts indicating that relief is warranted under CR 60.02(e) or (f). As a preliminary matter, the statute that Copley argues governs his claim under CR 60.02 - KRS 439.3402 - applies only to violent offenders who were victims of domestic abuse and who were convicted prior to July 14, 1992. The Judgment in this case was entered in January of 2011, thereby foreclosing Copley from any relief under KRS 439.3402.
Further, the issue of whether any change or modification to Copley's parole eligibility was warranted is not an appropriate issue to be raised for the first time via a post-judgment proceeding under CR 60.02. KRS 439.3402 sets out in detail the procedure by which a violent offender may claim exemption from the requirement under 439.3401(3) of serving eighty-five percent of the sentence imposed. Such procedure involves filing a motion with the circuit court in which the offender was convicted, the circuit court holding an evidentiary hearing, the circuit court issuing findings of fact and an order, and the criminal defendant directly appealing the circuit court's decision, if desired. KRS 439.3402(1)-(6). While the foregoing statute may have been an avenue of relief that Copley could have pursued prior to the entry of his guilty plea, he did not in fact assert such relief, and is foreclosed from doing so now via CR 60.02.
Additionally, as previously discussed, CR 60.02 motions are to address errors which "were unknown and could not have been known to the moving party by the exercise of reasonable diligence and in time to have been otherwise presented to the court." Young, 918 S.W.2d at 231. Here, Copley's assertion in his CR 60.02 motion that he was a victim of domestic violence at the hands of Pamela was based on facts that were known to Copley well before the entry of his plea, and Copley negotiated the plea acquainted with the facts and circumstances of his case.
As explained in Gross, "[b]efore the movant is entitled to an evidentiary hearing, he must affirmatively allege facts which, if true, . . . allege special circumstances that justify CR 60.02 relief." Gross, 648 S.W.2d at 856. Such special circumstances have not been alleged in this case, and we conclude that the circuit court did not abuse its discretion in denying both Copley's request for an evidentiary hearing and for relief under CR 60.02.
For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the order of the Russell Circuit Court.
ALL CONCUR. BRIEFS FOR APPELLANT: Ronald Copley, pro se
Burgin, Kentucky BRIEF FOR APPELLEE: Andy Beshear
Attorney General Matthew R. Krygiel
Assistant Attorney General
Frankfort, Kentucky