Opinion
No. 40314-5-II.
Filed: January 4, 2011. UNPUBLISHED OPINION
Appeal from a judgment of the Superior Court for Mason County, No. 09-1-00432-3, Toni A. Sheldon, J., entered January 22, 2010.
Affirmed by unpublished opinion per Worswick, J., concurred in by Penoyar, C.J., and Van Deren, J.
William West appeals from the sentence imposed following his plea of guilty to felony driving while under the influence of intoxicants (DUI). He contends that the trial court miscalculated his offender score and therefore miscalculated his standard sentence range. Finding no error, we affirm.
A commissioner of this court initially considered West's appeal as a motion on the merits under RAP 18.14 and then transferred it to a panel of judges.
When West pleaded guilty to DUI occurring on November 18, 2009, he had eight prior convictions for DUI: two in 1996 and one each in 1998, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2004 and 2006. The trial court scored each prior DUI conviction as one point toward West's offender score. With that offender score of eight, West's standard sentence was 60 months, the statutory maximum sentence for the crime. The trial court sentenced West to 60 months of confinement. He appeals the calculation of his offender score.
West argues that the trial court erred by including in his offender score those DUI's that were committed more than ten years previously. He relies on RCW 9.94A.525(2)(e), which provides:
If the present conviction is felony driving while under the influence of intoxicating liquor . . ., prior convictions of felony driving while under the influence of intoxicating liquor . . . shall be included in the offender score if: (i) The prior convictions were committed within five years since the last date of release from confinement (including full-time residential treatment) or entry of judgment and sentence; or (ii) the prior convictions would be considered "prior offenses within ten years" as defined in RCW 46.61.5055.
Under RCW 46.61.5055(14)(c), "within ten years means "that the arrest for a prior offense occurred within ten years of the arrest for the current offense." Since West was arrested for his current offense on November 18, 2009, he contends that his two 1996 DUI convictions and his one 1998 DUI conviction did not occur "within ten years" and so should not have been counted in his offender score.
But RCW 9.94A.525(2)(e) provides that prior DUI convictions shall be included in the offender score if they occurred within ten years or if they were committed within five years of entry of a prior judgment and sentence. West never went five years without committing another DUI. Therefore, the trial court properly included all eight prior DUI convictions in West's offender score, under RCW 9.94A.525(2)(e)(i), even though he committed some of those prior DUI's more than ten years before his current DUI.
We affirm.
A majority of the panel having determined that this opinion will not be printed in the Washington Appellate Reports, but will be filed for public record pursuant to RCW 2.06.040, it is so ordered.
VAN DEREN, J. and PENOYAR, C.J., concur.