Cyntoia Brown v. Carolyn Jordan

12/06/2018

IN THE SUPREME COURT OF TENNESSEE

AT NASHVILLE

Assigned on Briefs October 11, 2018

CYNTOIA BROWN v. CAROLYN JORDAN

Rule 23 Certified Question of Law

from the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit

No. 16-6738 Julia Smith Gibbons, Judge

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No. M2018-01415-SC-R23-CO

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We accepted certification of a question of law from the United States Court of Appeals

for the Sixth Circuit that requires us to determine if a defendant convicted of first-degree

murder committed on or after July 1, 1995, and sentenced to life in prison under

Tennessee Code Annotated section 39-13-202(c)(3) will become eligible for release, and

if so, after how many years. We conclude that a defendant so convicted and sentenced to

life in prison under Tennessee Code Annotated section 39-13-202(c)(3) may be released,

at the earliest, after fifty-one years of imprisonment.

Tenn. Sup. Ct. R. 23 Certified Question of Law

ROGER A. PAGE, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which JEFFREY S. BIVINS, C.J.,

and CORNELIA A. CLARK, SHARON G. LEE, and HOLLY KIRBY JJ., joined.

Charles Mark Pickrell and Charles W. Bone, Nashville, Tennessee, for the appellant,

Cyntoia Brown.

John H. Bledsoe, Nashville, Tennessee, for the appellee, Carolyn Jordan.

OPINION

I. Factual and Procedural Background

The certified question of law at issue in this appeal arises from a lawsuit Cyntoia

Brown brought in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee

(“District Court”) pursuant to United States Code title 28, section 2254 against Vicki

Freeman, Warden.1 In February 2005, then-sixteen-year-old Cyntoia Brown was charged

with criminal offenses involving the 2004 shooting death of Johnny Allen. State v.

Brown, No. M2007-00427-CCA-R3-CD, 2009 WL 1038275, at *3 (Tenn. Crim. App.

Apr. 20, 2009), perm. app. denied (Tenn. Sept. 28, 2009). After a transfer hearing in

juvenile court, Ms. Brown was transferred to criminal court, where her case was tried

before a jury. Id. at n.3. The jury convicted her of premeditated first-degree murder,

felony murder, and especially aggravated robbery. Id. at *12. The trial court merged the

murder convictions and imposed a mandatory sentence of life imprisonment to run

concurrently with a twenty-year sentence for especially aggravated robbery.2 Id. at *12

n.6, *35. In its sentencing order, the trial court noted that Ms. Brown “must serve at least

fifty-one (51) calendar years before she is eligible for release . . . .”3

Ms. Brown filed a timely petition for post-conviction relief, in which she claimed

her life sentence was unconstitutional under Miller v. Alabama, 567 U.S. 460 (2012).

The post-conviction court denied relief, and that decision was affirmed on appeal. Brown

v. State, No. M2013-00825-CCA-R3-PC, 2014 WL 5780718 (Tenn. Crim. App, Nov. 6,

2014), perm. app. denied (Tenn. May 15, 2015).

Ms. Brown subsequently filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus under United

States Code title 28, section 2254 in the District Court, in which she alleged, inter alia,

that her mandatory minimum sentence of life imprisonment constitutes cruel and unusual

punishment prohibited under Miller v. Alabama. The District Court denied relief,

reasoning that Miller prohibits a mandatory sentence of life without the possibility of

parole for juvenile offenders, and Ms. Brown received a life sentence, not a sentence of

life without the possibility of parole. Brown v. Freeman, No. 3:15-cv-00712, 2016 WL

1

Ms. Freeman is no longer the warden of the prison where Ms. Brown is confined. Carolyn

Jordan was substituted as the respondent in the federal court proceedings upon her appointment as

Warden. See, e.g., Tenn. R. App. P. 19(c).

2

The trial court initially sentenced the defendant to twenty years for especially aggravated

robbery. Based on a discrepancy between the indictment and the judgment of conviction, the Court of

Criminal Appeals modified the defendant’s conviction to aggravated robbery and remanded the matter to

the trial court for resentencing. On remand, the trial court sentenced the defendant to an eight-year

sentence concurrent with the life sentence. Brown v. State, No. M2013-00825-CCA-R3-PC, 2014 WL

5780718, at *1 (Tenn. Crim. App. Nov. 6, 2014), perm. app. denied (Tenn. May 15, 2015).

3

We take judicial notice of the court records and actions in earlier proceedings in this case. See

Nunley v. State, 552 S.W.3d 800, 806 n.3 (Tenn. 2018).

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8711705, at *8 (M.D. Tenn. Oct. 28, 2016). Ms. Brown’s appeal from that decision is

currently pending before the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, which

certified the following question for this Court’s consideration:

Will a defendant convicted of first-degree murder committed on or after

July 1, 1995, and sentenced to life in prison under Tennessee Code

Annotated [section] 39-13-202(c)(3) become eligible for release and, if so,

after how many years?

Brown v. Jordan, No. M2018-01415-SC-R23-CO (Tenn. Oct. 11, 2018) (order accepting

certification).

II. Standards of Review

Tennessee Supreme Court Rule 23, section 1 provides that

[t]he Supreme Court may, at its discretion, answer questions of law

certified to it by . . . a Court of Appeals of the United States . . . . This rule

may be invoked when the certifying court determines that, in a proceeding

before it, there are questions of law of this state which will be determinative

of the cause and as to which it appears to the certifying court there is no

controlling precedent in the decisions of the Supreme Court of Tennessee.

Further, the answers to these questions of law depend upon the interpretation of

statutes; therefore, we apply the familiar rules of statutory construction. Shorts v.

Bartholomew, 278 S.W.3d 268, 274 (Tenn. 2009). A court’s overarching purpose in

construing statutes is to ascertain and effectuate legislative intent without expanding a

statute beyond its intended scope. Baker v. State, 417 S.W.3d 428, 433 (Tenn. 2013).

Words used in a statute “must be given their natural and ordinary meaning in the context

in which they appear and in light of the statute’s general purpose.” Mills v. Fulmarque,

Inc., 360 S.W.3d 362, 368 (Tenn. 2012) (citations omitted). We endeavor to construe

statutes in a reasonable manner that “avoids statutory conflict and provides for

harmonious operation of the laws.” Baker, 417 S.W.3d at 433 (internal quotations

omitted). Where statutory language is ambiguous or a statutory conflict exists, we may

consider and discern legislative intent from matters other than the statutory language,

“such as the broader statutory scheme, the history and purpose of the legislation, public

policy, historical facts preceding or contemporaneous with the enactment of the statute,

earlier versions of the statute, the caption of the act, and the legislative history of the

statute.” Womack v. Corr. Corp. of Am., 448 S.W.3d 362, 366 (Tenn. 2014) (citing

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Pickard v. Tenn. Water Quality Control Bd., 424 S.W.3d 511, 518 (Tenn. 2013)). We

presume that the General Assembly has knowledge of its prior enactments and knows the

state of the law and the existence of other statutes relating to the same subject at the time

it enacts new statutes. Shorts, 278 S.W.3d at 277 (citing Wilson v. Johnson Cnty., 879

S.W.2d 807, 810 (Tenn. 1994)).

III. Analysis

The certified question concerns the interpretation and application of the Tennessee

sentencing statutes governing release eligibility of criminal defendants under Tennessee

Code Annotated sections 40-35-501(h) and (i). Those sections currently provide:

(h)(1) Release eligibility for each defendant receiving a sentence of

imprisonment for life for first degree murder shall occur after service of

sixty percent (60%) of sixty (60) years less sentence credits earned and

retained by the defendant, but in no event shall a defendant sentenced to

imprisonment for life be eligible for parole until the defendant has served a

minimum of twenty-five (25) full calendar years of the sentence,

notwithstanding the governor’s power to reduce prison overcrowding

pursuant to title 41, chapter 1, part 5, any sentence reduction credits

authorized by § 41-21-236 or any other provision of law relating to

sentence credits. A defendant receiving a sentence of imprisonment for life

for first degree murder shall be entitled to earn and retain sentence credits,

but the credits shall not operate to make the defendant eligible for release

prior to the service of twenty-five (25) full calendar years.

(2) There shall be no release eligibility for a defendant receiving a

sentence of imprisonment for life without possibility of parole for

first degree murder.

(i)(1) There shall be no release eligibility for a person committing an

offense, on or after July 1, 1995, that is enumerated in subdivision (i)(2).

The person shall serve one hundred percent (100%) of the sentence

imposed by the court less sentence credits earned and retained. However,

no sentence reduction credits authorized by § 41-21-236 or any other

provision of law, shall operate to reduce the sentence imposed by the court

by more than fifteen percent (15%).

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(2) The offenses to which subdivision (i)(1) applies are:

(A) Murder in the first degree;

(B) Murder in the second degree;

(C) Especially aggravated kidnapping;

(D) Aggravated kidnapping;

(E) Especially aggravated robbery;

(F) Aggravated rape;

(G) Rape;

(H) Aggravated sexual battery;

(I) Rape of a child;

(J) Aggravated arson;

(K) Aggravated child abuse;

(L) Aggravated rape of a child;

(M) Sexual exploitation of a minor involving more than one

hundred (100) images;

(N) Aggravated sexual exploitation of a minor involving

more than twenty-five (25) images; or

(O) Especially aggravated sexual exploitation of a minor.

Tenn. Code Ann. § 40-35-501(h), (i).4

At first blush, it may appear that sections (h) and (i) are in conflict. Such a

conclusion is not unreasonable, given the lack of clarity within the statute that could

cause the subsections in question to be read as contradictory to each other. Indeed, the

Tennessee Attorney General opined as much in a 1997 opinion when responding to a

question about how to calculate the term of confinement for a defendant convicted of a

first-degree murder committed on or after July 1, 1995. See Tenn. Att’y Gen. Op. 97-

098, 1997 WL 449672 (July 1, 1997). While the Attorney General correctly opined that a

defendant sentenced to life imprisonment for a first-degree murder committed on or after

July 1, 1995, is eligible for release, at the earliest, after service of fifty-one years, the

Attorney General incorrectly concluded that a conflict exists between sections (h) and (i).

Further, to the extent our opinion in Vaughn v. State, 202 S.W.3d 106 (Tenn. 2006),

endorsed the Attorney General’s opinion that a conflict exists between these two

provisions, that part of the opinion is abrogated.

4

Section (i) was added in 1995 when the Tennessee General Assembly ratified 1995 Tenn. Pub.

Acts, ch. 492, §§ 1,2.

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Tennessee does not have indeterminate sentences for criminal offenses.

Tennessee Code Annotated section 40-35-211 requires the imposition of a determinate

sentence in all felony and misdemeanor cases.

Specific sentences for a felony shall be for a term of years or months or life,

if the defendant is sentenced to the department of correction. . . There are

no indeterminate sentences. Sentences for all felonies and misdemeanors

are determinate in nature, and the defendant is responsible for the entire

sentence undiminished by sentence credits of any sort, except for credits

authorized by . . . § 41-21-236.

Tenn. Code Ann. § 40-35-211(1). The determinate sentence for a life sentence is sixty

years, as set forth in Tennessee Code Annotated section 40-35-501(h)(1). For a

defendant convicted of a first-degree murder committed before July 1, 1995, the release

eligibility occurs after service of sixty percent of sixty years less any sentence credits

earned, but those sentence credits cannot operate to enable a defendant to become eligible

for release until a minimum of twenty-five calendar years have been served. Tenn. Code

Ann. § 40-35-501(h)(1).

When the General Assembly added subsection (i) in 1995, the minimum sentence

a defendant must serve prior to becoming eligible for release was increased from sixty

percent to one-hundred percent not only for those convicted of first-degree murder and

given a life sentence but also for convictions of the other enumerated offenses listed in

subsection (i)(2). The addition of subsection (i) to 40-35-501 did not alter the provision

in section 40-35-501 setting forth the length of the determinate sentence. It merely

altered the release eligibility for the sentence. Thus, first-degree murders committed

either before or after July 1, 1995, carry the same determinate sentence length of sixty

years. However, for first-degree murders committed on or after July 1, 1995, a defendant

must serve one hundred percent of sixty years less any sentence credits received, but the

sentence credits cannot operate to reduce the sentence imposed by more than fifteen

percent. Tenn. Code Ann. § 40-35-501(i). Fifteen percent of sixty years is nine years,

thus resulting in service of a minimum fifty-one-years. As such, a defendant who

commits a first-degree murder on or after July 1, 1995, may be released, at the earliest,

after service of fifty-one years.5

5

It is important to note that a defendant convicted of a first- degree murder that occurred on or

after July 1, 1995, will not necessarily become eligible for release after service of fifty-one years. A

defendant’s release will depend on the sentence credits a defendant receives under Tennessee Code

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The Attorney General opined in 1997 that retention of subsection (h) created a

conflict when subsection (i) was added because subsection (h) provides a twenty-five-

year floor before a defendant sentenced to life for first-degree murder becomes eligible

for release and subsection (i) raises that floor. Finding no way to reconcile the two

provisions, the Attorney General opined that Tennessee Code Annotated section 40-35-

501(h)(1) was repealed by implication by the enactment of Public Chapter 492, to the

extent the two provisions conflict. As noted by the Attorney General, the legislative

history indicates that the intent of subsection (i) was to increase the floor from sixty

percent (as provided in subsection (h)) to one-hundred percent but to retain the sixty-year

sentence for first-degree murder. See Tenn. Att’y Gen. Op. 97-098, 1997 WL 449672, at

*2 (citing Special Report to the House Judiciary Comm., Tape # 1, May 3, 1995, at 672).

The petitioner contends that the Attorney General’s reasoning is flawed because under a

proper statutory construction, the only possible way to read these two provisions together

is to find that under the rule of specificity, subsection (h) controls as it applies to first-

degree murder.

However, both interpretations are flawed. Subsection (h) was retained for two

reasons. First, as noted in the Attorney General’s opinion, subsection (h) sets forth the

determinate sentence of sixty years for a life sentence, which was not changed by the

addition of subsection (i). Second, because subsection (h) applies only to first-degree

murders, for which there is no statute of limitation, the sentencing laws pertaining to

release eligibility for a life sentence for a first-degree murder committed prior to July 1,

1995, by necessity, must remain in effect. Therefore, the release eligibility provisions of

subsection (h) do not conflict with the release eligibility provisions of subsection (i)(1)

but instead provide for a different release eligibility for first-degree murders (among

other offenses) occurring on or after July 1, 1995. This interpretation gives effect to the

legislative intent without broadening the statute beyond its intended scope and allows all

provisions to be given fair import to their terms in a way that promotes justice and

effectuates the objectives of the criminal code.

Indeed, we indicated as much in Vaughn. In that case, the Court considered

whether defense counsel were ineffective for failing to object to erroneous jury

instructions regarding their clients’ change in release eligibility under Tennessee Code

Annotated section 40-35-501(i). Vaughn, 202 S.W.3d at 116-20. The defendants in that

case committed a first-degree murder on July 2, 1995, the day after the effective date of

Annotated section 41-21-236 or other applicable law governing sentence credits. Tenn. Code Ann. § 40-

35-501(i).

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subsection (i). Id. at 110, 118. Counsel, unaware of the changes to release eligibility for

first-degree murder, failed to challenge jury instructions that stated the defendants’

release eligibility for a life sentence was twenty-five years pursuant to subsection (h)

rather than fifty-one years pursuant to subsection (i). Id. at 110, 119. To reach the merits

of the ineffective assistance of counsel claim, the Court discussed the underlying issue ‒

that is, what was the release eligibility for a first-degree murder committed on or after

July 1, 1995. Id. at 118. The Court referenced the Attorney General’s 1997 opinion and

the potential conflict between subsections (h) and (i) and seemed to agree that a conflict

existed between the two in that “it was not expressly stated that section (h) would no

longer apply to a person committing an offense on or after July 1, 1995.” Id. at 118-19.

In resolving that conflict, the Court stated, “As for the conflict in the statutes, well-settled

principles of statutory construction make it clear that the most recently enacted statute

repeals by implication any irreconcilable provisions of the former act.” Id. at 118 (citing

Tennessee Carolina Transp., Inc. v. Pentecost, 362 S.W.2d 461, 463 (1962)). Relevant to

the question at issue here, the Court observed that “[t]he passage of section 40-35-501(i)

did not repeal section (h), as (h) still applies to a person committing an offense before

July 1, 1995.” Vaughn, 202 S.W.3d at 118.

To the extent Vaughn affirms the Attorney General’s opinion that an irreconcilable

conflict exists between subsections (h) and (i), that portion of the opinion is abrogated.

As we have determined, no conflict exists between these statutory provisions. Both

subsections remain in full effect and are not irreconcilable; therefore, no part of

subsection (h) is repealed by implication. Vaughn, however, correctly held that a

defendant convicted of first-degree murder committed on or after July 1, 1995, may be

released after serving at least fifty-one years in confinement. Vaughn, 202 S.W.3d at

117.

IV. Conclusion

A defendant convicted of first-degree murder that occurred on or after July 1,

1995, may be released after service of at least fifty-one years if the defendant earns the

maximum allowable sentence reduction credits. The Clerk shall transmit this opinion to

the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and to the parties in accordance

with Rule 23, section 8 of the Rules of the Tennessee Supreme Court. Costs in this Court

are taxed to the respondent, Carolyn Jordan.

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ROGER A. PAGE, JUSTICE

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