Sentencing; Whether the trial court articulated an adequate justification for the imposition of the maximum possible sentence; People v Tanner

On remand from the Supreme Court, the court remanded for the trial court to further articulate its reasons for the departure sentence or to resentence defendant. He pled guilty to OWI causing death. The trial court departed from the minimum sentence of 36 to 71 months and imposed 10 to 15 years. While "the trial court identified three sentencing considerations that very well may justify an upward departure from the sentencing guidelines if elaborated upon, we conclude that the trial court’s remaining justifications for the departure from the guidelines range do not constitute appropriate considerations in this case." First, the record did not support the trial court’s claim that "defendant had failed to support his children. Moreover, the trial court did not articulate how or why defendant’s child support payments, or lack thereof, were relevant to whether a departure sentence was proportional to the circumstances surrounding the offense or the offender." Second, the court agreed with defendant, and the prosecution conceded, that the trial "court improperly considered as a sentencing factor defense counsel’s request that defendant undergo a forensic examination to determine whether he was competent to stand trial." Further, it was "unclear how much weight the trial court afforded to each of its stated reasons, or how each reason factored into the trial court’s conclusion that an upward departure sentence was warranted. Additionally, the trial court did not adequately justify the extent of the particular departure in this case, which resulted in the imposition of the maximum minimum sentence permissible under the two-thirds rule" in Tanner and codified in MCL 769.34(2)(b). "In this case, the trial court failed to explain how its articulated reasons and the circumstances of the offense and the offender rendered the maximum possible sentence more proportional than another sentence would have been."