Sentencing under the Holmes Youth Trainee Act (HYTA); MCL 762.11(1), (2), & (3)(c)

Holding that defendant was ineligible for sentencing under HYTA, the court vacated his sentence and remanded for resentencing. The prosecution argued that he “did not qualify for HYTA status because of (a) his age at the time of the offense, (b) the date of his guilty plea, and (c) that his offense was a violation of the motor vehicle code.” The court concluded that based on the facts, MCL 762.11(1) did not apply to defendant. While he was 17 years of age when the offense occurred, he did “not meet the criteria of ‘[u]ntil [10/1/21] . . . if an individual pleads guilty to a criminal offense. . . .’” Defendant pled guilty on 12/14/21, “clearly two months after the date identified by the statutory provision.” As such, although he was 17 years old when the offense occurred on 9/29/20, “his age is only relevant to the date of the offense and not his eligibility for HYTA status, which is dependent upon when ‘an individual pleads guilty to a criminal offense[.]’” Similarly, he was “ineligible for HYTA status under MCL 762.11(2), which provides that ‘[b]eginning [10/1/21,’ ‘if an individual pleads guilty to a criminal offense, committed on or after the individual’s eighteenth birthday,’ sentencing under HYTA is permissible.” Unfortunately for him, while the date he pled guilty occurred after 10/1/21, “his age at the time of the offense precludes the application of MCL 762.11(2) because he did not commit the offense ‘on or after’ his ‘eighteenth birthday[.]’” Thus, at the time of sentencing, he lacked eligibility for HYTA status. “Regardless of the provisions of MCL 762.11(1) and (2) addressing the date of entry of a plea and the age of defendant at the time of the offense, defendant is also ineligible for youthful trainee status, as a matter of law, under the separate provision of MCL 762.11(3)(c).” The prosecutor argued on appeal that he was not eligible for HYTA status due to the offense to which he pled guilty, reckless driving causing serious impairment of a body function. The court noted that “this charge constitutes a ‘traffic offense,’ as defined by MCL 762.11(7)(b) . . . which is specifically excluded from HYTA eligibility by MCL 762.11(3)(c).” Thus, defendant “lacked eligibility under multiple provisions of MCL 762.11 for sentencing under HYTA.”