Sentencing; The statutory presumption of non-jail sentences for ordinary misdemeanors under MCL 769.5(3); Principle that driving while license suspended (DWLS) is not a serious misdemeanor under MCL 780.811(1)(a); Whether reasonable grounds existed for a departure; MCL 769.5(4); Proportionality; People v Steanhouse; Effect of a local sentencing policy; People v Chapa; People v McFarlin; People v Whalen

Holding that the district court did not adequately justify defendant’s jail sentence for DWLS, and may have sentenced him according to a district court sentencing policy, the court vacated his sentence and remanded to the district court for resentencing. He pled guilty in the district court to the misdemeanor offense of DWLS and was sentenced to 93 days in jail. He appealed to the circuit court, arguing his sentence “should not include jail time based on the statutory presumption of non-jail sentences for ordinary misdemeanors under MCL 769.5(3), and that his sentence was influenced by an impermissible local sentencing policy.” The circuit court denied his application. On appeal, defendant argued that the district court unfairly sentenced him to jail for the nonserious misdemeanor of DWLS without sufficient reason. “The district court appropriately took [his] criminal history into consideration, but it should also have weighed the seriousness of the offense.” In addition, it “did not consider the circumstances of the offense and did not explain how its departure sentence was more proportionate than a different sentence would have been. As a result, [it] did not adequately justify the imposed sentence, which hinders our appellate review of whether the sentence was reasonable.” Defendant also claimed he was sentenced according to a district court sentencing policy. Based on the findings presented by defense counsel, it appeared the district court “has been sentencing equally situated individuals to very high rates of incarceration and lengthy terms of probation.” The court noted that all the cases brought to it “concerning this issue initially arose from the” district court, and it seemed “more than a coincidence that individuals charged with DWLS and sentenced by the” district court “received disproportionately harsh sentences.” If the district court “has been employing a local sentencing policy, it must cease this practice immediately, as we have long made clear that a sentence that conforms to a local sentencing policy rather than an individualized sentence is invalid.”