Sentencing; Youth as a mitigating factor; The Miller factors; People v King; People v Boykin; Proportionality; De facto life sentence

Concluding that the trial court did not adequately explain its reasons for defendant’s sentence on resentencing, the court remanded the case for it to do so. He was resentenced to 40 to 60 years for his 2014 jury-trial convictions of felony murder, AWIM, first-degree home invasion, and felony-firearm. Defendant argued that “the trial court failed to properly consider mitigating factors, and the sentence was disproportionate and an unconstitutional de facto life sentence.” The court rejected his claim “that the trial court did not properly consider [his] youth as a mitigating factor.” Defense counsel provided the trial “court with a comprehensive sentencing memorandum that covered all aspects of defendant’s life, which included many significant difficulties with family life, school, and early criminal occurrences. Similarly, the PSIR contained much the same information, and both defendant and his counsel reiterated this information prior to sentencing.” Further, the trial “court repeatedly noted that it had read the information in both documents. Under King and Boykin, the trial court did consider the attributes of youth as argued by defendant.” But the court noted that the “trial court offered no explanation as to how defendant’s sentence was proportionate to him individually or how it met any of the goals of sentencing.” And even though his “sentence was within the parameters of MCL 769.25(9), and is presumed proportionate on appeal, we have no explanation—other than that the trial court determined the sentence to be ‘proportional’—for why this was a sentence proportional to the crime and the offender. So, even though ‘there is no authority that imposes a higher standard of articulation regarding youth,’ there is still a ‘general requirement that a trial court must adequately explain its sentence on the record in order to facilitate appellate review.’” Defendant next argued his sentence was an unconstitutional de facto life sentence. He asserted it was “the ‘functional equivalent of a sentence of life in prison.’” But he did “not identify any unusual circumstances which would make his” legislatively mandated “sentence disproportionate.” Because he did not establish “the existence of any unusual circumstances to rebut the presumptive proportionality of his sentence, defendant has failed to establish plain error.” The court retained jurisdiction.