John Lane-El v. State of Indiana (mem. dec.)

MEMORANDUM DECISION
Jun 10 2015, 9:56 am
Pursuant to Ind. Appellate Rule 65(D), this
Memorandum Decision shall not be regarded as
precedent or cited before any court except for the
purpose of establishing the defense of res judicata,
collateral estoppel, or the law of the case.
APPELLANT PRO SE ATTORNEY FOR APPELLEE
John Lane-El Gregory F. Zoeller
New Castle, Indiana Attorney General of Indiana
Aaron T. Craft
Deputy Attorney General
Indianapolis, Indiana
IN THE
COURT OF APPEALS OF INDIANA
John Lane-El, June 10, 2015
Appellant-Petitioner, Court of Appeals Case No.
33A01-1410-MI-451
v. Appeal from the Henry Circuit Court
The Honorable Kit C. Dean Crane,
State of Indiana, Judge
Trial Court Cause No.
Appellee-Respondent
33C02-1407-MI-69
Mathias, Judge.
[1] John Lane-El (“Lane-El”) appeals from the Henry Circuit Court’s denial of
Lane-El’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus. Concluding that Lane-El is not
entitled to immediate release, we affirm.
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Facts and Procedural History
[2] The facts underlying this case appear to be relatively undisputed. In August of
1980, Lane-El pleaded guilty to Class B felony robbery and was sentenced to six
years. This sentence was ordered to be served consecutively to a fifteen-year
sentence imposed on another robbery conviction1 and a twelve-year sentence
imposed on a federal conviction for robbery.
[3] Lane-El completed his fifteen-year sentence on November 13, 1989, and he
began to serve his six-year sentence. On March 23, 1992, Lane-El was released
on parole on the six-year sentence.
[4] On December 18, 1992, Lane-El was charged with Class A felony rape and
Class B felony criminal confinement. On January 7, 1993, the State put Lane-
El’s parole on hold and began parole revocation proceedings. Lane-El was
convicted of the rape and confinement charges on August 25, 1993, and was
subsequently sentenced to twenty years on the rape conviction, plus a thirty-
year habitual offender enhancement, and a concurrent sentence of one and one-
half years on the confinement conviction, for a total of fifty years.
[5] After his conviction and sentence in that case, Lane-El’s parole was revoked.
Lane-El claims, and the State does not refute, that Lane-El’s parole was
revoked solely on the basis of his conviction for rape and confinement. Lane-El
began serving the remainder of his robbery sentence in 1993, and completed it
in 1994. At this point, he began to serve his sentences for rape and confinement.
1
See Lane v. State, 428 N.E.2d 28 (Ind. 1981).
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[6] Thereafter, Lane-El filed a petition for post-conviction relief, which the trial
court granted in 1997. The State appealed, and Lane-El was released on bond
on December 3, 1997, pending the outcome of the appeal. Lane-El was not free
for long, though. On April 23, 1998, this court reversed the trial court’s grant of
Lane-El’s petition for post-conviction relief. See State v. Lane, No. 49A02-9709-
PC-619 (Ind. Ct. App. Apr. 23, 1998) (memorandum decision). Our supreme
court denied transfer on August 19, 1998. See State v. Lane, 706 N.E.2d 168 (Ind.
Aug. 19, 1998) (table). Accordingly, on November 9, 1998, Lane-El’s appeal
bond was revoked, and his convictions and sentences were reinstated.
[7] On July 1, 2014, Lane-El filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus against
Keith Butts, the superintendent of the New Castle Correctional Facility in
which Lane-El is incarcerated. In his petition, Lane-El claimed that he was
being illegally detained and that he should have been discharged from
incarceration on February 14, 2014. Lane-El claimed that his parole revocation,
which was based on his convictions for rape and confinement, was invalid
because his convictions for rape and confinement were overturned by the post-
conviction court. Lane-El further argued that the time he served after his parole
was revoked should have been credited not to his sentence for robbery, but to
his sentence for rape.
[8] The State responded to Lane-El’s petition by filing a motion to dismiss/motion
for summary judgment. The trial court granted the State’s motion to dismiss on
October 14, 2014. Lane-El filed a notice of appeal on October 24, 2014, and this
appeal ensued.
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Discussion and Decision
[9] Indiana Code section 34-25.5-1-1 provides that “[e]very person whose liberty is
restrained, under any pretense whatever, may prosecute a writ of habeas corpus
to inquire into the cause of the restraint, and shall be delivered from the
restraint if the restraint is illegal.” The purpose of a writ of habeas corpus is to
determine the lawfulness of custody or detention of the defendant and may not
be used to determine collateral matters not affecting the custody process.
Hardley v. State, 893 N.E.2d 740, 742 (Ind. Ct. App. 2008). A petitioner is
entitled to habeas corpus only if he is entitled to his immediate release from
unlawful custody. Id. We review the trial court’s habeas decision for an abuse of
discretion. Id.
[10] Lane-El’s argument is not easy to follow,2 but it appears to be this: the post-
conviction court’s act of vacating his convictions for rape and confinement
made the revocation of his parole, which was based on these convictions, a
nullity; because his parole was not properly revoked, he completed his sentence
on the robbery conviction, and when he was re-incarcerated for rape and
confinement, he should not have been ordered to serve any remaining portion
of his robbery sentence but should instead have began to immediately serve his
sentence for rape and confinement. According to Lane-El’s calculations, his
2
We recognize that Lane-El is proceeding pro se, and we have endeavored to address the issues he presents
on the merits. However, we note that pro se litigants are held to the same standards as licensed attorneys.
Whatley v. State, 937 N.E.2d 1238, 1240 (Ind. Ct. App. 2010). Accordingly, we will not and may not become
advocates for Lane-El by attempting to make his arguments for him.
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sentence for rape was completed on February 14, 2014, and his continued
incarceration is unlawful. We disagree.
[11] Lane-El’s argument is based on several flawed presumptions. First, he assumes
that the vacation of his convictions and sentences by the post-conviction court
automatically nullified or voided the revocation of his parole. However, he cites
no authority to support this proposition. Even if the revocation of Lane-El’s
parole was based, as he claims, solely on the evidence of his convictions for
rape and confinement, this does not mean that the vacation of his convictions
voided the revocation of his parole. Also, nothing in the record indicates that
Lane-El attempted to have the revocation of his parole reversed. In this sense,
the facts of the present case are distinguishable from those in Brown v. State, 458
N.E.2d 245 (Ind. Ct. App. 1983).
[12] In Brown, the defendant’s probation was revoked based solely upon the fact that
he was subsequently convicted for another crime. However, when his
subsequent conviction was overturned on appeal, the defendant filed a petition
for post-conviction relief claiming that the revocation of his parole was not
supported by the evidence.
[13] On appeal from the post-conviction court’s denial of the defendant’s motion,
we held that if the revocation of a defendant’s probation was based solely upon
a conviction that was subsequently overturned on appeal, additional proof is
required to support the revocation. Id. at 249. Here, however, Lane-El did not
file any post-conviction petition seeking to overturn the revocation of his parole.
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Thus, Brown does not support Lane-El’s contention that the vacation of his rape
and confinement convictions automatically voided the revocation of his parole.
Cf. id. at 250 (noting that the recommended procedure in the event of a reversal
of a conviction which formed the basis of a revocation of probation is to hold a
new hearing to reconsider the prior revocation at which the court may hear all
pertinent evidence).
[14] More importantly, however, Lane-El’s argument all but ignores the fact that the
post-conviction court’s vacation of Lane-El’s convictions was reversed by this
court on appeal. Brown is therefore completely inapposite. Indeed, as Lane-El
himself notes, the effect of a reversal by a court on appeal is to vacate and
nullify the lower court’s judgment and return the parties to the positions they
held before the entry of the lower court’s judgment. See Silverman v. Villegas, 894
N.E.2d 249, 259 (Ind. Ct. App. 2008) (citing Doughty v. State Dep’t of Pub.
Welfare, 233 Ind. 475, 477, 121 N.E.2d 645, 646 (1954)). Thus, the post-
conviction court’s vacation of Lane-El’s rape and confinement convictions was
itself vacated and nullified by this court on appeal. Thus, Lane-El’s convictions
were reinstated. See id.
[15] Although Lane-El now claims that the DOC never held any administrative
hearings to reinstate the revocation of his parole, this again presumes that his
parole revocation was somehow automatically voided when his convictions
were temporarily vacated by the post-conviction court. Because Lane-El’s
parole revocation was never reversed, the DOC had no need to reinstate his
parole revocation. Moreover, Lane-El’s convictions were reinstated by effect of
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this court’s opinion reversing the post-conviction court’s vacation of Lane-El’s
convictions.
[16] Because we reject the premise of Lane-El’s arguments, we affirm the judgment
of the trial court denying his petition for a writ of habeas corpus.
[17] Affirmed.
May, J., and Robb, J., concur.
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