NMSC: Criminal Commitment Can Be Enhanced When Aggravating Factors Are Present

I’m still running a bit behind on the blogging, so today I’m doing State v. Quintana, a criminal appeal from late March. In a short opinion authored by Justice Bacon, the Court affirmed the district court and court of appeals, holding that a criminal commitment can be enhanced when aggravating factors are proven by clear and convincing evidence.

Background

The defendant in this case brutally murdered the victim. He was not competent to stand trial, and the court therefore held an evidentiary hearing to determine whether criminal commitment was appropriate. The court found that clear and convincing evidence showed that the defendant had committed second degree murder. The court also found evidence to support two aggravating factors: the extreme viciousness and brutality of the murder, and the likelihood that the defendant would be non-compliant with medicine, such that his psychosis would return. As a result, the court enhanced the 15-year second degree murder sentence by five years (for the aggravating factors).

The defendant appealed to the court of appeals, arguing that  the New Mexico Mental Illness and Competency Code (NMMIC) did not permit the maximum term of commitment to be enhanced based on aggravating factors. The court of appeals affirmed, hold that the NMMIC allowed for enhancements based on aggravating factors, and the Supreme Court granted certiorari.

Analysis

The issue in this appeal was whether the NMMIC allowed aggravating factors to extend the commitment term. This is a question of statutory construction, which the Court reviews without deference. To decide it, the Court needed to determine whether the legislature had intended to allow a term of commitment to be extended.

The Court always looks first to the language of the statutes as the primary indicator of legislative intent. Where the language is clear and unambiguous, it controls. Here, the Court found that the plain language of the statute allowed enhancements. When a court finds a defendant committed a felony but is (1) incompetent to stand trial and (2) still dangerous, the NMMIC requires it to impose a commitment for a time equal to the maximum sentence the defendant would have been subject to in a criminal proceeding. Because sentences are defined by the Criminal Sentencing Act (“CSA”), the Court looked to the CSA to determine whether enhancement was allowed.

Under the CSA, aggravation or mitigation of sentences is “normal and appropriate.” By default, enhancement was therefore part of the NMMIC. But an earlier case, State v. Chorney, had held that only those aggravating factors related to “dangerousness” could be used to enhance a term of commitment. Here, the district court’s findings regarding the aggravating circumstances did relate to the dangerousness of the defendant, so the enhancements were proper.

The defendant had also raised an interesting argument that a jury was required to make the findings related to enhancement. But the defendant had waived his right to a jury on those issues and, in any event, commitment is not a criminal proceeding. So the Court did not address it.

Although civil commitments are perhaps a niche area, and it appears that much of this law was already fairly clear, this opinion would appear to collect those cases and cleanly settle the question of enhancements in civil commitments.

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