The People of the State of New York, Respondent v. John Lingle, Appellant; the People of the State of New York…

Summary

In six consolidated appeals, the New York Court of Appeals held that defendants who were resentenced to add statutorily mandated postrelease supervision (PRS) after their original judges committed Sparber errors (failing to pronounce PRS in open court) could not escape PRS on double jeopardy or substantive due process grounds, because under People v Williams a legitimate expectation of finality arises only when a defendant completes the lawful portion of the illegal sentence and exhausts any appeal, and none of these defendants had done so. The Court further held that a resentencing to correct a Sparber error is a limited, non-plenary proceeding confined to making the required PRS pronouncement, so the resentencing court may not reconsider the incarceratory component, and the Appellate Division correspondingly lacks authority to reduce the prison term in the interest of justice on appeal from such a resentencing. Orders were affirmed in Lingle, Parisi, Murrell, Prendergast and Rodriguez; in Sharlow, who had been conditionally released after serving six sevenths of his term, the Appellate Division order vacating PRS was reversed and Supreme Court's resentence was reinstated. Judge Ciparick, joined by Chief Judge Lippman and Judge Jones, dissented in Sharlow and Rodriguez, reading Williams to draw the double jeopardy line at release from confinement and to preserve trial-court and Appellate Division authority to reduce the incarceratory term.