The Akron Legal News

Man who molested his grandchildren has prison sentence reduced

ANNIE YAMSON
Special to the Legal News
Published: April 16, 2014

The 9th District Court of Appeals recently reversed the judgment of the Summit County Court of Common Pleas when it found that the lower court failed to make the proper findings before imposing consecutive sentences.

The defendant, Jack Carmel, pleaded guilty to five counts of gross sexual imposition, felonies of the third degree, in January of 2013.

The trial court sentenced him to a 36-month prison term on each count, to be served consecutively for a total sentence of 15 years.

Carmel was also categorized as a Tier II sex offender.

In his sole assignment of error on appeal, Carmel argued that the trial court erred in sentencing him to consecutive prison terms when R.C. 2929.14(C)(4) dictated that it make factual findings on the record before doing so.

R.C. 2929.14 states that courts may impose consecutive sentences if such sanctions are necessary to protect the public from future crime or to punish the offender.

The consecutive sentences cannot be disproportionate to the seriousness of the offender’s conduct or the danger he poses to the public.

Consecutive sentences are also allowed if an offender committed one of more of his crimes while awaiting trial or under post-release control or if the “harm caused by two or more of the multiple offenses was so great or unusual that no single prison term for any of the offenses ... adequately reflects the seriousness of the offender’s conduct.”

The trial court is also required, under the statute, to consider the defendant’s criminal history.

“The fact that trial courts do not have to explain their reasoning behind the findings does not negate the fact that the trial courts still must make the findings,” wrote Presiding Judge Carla Moore on behalf of the district’s three-judge appellate panel.

Judge Moore noted that, in previous cases, the 9th District held that such findings were required to be made on the record at the sentencing hearing.

The appellate panel reviewed the transcript of Carmel’s hearing, where the trial judge stated that Carmel was “not the first grandfather to stand before me in the short four and a half years that I have been a judge having molested (his) grandchildren.”

“You have pled guilty to five counts but you have acknowledged in your psychosexual evaluation that you did it 15 times,” the judge stated. “I will say that I respect the Summit Psychological Associates’ description of you, Mr. Carmel, in its report about being manipulative and assuming little responsibility for your problems, preferring to blame them on others and/or circumstances.”

The trial court noted that, although Carmel admitted his guilt, he caused his family to “suffer a great division” and “shirked his role as the male head of the family.”

It then ordered Carmel to serve the consecutive sentences.

Those statements, according to the court of appeals, did not reflect the findings required by statute.

“Although the trial court verbally admonished Mr. Carmel for the pain he caused his family, being manipulative and not assuming responsibility for his problems, it did not make the requisite findings set forth in R.C. 2929.14(C)(4) on the record at the sentencing hearing,” wrote Judge Moore.

The trial court did, however, make those findings in its sentencing entry, which the state argued was enough to justify the consecutive sentences.

The appellate panel disagreed, holding that the trial court had to make the findings on the record in order to sustain the sanctions.

“In sustaining Mr. Carmel’s sole assignment of error, the judgment of the Summit County Court of Common Pleas is reversed, and this cause is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this decision,” Judge Moore concluded.

Judges Eve Belfance and Donna Carr concurred.

The case is cited State v. Carmel, 2014-Ohio-1209.

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