State of Utah, Plaintiff and Respondent v. Darrel Copeland, Defendant and Appellant

Summary

The Utah Supreme Court upheld the probation-eligibility classification in Utah Code Ann. § 76-5-406.5 against an equal protection challenge under rational basis review, and rejected facial cruel-and-unusual and vagueness challenges to the child-sodomy mandatory minimum in § 76-5-403.1 as well as an as-applied cruel-and-unusual attack on the fifteen-year sentence. It held that a defendant who pleads guilty but mentally ill is entitled to the pre-sentencing hearing mandated by § 77-35-21.5(3), struck subsections (c) and (d) of § 77-35-21.5(4) as arbitrary and capricious under the due process guarantee of article I, section VII of the Utah Constitution, and found the plea colloquy adequate on the nature and elements of the offense. Because the record left unclear what sentencing recommendation the State promised, whether that promise was illusory given the judge's limited discretion, and whether it was kept, the court vacated the sentence and remanded for findings, directing that defendant be allowed to withdraw his plea if the State promised hospital commitment, he understood it to be the promise without knowing it was valueless, or the State failed to fulfill its promise. Chief Justice Hall, concurring in part and dissenting in part, concurred only in the mental-condition remand and would have held the plea knowing and voluntary.