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Criminal Procedure — Plea withdrawal

By: WISCONSIN LAW JOURNAL STAFF//November 26, 2014//

Criminal Procedure — Plea withdrawal

By: WISCONSIN LAW JOURNAL STAFF//November 26, 2014//

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Wisconsin Supreme Court

Criminal

Criminal Procedure — Plea withdrawal

A guilty or no-contest plea entered to avoid a penalty enhancer attached to a felony charge when that penalty enhancer was indisputably a legal impossibility, is invalid.

“[I]t is undisputed in the present case that the persistent repeater enhancer attached to the armed robbery charge could not, as a matter of law, have been applied to the defendant. The law required the State to drop the persistent repeater enhancer. The State’s offer to drop the persistent repeater enhancer as part of the plea agreement provided no benefit to the defendant.”

“In the present case, the plea offer was significantly less valuable than the defendant believed because the persistent repeater enhancer was a legal impossibility. Dropping the enhancer provided an illusory benefit to the defendant. When entering his plea of no contest, the defendant failed to understand ‘the actual value’ of the plea offer he accepted.”

Affirmed.

2012AP2044-CR State v. Dillard

Abrahamson, C.J.

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