Opinion
Appellate Case No. 2023-000629 Opinion No. 28177
09-06-2023
STATE of South Carolina, Petitioner, v. Jeroid J. PRICE, Defendant.
Attorney General Alan McCrory Wilson, Chief Deputy Attorney General W. Jeffrey Young, Solicitor General Robert D. Cook, Deputy Attorney General Donald J. Zelenka, Senior Assistant Deputy Attorney General Heather Savitz Weiss, all of Columbia, for Petitioner. James Todd Rutherford, of The Rutherford Law Firm, LLC, of Columbia, for Defendant.
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE COURT OF GENERAL SESSIONS
Appeal from Richland County, L. Casey Manning, Circuit Court Judge
Attorney General Alan McCrory Wilson, Chief Deputy Attorney General W. Jeffrey Young, Solicitor General Robert D. Cook, Deputy Attorney General Donald J. Zelenka, Senior Assistant Deputy Attorney General Heather Savitz Weiss, all of Columbia, for Petitioner.
James Todd Rutherford, of The Rutherford Law Firm, LLC, of Columbia, for Defendant.
ORDER VACATED
JUSTICE FEW:
We issued a common-law writ of certiorari to review a "sealed" order of the circuit court reducing the prison sentence of Jeroid John Price and releasing him from prison after he served only nineteen years of his thirty-five-year sentence on his conviction for murder. We previously issued an order unsealing all documents in the case. We now vacate the order for two reasons: (1) the circuit court did not have the authority to reduce the sentence because the solicitor and the circuit court did not comply with any of the requirements set forth in the applicable statute, and (2) the circuit court did not have the authority to close the proceedings to the public or seal the order. We remand the defendant to the custody of the South Carolina Department of Corrections.
I. Background
Price was convicted of murder in 2003 and sentenced to thirty-five years in prison. The facts of the murder and the procedural history of that case are set forth in our opinion affirming his conviction on direct appeal. State v. Price, 368 S.C. 494, 496-97, 629 S.E.2d 363, 364-65 (2006). The parties inform us Price began serving his sentence on December 23, 2003, and remained in prison until March 15, 2023. On that date, the Department of Corrections released Price pursuant to an order sighed by now-retired circuit court judge L. Casey Manning on December 30, 2022.
There is no official record of the events that led to Judge Manning signing the order releasing Price from prison. It appears, however, that in February 2022, attorney J. Todd Rutherford—counsel for Price—contacted Solicitor Byron E. Gipson of the Fifth Judicial Circuit about reducing Price’s sentence pursuant to section 17-25-65 of the South Carolina Code (2014). In mid-December 2022, Rutherford and Solicitor Gipson began exchanging emails with drafts of an order. According to Rutherford, he and Solicitor Gipson met privately with Judge Manning in late December in the judge’s chambers. The Richland County "Case Management System Public Index" does not reflect that this meeting occurred, and there is no indication the meeting was recorded or transcribed. The victim’s family was not notified of any of these events.
On December 30, Judge Manning signed two documents. The first document, entitled "ORDER REDUCING SENTENCE," provides,
This Matter comes before this Court by Defendant, through his undersigned attorney, J. Todd Rutherford, who petitions this Court to Reduce the Defendant’s Sentence: The Court finds the following facts to exist in this ease:
1. That the Defendant was convicted of Murder … on December 19, 2003 and came, to the South Carolina Department of Corrections on December 23, 2003.
2. That the Defendant was sentenced to a sentence of thirty-five years in prison by The Honorable Reginald I. Lloyd and has served approximately nineteen years to date.
3. Upon motion of the Solicitor in accordance with S.C. Code Ann. § 17-25-65.
4. An account of Defendant’s cooperation is contained in an addendum attached to this Order.
THEREFORE, IT IS ORDERED that the sentence be reduced from thirty-five years to nineteen years.
The second document states only, "Order sealed this 30th day of December of 2022," without identifying the "Order" being sealed.
It appears Judge Manning placed both documents in a sealed envelope, signed his name across the seal, and wrote the date "12-30-22" on the exterior of the envelope. At an unknown point in time, the envelope was delivered to the clerk. The envelope bears no indication it contained an order or that the contents of the envelope related to any particular case. Neither the envelope nor the documents inside it have ever been file-stamped nor bear any other indication either of them were filed with the clerk of court. As of April 19, 2023, the public index contained no entry for any order subsequent to the clerk of court receiving this Court’s remittitur from our decision in Price’s direct appeal on May 9, 2006.