After two years of tireless litigation, Chris Edmunds won the freedom of his client, Joe Washington. Washington—a 68-year-old man from Baton Rouge—was sentenced to life-without-parole in Angola for stealing a bookbag and some Nike shoes from the back of a pickup truck in 2010. The East Baton Rouge DA, Hillar Moore, threw the book at Washington, invoking what is known as the “Habitual Offender” law. The DA reached back all the way to the 1970s to allege that Washington was a repeat offender deserving of life without parole, because he had prior felonies that were punishable by 12 years in prison. But one of the felonies used to enhance his sentence—a 1974 simple burglary—did not qualify under the law, because it was punishable by only 9 years. It wasn’t until 1977 that the Louisiana legislature increased the penalty for simple to 12 years. But the DA, Washington’s attorney, and the judge all missed this obvious mistake in 2011, when Washington was sentenced.
This should have been a simple fix: because his sentence was illegal, he needed to be resentenced. In November 2020, Chris Edmunds Law Office filed a motion to correct Washington’s illegal sentence. But Hillar Moore fought tooth-and-nail to keep the life sentence, offering specious arguments that it was legal. Unfortunately, the trial judge denied the motion—without providing any written reasoning for his decision. The First Circuit Court Court of Appeal did the same, in a two-sentence order that did not address any of the substantive arguments (“Writ Denied”). Finally, justice prevailed on November 16, 2022, when the Louisiana Supreme Court vacated Washington’s sentence, holding that the life-without-parole sentence is “illegal." The high court explained that Washington’s 1974 simple burglary could not be used to enhance his sentence, because simple burglary was not punishable by 12 years “at the time he committed that crime.” You can read the decision here. The Advocate did a story about the protracted legal battle, which you can read here.
Thankfully, the trial judge agreed to promptly resentence Washington the following week, and the DA agreed to withdraw the habitual-offender bill entirely. The judge resentenced to Washington to 8 years (4 less than the maximum for simple burglary). Because he had already served 11, he was released immediately—two days before Thanksgiving. The judge apologized to Joe for how he had been treated, and Joe made it home to his family in time for the holidays.
