A man convicted of child molestation convinced a local judge to cut his prison time by nearly 25 percent, but the county prosecutor opposed the reduced sentence, appealed the decision, and won.
Former Greenwood resident Alan Jenkins was sentenced to 100 years in prison after being convicted in 2004 of two counts of child molestation. His sentence was later changed to 65 years. He had served about 13 years, and then went before Johnson Superior Court 1 Judge Kevin Barton to ask that his sentence be cut by 15 years.
Johnson County Prosecutor Brad Cooper was opposed to the sentence being changed because Jenkins was sentenced under a fixed-sentence agreement, where he acknowledged that he knew his sentence could not be modified, but also because Jenkins was a convicted child molester and the agreed-upon sentence was appropriate, Cooper said.
When Barton granted the change, Cooper chose to appeal the decision to the Indiana Court of Appeals.
“We believe that the court was wrong on the law on that, so we filed an appeal,” Cooper said.
Barton said he considered and granted the change because the Indiana General Assembly had made changes in the law that permitted Jenkins to make the request, but also because of the nature of the sentencing agreement and due to the changes in Jenkins’ conduct since he was initially convicted and sentenced, such as volunteering in the prison chapel.
The appeals court agreed that Barton should not have changed Jenkins’ sentence, because the agreement didn’t allow Jenkins to request a change. Now, Jenkins will be required to serve the entire 65-year sentence. Jenkins has been in prison since 2004.
He was convicted and sentenced following a Greenwood police investigation that found that Jenkins was in a sexual relationship, often involving drugs and alcohol, with a pre-teen girl, according to court records. Court documents said the girl would skip school, Jenkins would drive her to stores to steal liquor and cigarettes, and the two eventually started using crack cocaine together.
Jenkins was initially sentenced to 100 years in prison on the two child molestation convictions and for being a habitual offender, but he appealed the decision. The appeals court said at the time that the 30-year sentence for being a habitual offender should instead be attached to one of the other felony convictions. Jenkins was charged as a habitual offender due to his prior felony convictions for burglary and escape.
A couple years later, he asked for a change to his sentence, claiming his attorneys were ineffective in early court proceedings. That court mostly denied his request, but did find fault that his attorney in the appeal did not tell him that a decision had been made, so Jenkins did not have the opportunity to appeal to the Indiana Supreme Court, which may have determined that a 100-year sentence was not appropriate, Appeals Court Judge Paul Mathias wrote in the court’s decision.
The court ordered that Jenkins be re-sentenced for his crimes.
That sentencing hearing was conducted in 2016, and Jenkins and the prosecutor’s office agreed that a 65-year sentence was appropriate, according to court records. The court questioned Jenkins extensively to make sure that he understood what he was agreeing to, and that it would be his final sentence, if he choose to accept the agreement. He was specifically told that if he agreed to the 65-year sentence, that the judge no longer had discretion in terms of issuing a sentence, and he was bound to the terms, court documents said.
But eight months later, Jenkins asked for his sentence to be modified. A hearing was conducted in Barton’s court, and Cooper argued that the sentence should not be changed because it was a contract between Jenkins and the state, and Jenkins was told that the sentence could not later be changed. The victim in the child molestation case also testified against any change to Jenkins’ sentence at the hearing, Cooper said.
“On the merits, it shouldn’t be modified because he is a convicted child molester, and two, we had a contract,” Cooper said.
In August, Barton agreed to change Jenkins’ sentence from 65 years to 50 years.
Barton said that the fixed-sentence agreement between the prosecutor’s office and Jenkins was an oral agreement, but was not in writing.
“It looked as though it was something the general assembly had authorized and it had not been barred by a written agreement,” Barton said.
After determining that he could consider Jenkins’ request, Barton then had to examine whether Jenkins’ sentence should be reduced, Barton said. He considered the interactions he had with Jenkins in prior court hearings compared to Jenkins’ current behavior. The Indiana Department of Correction reported to the court that Jenkins lived in an honor dorm, had been involved in programs such as a suicide prevention project, had exemplary conduct reports and volunteered in the chapel, Barton said. Jenkins also demonstrated he had a basic working knowledge of Scripture, Barton said.
“I believe the person I saw was vastly different than the one I sent to prison in 2004,” Barton said of Jenkins.
Barton said those redeeming qualities were not present when Jenkins was convicted, but “I believe there was genuine change that had taken place.”
If a prison sentence has the desired effect on a person and their conduct, that change should be taken into account, Barton said. He also considered that he gave Jenkins a fairly stringent 65-year sentence, the judge said.
So during Jenkins’ request for a reduced sentence, when Barton saw evidence that Jenkins had made adjustments in his character that the court had asked him to make, Barton did not want to send the message to Jenkins that his efforts didn’t matter.
“How do we then communicate to them that all that’s worthless?” Barton said.
He wanted to offer some kind of recognition or reward for Jenkins’ changed conduct, while also weighing the seriousness of the crime and the length of the sentence. He also considered Jenkins’ age of 52, the amount of years that could be reduced and how old Jenkins would be upon release, all which raise the question of how long a person should be imprisoned, Barton said. He also compared the case and sentence to other cases.
In the end, he wanted Jenkins to know that his changes were important and valued.
“I just couldn’t look him in the eye and say everything you’ve done is worthless,” Barton said.
Trial court judges, such as Barton, generally have the power under Indiana law to modify sentences, except when the inmate is a violent criminal, which includes being convicted of child molestation.
But the appeals court relied on laws regarding plea agreements that say that sentences that are agreed upon can not be changed, unless the agreement included language that a judge could do that. Jenkins’ agreement did not.
Jenkins represented himself in the appeal proceedings.
