Peo v. Gresham

22CA1894 Peo v Gresham 06-26-2025

COLORADO COURT OF APPEALS

Court of Appeals No. 22CA1894
Larimer County District Court No. 16CR1890
Honorable Stephen J. Jouard, Judge

The People of the State of Colorado,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

Michael Gresham,

Defendant-Appellant.

ORDER AFFIRMED

Division VII
Opinion by JUSTICE MARTINEZ*
Lipinsky and Lum, JJ., concur

NOT PUBLISHED PURSUANT TO C.A.R. 35(e)
Announced June 26, 2025

Philip J. Weiser, Attorney General, Sonia Raichur Russo, Senior Assistant
Attorney General, Denver, Colorado, for Plaintiff-Appellee

James West, Alternate Defense Counsel, Longmont, Colorado, for Defendant-
Appellant

*Sitting by assignment of the Chief Justice under provisions of Colo. Const. art.
VI, § 5(3), and § 24-51-1105, C.R.S. 2024.
¶1 Defendant, Michael Gresham, appeals the postconviction

court’s denial of several claims raised in his Crim. P. 35(c) motion.

We affirm.

I. Background

¶2 Gresham drove from Ohio to Colorado with two companions to

meet a Colorado drug dealer. Gresham and his companions met

the drug dealer in a parking lot where one of the companions shot

and killed the drug dealer. The three men took the drug dealer’s

car, dumped his body, and started driving their vehicle and the

drug dealer’s vehicle back to Ohio. They were pulled over in Illinois,

and police found evidence of the murder and drugs in the vehicles.

Gresham was twenty years old at the time.

¶3 Gresham was initially charged with first degree murder,

aggravated robbery, and various other counts. He pleaded guilty to

second degree murder and aggravated robbery in exchange for the

dismissal of the remaining counts. The district court sentenced

Gresham to consecutive terms for the two offenses, resulting in an

aggregate sentence of fifty-seven years in the custody of the

Department of Corrections (thirty-six years for second degree

murder and twenty-one years for aggravated robbery).

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¶4 Gresham then filed a Crim. P. 35(c) motion challenging his

conviction and sentence. As relevant here, he argued in the motion

that his plea was not knowing or intelligent and his sentence

violated the Equal Protection Clause and the Eighth Amendment.

The postconviction court held a hearing and denied the motion.

¶5 Gresham appeals.

II. Gresham’s Plea

¶6 We review de novo the postconviction court’s ruling that

Gresham’s plea was constitutionally valid. Medina v. People, 2023

CO 46, ¶ 15. To the extent that our inquiry requires us to review

the court’s factual findings, we defer to those factual findings if they

are supported by the record. Id.

¶7 At the outset, we reject Gresham’s argument that the

postconviction court failed to rule on the propriety of his plea in

denying his motion. In a footnote in its written order, the

postconviction court explained that it “determine[d] based upon the

record that [Gresham] was, in fact, properly advised of his

rights . . . and that his guilty plea . . . was voluntary and

intelligently made.” It is of no significance that this determination

appeared in a footnote — the postconviction court clearly rejected

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Gresham’s challenge to his plea. We now turn to the propriety of

that rejection.

¶8 Gresham argues that his plea was not knowing or intelligent

because the advisement court did not thoroughly explain the mens

rea elements of the offenses to which he pleaded guilty. Second

degree murder requires that the defendant knowingly causes the

death of another person. § 18-3-103(1)(a), C.R.S. 2024. As relevant

here, aggravated robbery requires that the defendant (1) knowingly

takes a thing of value from the victim by force, threat, or

intimidation; and (2) in doing so, knowingly wounds or strikes the

victim or puts the victim in reasonable fear of bodily injury. §§ 18-

4-301(1), -302(1)(b), C.R.S. 2024.

¶9 Gresham concedes that he was advised about these mens rea

elements before he pleaded guilty to them. He nevertheless argues

that had he gone to trial, the prosecution would have argued that

he was guilty as a complicitor, and therefore the advisement court

had to explain the legal doctrine of complicity to render his plea

knowing and intelligent. We disagree.

¶ 10 Gresham does not dispute that there was a factual basis for

his plea. Nor does he dispute that his advisement satisfied Crim. P.

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11’s requirements. He cites no authority for the proposition that an

advisement that satisfies Crim. P. 11 is nevertheless

constitutionally infirm if it does not inform the defendant of the

theory of liability the prosecution might pursue at trial, and we are

aware of none.

¶ 11 Rather, due process requires only that the defendant be

advised of the true nature of the charges against him, including an

explanation of the elements of the offense to which the defendant is

pleading guilty. See People v. Cabral, 698 P.2d 234, 235 (Colo.

1985); Crim. P. 11(b). The advisement court provided such an

explanation to Gresham. We therefore conclude that Gresham’s

guilty plea was knowing and intelligent, and the postconviction

court properly denied his claim alleging that he was not properly

advised.

III. Gresham’s Sentence

¶ 12 We review the postconviction court’s denial of Gresham’s

claims challenging his sentence as a mixed question of fact and law,

deferring to the court’s factual findings that have record support

and reviewing the court’s legal conclusions de novo. See People v.

Pendleton, 2015 COA 154, ¶ 7.

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¶ 13 As we understand it, Gresham’s argument challenging his

sentence is based on the Equal Protection Clause and the Eighth

Amendment. Gresham posits that the Eighth Amendment prohibits

de facto life without the possibility of parole (LWOP) sentences for

juvenile offenders. Because he was twenty at the time of the

offenses and twenty-one at sentencing, Graham contends he was

similarly situated to a juvenile offender. Thus, according to

Gresham, the Equal Protection Clause requires that the prohibition

on de facto LWOP sentences for juvenile offenders be extended to

him. Gresham also contends that he is entitled to a more

“meaningful” proportionality review than the abbreviated review he

received, but he does not identify the reason why he believes he is

entitled to a more “meaningful” review. Because Gresham correctly

concedes that “the state of the law now” is that proportionality

review does not apply to aggregate sentences like his, we infer he is

arguing that he is entitled to a more “meaningful” review for the

same reason that he argues the prohibition on de facto LWOP

sentences for juvenile offenders should be extended to him. In

other words, a more “meaningful” proportionality review could be

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the mechanism that protects him from an unconstitutional de facto

LWOP sentence.

¶ 14 We need not consider whether the Equal Protection Clause

and Eighth Amendment combine to produce the result Gresham

claims because we disagree with the fundamental assumption of his

arguments. Gresham’s arguments assume — and require — that

he received a de facto LWOP sentence. In our view, however, he did

not receive a de facto life sentence.

¶ 15 A de facto LWOP sentence is one lacking a meaningful

opportunity for release within the defendant’s natural lifetime. See

People v. Lucero, 2013 COA 53, ¶ 12. Gresham’s sentence afforded

him a meaningful opportunity for release within his natural lifetime.

¶ 16 Gresham will be statutorily eligible for parole after serving

seventy-five percent of his fifty-seven-year sentence, after about

forty-three years. See § 17-22.5-403(2.5)(a), C.R.S. 2024

(establishing parole eligibility after seventy-five percent of the

sentence has been served for second degree murder and aggravated

robbery). He was twenty-one at the time of sentencing and received

almost two years of credit for time served (694 days). Thus, under

the parole statute, he will be parole eligible no later than age sixty-

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three. Also, the postconviction court found that, considering

“earned time . . . [,] Gresham is likely to be released on parole

sometime in his 50’s.”

¶ 17 Based on Gresham’s statutory parole eligibility date and the

postconviction court’s unchallenged finding that he will likely be

released in his fifties, we conclude that Gresham has a meaningful

opportunity for release within his natural lifetime. Consequently,

he did not receive a de facto LWOP sentence.

¶ 18 This conclusion is fatal to Gresham’s arguments. Without a

de facto LWOP sentence, there is no purported Eighth Amendment

prohibition that the Equal Protection Clause could extend to

Gresham, even by way of a more “meaningful” proportionality

review. We therefore conclude that the postconviction court

properly denied Gresham’s challenge to his sentence.

IV. Disposition

¶ 19 The postconviction court’s order is affirmed.

JUDGE LIPINSKY and JUDGE LUM concur.

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