In a few days, the Arizona Department of Corrections will receive a court order to substantially reduce the prison time a Sierra Vista man is serving for drug offenses which date back to 2013.
Usef Latrice Simmons has been serving 39 years as a category three repetitive offender after a Cochise County jury found him guilty of 11 drug charges. Five of those convictions were tossed out by the Arizona Court of Appeals in 2015, but the trial judge did not reduce Simmons’ overall prison time.
Simmons, 34, has argued that he was entitled to a new trial when the five convictions were dismissed. The dispute centered on the fact jurors heard testimony related to the five dismissed charges which may have been inadmissible in a trial on only the six counts.
On Tuesday, Judge Laura Cardinal of the Cochise County Superior Court was prepared to conduct an evidentiary hearing on whether to grant Simmons a new trial. A writ issued by the judge brought Simmons from his prison unit in Winslow to participate in the hearing in front of about two dozen supporters.
The hearing was set to be held more than nine years after Simmons engaged in several drug offense. However, the judge never needed to conduct the hearing. Instead, the Cochise County Attorney’s Office and Simmons’ court-appointed attorney worked together to negotiate a sentence modification which resolved the outstanding due process concerns.
The agreement approved by Cardinal called for one of the six convictions to be dismissed outright, as it involved possession of marijuana for personal use which in many instances is no longer a crime. In addition, Simmons’ four terms of 15.75 years were reclassified so they will all be served concurrently, or at the same time.
Those terms are not eligible for early release, so Simmons must serve the full 15.75 years. Then he will have a short 3-year term for the remaining count, which is eligible for release after 85 percent.
Simmons will be returned to ADC custody soon along with a copy of his new sentencing order. Once the calculations are completed, he should have a release date in 2032 instead of 2048.
READ MORE ABOUT SIMMONS: HERE
