No. 29930 – Wednesday, July 21, 2010 at 10:15 a.m.

GABRIEL APILANDO, Petitioner-Appellee, v. STATE OF HAWAII, Respondent-Appellant.

Attorney(s) for Respondent-Appellant
Honorable Peter B. Carlisle, Prosecuting Attorney and Delanie D. Prescott-Tate, Deputy Prosecuting Attorney, City & County of Honolulu

Attorney(s) for Petitioner-Appellee
Jeffrey A. Hawk

COURT:    Nakamura, CJ; Foley and Leonard, JJ.

SPECIAL NOTE:    The above argument will take place in the Supreme Court courtroom on the Second Floor of Aliʻiolani Hale, 417 South King Street, Honolulu, Hawaii.

[ Listen to the entire audio recording in mp3 format ]

Brief description:

Respondent-Appellant State of Hawaiʻi (State) appeals from the Circuit Court of the First Circuit’s July 9, 2009 Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law and Order Granting Defendant’s Petition for Post-Conviction Relief (Post-Conviction Order).  In the Post-Conviction Order, the circuit court concluded that there was manifest injustice in conjunction with Petitioner-Appellee Gabriel Apilando’s (Apilando) guilty pleas and that Apilando was entitled to withdraw his guilty pleas.  On appeal, the State challenges several of the circuit court’s findings of fact and conclusions of law, arguing that Apilando was not entitled to withdraw his guilty pleas, post-sentencing, due to a “technical violation” of the plea agreement by the State, where Apilando received the benefit of the plea agreement and then waited more than four years before bringing the violations to the circuit court’s attention.