Another swing, miss in Pratt case

SANDPOINT — A Bonner County man convicted of playing a role in a violent crime spree that culminated in the murder of a U.S. Forest Service law officer has lost his ninth bid at securing a reduced sentence, according to 1st District Court records.

Joseph Earl Pratt is serving a life sentence for his involvement in the murder of Brent “Jake” Jacobson, who tracked Pratt and his brother, James, to the Smith Creek drainage west of Dover following a failed home-invasion robbery in Sagle in 1989.

The Pratt brothers were discovered by Jacobson and Deputy Steven Barbieri sleeping beneath a tree. James Pratt opened fire with a 12-gauge shotgun, which mortally wounded Jacobson.

The brothers were subsequently convicted of first-degree murder, robbery and a slew of other charges.

James Pratt was sentenced to death by lethal injection, but the Idaho Supreme Court later converted the sentence to life without parole. Joseph Pratt, also sentenced to life, was spared the ultimate penalty because he did not fire the blast that fatally injured Jacobson, court records show.

In the intervening years, Joseph Pratt has filed nine motions for correction of an illegal sentence and has also sought redress through the Idaho Court of Appeals. However, those efforts have failed to alter his sentence.

The legal doctrine of res judicata has stymied those attempts, according to 1st District Court records. Also known claim preclusion, res judicata essentially bars arguments which have already been adjudicated by a competent court from emerging again.

In his ninth motion, Joseph Pratt argued in September that he was not subject to the doctrine because he was not physically present in district court when the sentence went under review in 2000.

However, district Judge Barbara Buchanan ruled that Joseph Pratt was indeed trying to re-litigate the same issues by filing successive motions under Idaho Criminal Rule 35, which allows judges to correct illegal or unlawful sentences.

Buchanan further ruled that Pratt was abusing the judicial process by filing a cascade of Rule 35 motions.

“Simply inserting into each motion the magic words ‘correction of an illegal sentence’ does not allow Pratt to file an unending succession of Rule 35 motions ‘at any time,’ purportedly under ICR 35 (a), reasserting the same issues, and thereby circumventing the appeals process,” Buchanan said in a Sept. 23 order.

Joseph Pratt, 55, is serving his sentence at the Idaho State Correctional Institution in Kuna, according to the Idaho Department of Correction’s website. James Kevin Pratt, 57, is serving his sentence at the Idaho State Correctional Center, which is also located in Kuna.

Jacobson was posthumously awarded Idaho’s Medal of Honor in 2011 for “conspicuous gallantry and exceptionally meritorious conduct.”