Steven Wyman

ALPENA — A 65-year-old man will stay in prison until at least 2036 after the Michigan Court of Appeals upheld his conviction and sentencing for cocaine possession.

Police arrested Steven Wyman the day after Christmas in 2021 after pulling him over for speeding and discovering during a search of his vehicle 175 grams of cocaine and $620 in cash. A search of Wyman’s cell phone revealed he’d been texting with people “known to law enforcement to be involved in the drug trade,” the court of appeals said in its recent opinion.

Following conviction at a jury trial, Wyman was sentenced in March 2023 to more than 13 years in prison.

Wyman, who had tried unsuccessfully at trial to prevent the Alpena County Prosecutor’s Office from presenting the text messages as evidence against him, argued again in his appeal that the search warrant police used to obtain those text messages was not properly authorized. Wyman argued the evidence police used as a basis for the search warrant was not specific enough.

The three-judge appellate court panel disagreed, saying the search warrant was properly obtained and arguing that the text messages presented at trial likely didn’t do much to sway the jury, anyway.

“As was demonstrated at trial, defendant was found with over 175 grams of cocaine and cash in a shopping bag after driving for hours, stopping briefly, and returning toward his origin,” the appellate justices wrote. “Thus, absent the text messages, we are not convinced that the jury would have found defendant not guilty.”

Wyman also argued that the trial court erred when it allowed a State Police trooper to testify about his opinion that Wyman lied when he told police he wasn’t aware of anything illegal in the vehicle before giving police permission to search the vehicle. The Court of Appeals ruled that the trooper’s testimony was proper because he was not testifying then as an expert witness.

Finally, Wyman told the appellate court that his sentencing was wrong because the court should have considered his age and poor health. The appellate justices said the trial court acted appropriately.

“Although defendant was 63 years old when he was sentenced and has a heart condition, this Court has held that a defendant’s advanced age is not sufficient to overcome the presumption of a proportionate sentence,” the appellate justices wrote in their opinion.

Read the full Michigan Court of Appeals opinion denying Steven Wyman’s appeal.

Steven Wyman Appeal Denail by JustinHinkley on Scribd