RENDERED: MARCH 23, 2017
To BE PUBLISHED
Snpreme Court of Bentuckg
2016-SC-OOOO76-DG
DUR_AND EDWARD MURRELL v l APPELLANT
ON REVIEW FROM COURT OF APPEALS
V. CASE NO. 2015-CA-OOl651-MR
BOYLE CIRCUIT COURT NO. 15-CI-00229 _
DON BOTTOM, WARDEN v APPELLEE
NORTHPOINT TRAINING CENTER
OPINION OF THE COURT BY JUSTICE CUNNINGHAM
AFFIRMING ON OTHER GROUNDS
ln May of 2015, Appellant, Durand Edward Murrell, then a prisoner at
the Northpoint Training Center, filed a Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus in
the Boyle Circuit Court against Warden Don Bottom.
In 1993, a Jefferson Circuit Court sentenced Appellant to a total of forty-
two years’ imprisonment for seventeen counts of first-degree robbery, six n
counts of second-degree Wanton endangerment of a police ofticer, and one
count each of third-degree assault of a police officer and first-degree escape. In
1994, the United States District Court for the Western District of Kentucky
sentenced Appellant to 152 months’ incarceration for one count each of armed
bank robbery, use of a firearm in a crime of Violence, and carjacking.
Appellant’s federal sentence was ordered to be served consecutively to his state
sentence. At the time of Appellant’s federal sentencing, he was in the custody
of the Kentucky Department of Corrections (“DOC”). Consequently, the Federal
Bureau 'of Prisons (“FBOP”) issued a detainer in order to obtain custody upon
Appellant’s release from state custody.
On January 18, 2001; the Kentucky Parole Board (“KPB”) paroled
Appellant to his federal detainer. Appellant was then transferred from state
custody to federal custody, where he remained for approximately eleven years.
_On March 31, 2011, FBOP notified DOC in Writing of its intent to release
Appellant under federal supervision to Dismas Charities of Louisville Halfway
House. On September 12, 2012, Appellant was released from federal
supervision. Appellant immediately reported to his local Probation and Parole
Office and was placed on active state parole supervision.
On October 24, 2013, after obtaining new criminal charges, the KPB
revoked Appellant’s parole. Appellant filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus
in the Boyle Circuit Court after exhausting possible administrative remedies.
Appellant’s_sole ground for his petition was that DOC permanently surrendered
jurisdiction over his sentence when it transferred custody to Federal
authorities in 2001. Appellee', referring the trial'court to Commonwealth v.
Marcum, 873 S.W.2d 207 (Ky. 1994), argued that a writ of habeas corpus is
only appropriate if the judgment of conviction under which the prisoner is held
is void ab initio. Furthermore, Appellee cited the current version of Kentucl