Ariel Ginjauma, Jr., Appellant-Defendant v. State of Indiana, Appellee-Plaintiff (2026)

MEMORANDUM DECISION

[1] Ariel Ginjauma, Jr., pleaded guilty to attempted aggravated battery and criminal confinement—both Level 3 felonies—and was sentenced to consecutive terms totaling 22 years. Indiana Code § 35-50-1-2 (2023) caps aggregate consecutive sentences at 20 years when three conditions are met: (1) the most serious offense is a Level 3 felony; (2) the offenses are not statutorily categorized as “crimes of violence”; and (3) the convictions arise from a single episode of criminal conduct. The State agrees with Ginjauma—as do we—that these three conditions were met here. We reverse and remand with instructions to impose a sentence not exceeding 20 years.

Facts

[2] On November 14, 2023, Ginjauma went to his marital home in Hobart where his estranged wife, Evelyn, lived with her 15-year-old daughter, I.G., from a prior relationship. Earlier that day, Evelyn had been found not guilty of stabbing an associate of Ginjauma after a trial in which Ginjauma testified for the State.

[3] Armed with a handgun, Ginjauma kicked the door several times before Evelyn ultimately let him enter. Once inside, Ginjauma grabbed Evelyn in the foyer while pointing his gun at I.G. at the top of the stairs. Ginjauma then proceeded upstairs, toward I.G., while firing downstairs at Evelyn. Evelyn escaped out the door, and I.G. retreated to a bathroom, where Ginjauma briefly confined her at gunpoint. He then returned downstairs, followed Evelyn outside, and fired at her repeatedly as she ran across the street. Neither victim nor any bystander was struck. The entire episode lasted less than five minutes. Ginjauma fled and was almost immediately arrested.

[4] The State originally charged Ginjauma in 2023 with ten crimes, including two counts of Level 1 felony attempted murder. In October 2025, he pleaded guilty to attempted aggravated battery and criminal confinement—both Level 3 felonies—in exchange for dismissal of the remaining charges in that prosecution and multiple felonies in a separate domestic violence prosecution. The plea agreement did not specify sentences for the offenses and specifically authorized the parties to argue whether the sentences should be consecutive or concurrent.

[5] At sentencing, Ginjauma contended that Indiana Code § 35-50-1-2 (2023) (Sentencing Cap Statute) capped his aggregate sentence at 20 years. Both parties agreed that neither offense was listed as a “crime of violence” in that statute.¹ But the State argued that the sentencing cap did not apply because Ginjauma's offenses constituted two separate crimes against two different people at two different locations. The trial court agreed with the State and imposed consecutive terms of 12 years executed for the attempted aggravated battery and 10 years—2 executed, 4 in community corrections, and 4 suspended—for the criminal confinement. Ginjauma now appeals his aggregate sentence of 22 years.

Discussion and Decision

[6] Ginjauma renews his argument that his sentence for the two Level 3 felony offenses could not exceed 20 years under the Sentencing Cap Statute. Interpretation of a sentencing statute is a question of law that we review de novo. Pierce v. State, 29 N.E.3d 1258, 1265 (Ind. 2015).

[7] The Sentencing Cap Statute limits aggregate consecutive sentences for felony convictions that are not “crimes of violence,” as defined in the statute, and “aris[e] out of an episode of criminal conduct.” Ind. Code § 35-50-1-2(c) (2023). For this purpose, an “episode of criminal conduct” means “offenses or a connected series of offenses that are closely related in time, place, and circumstance.” Ind. Code § 35-50-1-2(b) (2023). When the most serious conviction in the “episode of criminal conduct” for which the defendant is being sentenced is a Level 3 felony, the cap on the aggregate sentence for all the convictions arising from that episode is 20 years. Ind. Code § 35-50-1-2(d)(4) (2023).

[8] On appeal, the State again acknowledges that Ginjauma's convictions for attempted aggravated battery and confinement are not crimes of violence as defined by the Sentencing Cap Statute. See Ind. Code § 35-50-1-2(a) (2023). But the State now agrees with Ginjauma that his offenses—arising from his firing at Evelyn inside and outside the home and confining I.G. in the same home, all within the course of about five minutes—constitute a single episode of criminal conduct that triggers the sentencing cap. We appreciate this concession, which is consistent with precedent.

[9] Whether offenses constitute a single episode of criminal conduct is “ ‘a fact-intensive inquiry’ ” to which no “bright-line test” applies. Fix v. State, 186 N.E.3d 1134, 1144 (Ind. 2022) (quoting Schlichter v. State, 779 N.E.2d 1155, 1157 (Ind. 2002)); Waldon v. State, 259 N.E.3d 318, 325 (Ind. Ct. App. 2025). But the victims of each offense need not be identical for the offenses to be considered a single episode of criminal conduct. Yost v. State, 150 N.E.3d 610, 614 (Ind. Ct. App. 2020).

[10] Nor must the offenses have been committed in the identical location. Reed v. State, 856 N.E.2d 1189, 1201 (Ind. 2006) (finding counsel was ineffective for failing to argue that the Sentencing Cap Statute then in effect applied to the defendant's attempted murder convictions arising from shots initially fired at two officers and then fired at only one of the officers from a different, but nearby, location over an approximately five-second period); Henson v. State, 881 N.E.2d 36, 39 (Ind. Ct. App. 2008) (ruling that burglaries on the same morning of neighboring garages owned by different people constituted a single episode of criminal conduct).

[11] Agreeing with the parties, we conclude that Ginjauma's offenses, which began in the same home against two related victims and spanned less than five minutes, constituted an “episode of criminal conduct” to which the Sentencing Cap Statute applies. See Ind. Code § 35-50-1-2(b)-(c) (2023). Accordingly, Ginjauma's 22-year sentence cannot stand because it exceeds the statutory maximum by 2 years. Ind. Code § 35-50-1-2(d)(4) (2023). See Harris v. State, 861 N.E.2d 1182, 1189 (Ind. 2007) (ruling that separate sex acts perpetrated against separate victims within five minutes in the same bed constituted an “episode of criminal conduct” under the Sentencing Cap Statute).

Conclusion

[12] We reverse and remand with instructions that the trial court resentence Ginjauma to an aggregate consecutive term not exceeding 20 years.

FOOTNOTES

1.   Indiana Code § 35-50-1-2(a)(8) (2023) specifies that aggravated battery, but not attempted aggravated battery, is a “crime of violence.”

Weissmann, Judge.

Bailey, J., and Brown, J., concur.