Donald M. Hillis pled guilty to three counts of child molestation and was given concurrent sentences of twenty years probation on condition that he serve three years in a Department of Corrections the “Department” detention center.1 Thereafter, Hillis was assigned to the Southeastern Probation Center “Southeastern” in Claxton where the Department conducted a medical evaluation and allegedly determined that his medical issues could be more appropriately addressed by his transfer to Ware State Prison.2 Following the transfer, Hillis filed a motion to modify his sentence, contending that his reassignment unlawfully increased the severity of his sentence and asking that he be returned to Southeastern or that he be given alternative probation options, such as home confinement. The trial court denied the motion, and Hillis appeals. We affirm. In two related enumerations, Hillis contends that the trial court erred in denying his motion to modify sentence because his reassignment from Southeastern to Ware State Prison constituted an increase in his sentence. In support of this contention, Hillis points out that the appellate courts of this state have consistently held that “incarceration” and “probation” are mutually exclusive concepts and that converting a defendant’s sentence from probation time to prison time constitutes an unlawful increase in his/her sentence.3 While Hillis correctly cites Blake , Pitts , and Edge in support of this proposition, those cases are inapplicable to this case.
OCGA § 42-8-35.4 authorizes the trial court to sentence a defendant such as Hillis to a program of confinement in a probation detention center and expressly permits the Department to exercise its discretion and transfer a probationer “to other facilities in order to provide needed physical and mental health care or for other reasons essential to the care and supervision of that probationer or as necessary for the effective administration and management of its facilities.”4 The Code section does not require the Department to transfer a probationer to a probation detention center nor does it prohibit the Department from transferring a probationer to a prison . Had the legislature intended to limit the Department’s transfer authority to other probation detention centers it could have done so. Instead, it used the broader term facilities .5 Moreover, Hillis expressly agreed —as a special condition of probation —that the Department may transfer him to other facilities if necessary. The decision to transfer a probationer to another facility is made by the Department and does not involve the trial court.
