DICKSON, J.
Under Indiana law, a trial court cannot order consecutive habitual offender sentences. Starks, 523 N.E.2d at 737; Weaver v. State, 676 N.E.2d 22, 27 (Ind. Ct. App. 1997) (reversing and remanding defendant’s two consecutive habitual offender sentence enhancements with instructions to resentence defendant as a habitual offender on only one of the convictions), trans. denied. This holds true whether the concurrent enhanced sentence is imposed in a single proceeding or in separate proceedings. Smith, 774 N.E.2d at 1024. In the more than two decades since this Court issued Starks, the relevant portions of the consecutive sentencing statute has remained unchanged. Both stare decisis and legislative acquiescence support this result.
We acknowledge a factual distinction between this case and the precedents just discussed. Unlike those cases, Breaston committed the crime with respect to which the second habitual offender enhancement was imposed after being arrested for, but before being discharged from, the first.
Indiana Code § 35-50-1-2(d) provides that:
If, after being arrested for one (1) crime, a person commits another crime:
(1) before the date the person is discharged from probation, parole, or a term of imprisonment imposed for the first crime; or
(2) while the person is released:
(A) upon the person’s own recognizance; or
(B) on bond;
the terms of imprisonment for the crimes shall be served consecutively, regardless of the order in which the crimes are tried and sentences are imposed.
The Court of Appeals held that this provision mandates that, in the “after being arrested” circumstance, not only the sentences on the instant offenses, but also any habitual offender enhancements imposed with respect thereto, must be imposed consecutively. [Footnote omitted.]
We find this to be a respectable position but ultimately disagree with our colleagues. The language of I.C. § 35-50-1-2(d) was enacted by the Legislature in 1987. 1987 Ind. Acts 3039, Pub. L. No. 330, § 1. [Footnote omitted.] As such, the statute was in its present form when this Court wrote Starks in 1988. As quoted above, Starks held that “[i]n the absence of express statutory authorization for . . . a tacking of habitual offender sentences, there is none.” 523 N.E.2d at 737. We hold that this principle applies in the “after being arrested” circumstance of I.C. § 35-50-1-2(d). The statute does not expressly authorize multiple habitual offender enhancements to be imposed consecutively.
In Starks, we recognized that the “special and distinct dimensions” of the habitual offender enhancement precludes a trial court from ordering habitual offender sentences to run consecutively. The trial court in this case erred when it ordered the habitual offender sentences to run consecutively.
Shepard, C.J., and Dickson, Boehm, and Rucker, JJ., concur.