Topeka ? The Kansas Court of Appeals ruled Friday that a Lawrence man will have to serve out his three-year prison sentence for a drug conviction.

Eric Waggoner, who is now 36, pleaded no contest in October 2013 to charges of possession of methamphetamine and marijuana. At sentencing, the Douglas County District Court noted he had been adjudicated as a juvenile in 1993 in Dodge City for the adult equivalent of attempted aggravated assault.

Under sentencing guidelines now in effect, that crime is considered a person felony, which generally results in stiffer sentences. But Waggoner argued that at the time of that conviction Kansas did not distinguish between person and nonperson felonies. The new Kansas sentencing guidelines did not go into effect until later in 1993.

Last year, the Kansas Supreme Court ruled that previous out-of-state convictions that occurred before the new guidelines took effect must be considered nonperson felonies when they are used to determine someone’s criminal history today. Waggoner argued that the same rule should apply to in-state convictions if they predate the new sentencing guidelines.

But a three-judge panel of the state appeals court disagreed, noting that the Supreme Court has since clarified its ruling by noting that it only applies to pre-1993 out-of-state convictions, not in-state convictions.

The opinion was written by Chief Judge Thomas Malone, Judge David Bruns and McPherson County District Judge Richard B. Walker, who was assigned to the case due to a vacancy on the Court of Appeals.