Title: In re Coley

State: california

Issuer: California Supreme Court

Document:

1 
Filed 8/30/12 
 
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 
 
In re WILLIE CLIFFORD COLEY 
) 
S185303 
 
) 
 
on Habeas Corpus. 
) 
Ct. App. 2/5 No. B224400 
____________________________________) 
 
California‘s ―Three Strikes‖ law applies to a criminal defendant who is 
currently charged and convicted of a felony and who has previously been 
convicted of one or more serious or violent felonies.  One aspect of the law that 
has proven controversial is that the lengthy punishment prescribed by the law may 
be imposed not only when such a defendant is convicted of another serious or 
violent felony but also when he or she is convicted of any offense that is 
categorized under California law as a felony.  This is so even when the current, so-
called triggering, offense is nonviolent and may be widely perceived as relatively 
minor.  (Pen. Code, §§ 667, subd. (c), 1170.12, subd. (a); see, e.g., People v. 
Carmony (2004) 33 Cal.4th 367, 381 (conc. opn. of Moreno, J., joined by Chin, J.) 
(Carmony I); Vitiello, California’s Three Strikes and We’re Out:  Was Judicial 
Activism California’s Best Hope? (2004) 37 U.C. Davis L.Rev. 1025, 1026 
[―Widely reported Three Strikes cases have involved trivial offenses — such as 
the theft of a bicycle, a slice of pizza, cookies or a bottle of vitamins — that have 
resulted in severe sentences‖].) 
Shortly after the Three Strikes law was enacted, a number of federal 
appellate decisions held that the 25-year-to-life minimum sentence mandated by 
the law for a third-strike felony conviction constituted cruel and unusual 
punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment of the federal Constitution 
 
2 
when imposed upon a defendant whose current felony offense was a 
comparatively minor, nonviolent offense.  (See, e.g., Andrade v. Attorney General 
of State of California (9th Cir. 2001) 270 F.3d 743; Brown v. Mayle (9th Cir. 
2002) 283 F.3d 1019.)  The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari in 
each of those cases,1 however, and in a related case, Ewing v. California (2003) 
538 U.S. 11 (Ewing), the federal high court addressed a cruel and unusual 
punishment challenge to the imposition of a sentence of 25 years to life under 
California‘s Three Strikes law upon a defendant whose triggering offense was the 
nonviolent theft of three golf clubs worth a total of $1,200.  In Ewing, the high 
court concluded, in a five-to-four decision, that, in light of the antirecidivist 
purpose of the Three Strikes law and the defendant‘s criminal history, the sentence 
imposed upon the defendant in that case was not unconstitutional.  The lead 
opinion in Ewing (authored by Justice O‘Connor), however, did not eliminate the 
possibility that some triggering offense, although designated a felony under 
California law, might be so minor and unrelated to the goal of deterring recidivism 
that a 25-year-to-life sentence would be ―grossly disproportionate‖ and constitute 
cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment, even when imposed 
upon a defendant with a serious criminal record. 
Subsequently, in People v. Carmony (2005) 127 Cal.App.4th 1066 
(Carmony II), a panel of the California Court of Appeal, Third Appellate District, 
concluded in a two-to-one decision that a 25-year-to-life sentence under the Three 
Strikes law constituted cruel and/or unusual punishment, in violation of the federal 
and state Constitutions, as applied to a defendant whose triggering offense was the 
                                              
1  
See Lockyer v. Andrade (2002) 535 U.S. 969, certiorari granted, reversed 
(2003) 538 U.S. 63; Mayle v. Brown (2003) 538 U.S. 901, certiorari granted, 
appellate court judgment vacated, remanded. 
 
3 
failure to annually update his sex offender registration within five working days of 
his birthday.  The defendant in Carmony II had properly registered as a sex 
offender at his current address one month before his birthday, had continued to 
reside at the same address throughout the relevant period, had remained in contact 
with his parole agent, and was arrested at that same address by his parole agent 
one month after his birthday.  Observing that ―because defendant did not evade or 
intend to evade law enforcement officers, his offense was the most technical and 
harmless violation of the registration law we have seen‖ (127 Cal.App.4th at 
p. 1078), the majority opinion in Carmony II concluded that, notwithstanding the 
defendant‘s record of serious prior offenses, the imposition of a 25-year-to-life 
sentence was grossly disproportionate to the gravity of the defendant‘s offenses 
and violated the constitutional prohibition of cruel and/or unusual punishment.  
Thereafter, a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth 
Circuit, addressing a cruel and unusual punishment claim in a factual setting very 
similar to that presented in Carmony II, reached the same conclusion as the 
California appellate court in Carmony II.  (Gonzalez v. Duncan (9th Cir. 2008) 
551 F.3d 875.) 
In the present habeas corpus proceeding, a panel of the Court of Appeal, 
Second Appellate District, Division Five, considering the constitutionality of a 25-
year-to-life sentence imposed upon a defendant who also was convicted of failing 
to update his sex offender registration within five working days of his birthday, 
expressly disagreed with the analysis and conclusion of the appellate court in 
Carmony II and held that the punishment was constitutionally permissible.  In 
light of the conflict in the two Court of Appeal decisions, we granted review. 
We agree with the Court of Appeal in the present case that imposition of a 
25-year-to-life sentence upon petitioner in this matter does not constitute cruel and 
unusual punishment in violation of the federal Constitution, but, for the reasons 
 
4 
discussed more fully hereafter, we conclude that we need not and should not rest 
our holding upon a determination that the Court of Appeal opinion in Carmony II 
was wrongly decided.  The conduct of petitioner in this case, as found by the trial 
court, is clearly distinguishable in a significant respect from the conduct of the 
defendant in Carmony II.  Unlike the defendant in Carmony II, who had very 
recently registered at his current address and who the Court of Appeal found ―did 
not evade or intend to evade law enforcement officers‖ (Carmony II, supra, 127 
Cal.App.4th at p. 1078), the trial court in this case, in refusing to strike any of 
petitioner‘s prior convictions and in imposing a 25-year-to-life sentence under the 
Three Strikes law, found that petitioner‘s triggering offense was not simply a 
minor or technical oversight by a defendant who had made a good faith effort to 
comply with the sex offender registration law.  Rather, the court found that 
petitioner had never registered as a sex offender at his current address and had 
knowingly and intentionally refused to comply with his obligations under the sex 
offender registration law. 
Petitioner‘s conduct, as found by the trial court, demonstrated that, despite 
the significant punishment petitioner had incurred as a result of his prior serious 
offenses, he was still intentionally unwilling to comply with an important legal 
obligation, and thus his triggering criminal conduct bore both a rational and 
substantial relationship to the antirecidivist purposes of the Three Strikes law.  
Given that relationship and the extremely serious and heinous nature of 
petitioner‘s prior criminal history, we conclude that, under Ewing, supra, 
538 U.S. 11, the imposition of a 25-year-to-life sentence does not constitute cruel 
and unusual punishment under the circumstances of this case.  In light of the facts 
underlying the offense in this case as found by the trial court, we need not decide 
whether the Eighth Amendment prohibits the imposition of a 25-year-to-life 
sentence under the Three Strikes law in a factual situation like that in Carmony II, 
 
5 
in which a defendant had properly registered his current residential address and 
demonstrated a good faith attempt to comply with the sex offender registration law 
but due to a negligent oversight had failed to update his registration within five 
working days of his birthday. 
I.  Facts and Proceedings Below 
Prior to the commission of his latest offense, petitioner Willie Clifford 
Coley had a lengthy and very significant criminal history.  In 1978, when he was 
18 or 19 years old, petitioner was convicted of burglary in Florida and was 
sentenced to 15 years in state prison.  He was released from prison in Florida in 
1986, and thereafter moved to California.  In 1988, petitioner was convicted in 
California of three serious and violent felony offenses — voluntary manslaughter 
(Pen. Code, § 192),2 robbery (§ 211), and acting in concert to aid and abet the 
commission of rape (§ 264.1) — and was sentenced to 20 years in state prison.3 
                                              
2  
Unless otherwise indicated, further statutory references are to the Penal 
Code. 
3 
In its opinion below, the Court of Appeal described the circumstances 
relating to petitioner‘s 1988 offenses:  ―The facts underlying petitioner‘s 
manslaughter, rape, and robbery convictions bear mentioning as they are 
particularly callous.  The manslaughter case arose out of a dispute between 
petitioner‘s roommate and a woman.  Petitioner‘s roommate believed the woman 
had stolen some of the roommate‘s cocaine.  The roommate struggled with the 
woman and called out to petitioner to lend assistance.  Petitioner held the woman 
down as his roommate attempted to examine the woman‘s rectum and vagina for 
the missing cocaine.  During the struggle, the woman was choked and fell 
unconscious.  The two men tied an electrical cord around her hands, feet, and 
neck.  Petitioner and his roommate went to sleep and, when they awoke, realized 
the woman was dead.  Because she had defecated, they bathed her.  The men cut 
the woman‘s fingernails in an attempt to destroy evidence under her fingernails 
(i.e., human skin) indicating she had scratched petitioner‘s roommate.  After doing 
so, they moved the woman to an inoperable freezer where her body was stored. 
 
―Four months after the killing, petitioner and his roommate committed rape 
and robbery.  They entered a woman‘s residence at 3:00 a.m. while she was 
 
(footnote continued on next page) 
 
6 
After having been released on parole and subsequently returned to prison 
for parole violations on three prior occasions,4 petitioner was again released from 
prison on parole on January 7, 2001.  As a result of his 1988 conviction of aiding 
and abetting rape, petitioner was required to register as a sex offender for the 
remainder of his life.  (§ 290, subds. (b), (c).)  In August 2001, petitioner was 
arrested and subsequently convicted of violating a provision of California‘s sex 
offender registration statutes and was sentenced to 25 years to life under the Three 
Strikes law.  Petitioner challenges the constitutionality of this sentence in the 
present habeas corpus proceeding.   
Because there is a dispute regarding the nature of petitioner‘s conduct 
underlying his most recent conviction — a dispute that bears directly upon the 
                                                                                                                                                              
(footnote continued from previous page) 
 
sleeping.  She was pulled from her bed, her hands were bound, and tape was 
placed across her mouth.  Petitioner‘s roommate raped the woman while petitioner 
stood guard. 
 
―Petitioner‘s roommate then ordered the woman to call another man and 
invite him to the residence.  When the man arrived, petitioner‘s roommate invited 
him inside and took him to the bedroom where petitioner was keeping the woman.  
Petitioner‘s roommate put a knife to the man‘s throat, threatened to kill him, and 
took his wallet. 
 
―The probation officer responsible for drafting the probation report prior to 
sentencing on these offenses wrote:  ‗It is absolutely incomprehensible to 
understand how [petitioner] and [his roommate] could continue living in an 
apartment with a body decomposing in a freezer and dripping fluid on the kitchen 
floor.‘  The probation officer indicated petitioner was ‗a man without a 
conscience‘ and that petitioner ‗show[ed] no remorse for his behavior and it is 
expected that he will re-involve himself in criminal behavior when he is released 
from State Prison.‘  He concluded, petitioner was ‗an extreme danger to the 
community.‘ ‖ 
4  
Petitioner‘s prior parole violations were based on positive narcotics testing 
for cocaine, PCP, and methamphetamine, and on absconding from parole by 
traveling to Florida without notice to, or permission of, his parole officer. 
 
7 
cruel and unusual punishment claim before us — we describe in some detail the 
relevant evidence presented at trial as well as additional facts disclosed by the 
probation report and other documents that were before the trial court. 
As noted, petitioner was released from prison on parole on January 7, 2001.  
Although required to do so, petitioner failed to contact his parole officer upon his 
release, and the former Board of Prison Terms promptly summarily suspended his 
parole on January 10, 2001.  Petitioner‘s parole officer was unaware of petitioner‘s 
whereabouts, however, and petitioner was not immediately apprehended. 
In addition to being required to contact his parole officer upon his release 
from prison, petitioner was required to register as a sex offender within five days 
of his release from prison.  Evidence at trial indicated that the Department of 
Justice had no record that, after his release from prison on January 7, 2001, 
petitioner had registered as a sex offender at any location within the state. 
In August 2001, law enforcement officers conducted a general ―parole 
sweep‖ in the Lancaster/Palmdale area for parolees who were suspected of having 
outstanding parole violations.  As part of the sweep, officers discovered that 
petitioner had recently filed a document with the Department of Motor Vehicles 
listing a residential address in the City of Palmdale.  The officers went to the new 
address and arrested petitioner at that address on August 23, 2001. 
The district attorney thereafter charged petitioner with two felony offenses: 
(1) failure to register as a sex offender upon arrival in a jurisdiction (§ 290, former 
subd. (a)(1)(A), now §§ 290, subd. (b), 290.013, 290.015) and (2) failure to update 
his sex offender registration within five working days of his birthday (which for 
petitioner fell on May 22, 2001) (§ 290, former subd. (a)(1)(D), now § 290.012).5  
                                              
5  
In 2007, Penal Code section 290 was repealed and reenacted as sections 
290 to 290.023.  (Stats. 2007, ch. 579, §§ 7-31.)   
 
8 
The information also alleged that petitioner had sustained three prior serious or 
violent felony convictions within the meaning of the Three Strikes law, bringing 
petitioner within the reach of the increased punishment prescribed by that law. 
At trial, the prosecution presented a number of witnesses, as well as 
documentary evidence, establishing that petitioner had been personally and 
repeatedly advised of the sex offender registration requirements imposed by the 
sex offender registration statutes, including the obligation to register as a sex 
offender with the local sheriff‘s department within five days of arrival in a city, 
and, independently, the obligation to update the registration every year within five 
working days of his birthday.6  The prosecution‘s evidence also established that 
after being released from prison in January 2001, petitioner had moved in with his 
girlfriend and her children who resided in the City of Palmdale and had continued 
to reside there until he was arrested in August 2001.  As noted above, the 
prosecution also presented evidence that records from the Department of Justice 
indicated that petitioner had not registered as a sex offender or updated his sex 
offender registration after his release from prison in January 2001. 
A clerk/technician employed by the Los Angeles County Sheriff‘s 
Department station in Palmdale testified that she was the only person who 
registered sex offenders at the Palmdale sheriff‘s department and had no record of 
                                              
6  
Both petitioner‘s parole officer and a Lancaster sheriff‘s department clerk 
who first registered petitioner as a sex offender in October 1998 testified that they 
had expressly advised petitioner that he was required to update his registration 
within five days of his birthday every year, in addition to being required to register 
upon a change of address.  The Lancaster clerk also testified that a registration 
form given to petitioner when he registered with her on April 12, 1999, explicitly 
stated that petitioner‘s next annual date for registration would be May 22, 1999, 
because his date of birth was May 22, 1959, and that she had specifically shown 
that item to petitioner.   
 
9 
having ever registered petitioner, that she was positive that she had not registered 
him, and that she did not believe that she had ever seen petitioner.  On cross-
examination, defense counsel questioned the quality of the technician‘s 
recordkeeping and computer skills, implying that she may have been mistaken 
regarding not having registered petitioner and may have failed properly to enter 
his registration in the department‘s computer database. 
One of the law enforcement officers who arrested petitioner at his Palmdale 
residence in August 2001 testified that, at the time of his arrest, petitioner, after 
being advised of his constitutional rights, acknowledged that he had lived at that 
address in Palmdale since January 2001 and told the officer that he (petitioner) had 
failed to register or to contact his parole officer because ―he wanted to try to get by 
through life without contact with the sheriff‘s department or parole.‖  Another 
officer testified that he had found numerous personal papers of petitioner in the 
drawer of the nightstand in petitioner‘s bedroom, including a document from the 
Department of Motor Vehicles; the papers found in the drawer did not include any 
document indicating that petitioner had in fact registered as a sex offender at the 
Palmdale sheriff‘s department upon his release from prison.   
Petitioner testified in his own defense.  Petitioner acknowledged that he 
knew he was required to register as a sex offender upon his release from prison 
and testified that he had in fact registered as a sex offender on January 12, 2001, at 
the Palmdale sheriff‘s department, had received a receipt reflecting that 
registration, and had put the receipt in the drawer in his nightstand where ―all my 
paperwork goes.‖  In the course of his testimony, petitioner provided a description 
of the exterior and interior of the building housing the sheriff‘s department, 
identified the clerk/technician employed by the Palmdale sheriff‘s department who 
had testified for the prosecution as the individual who had handled his registration 
on January 12, 2001, and purported to describe the registration process.  Petitioner 
 
10 
further testified that although he knew that he had to register when he was released 
from prison and when he moved, he believed that he only had to register once a 
year, and thought that because he had registered with the Palmdale sheriff‘s 
department in January 2001 he did not have to register again until his birthday the 
following year (that is, until May 2002); he admitted that he had not updated his 
registration within five days of his birthday in May 2001.  On cross-examination, 
petitioner acknowledged that although he believed that the alleged receipt of his 
asserted January 12, 2001 sex offender registration at the Palmdale sheriff‘s 
department was in his nightstand drawer when he was arrested in August 2001, he 
had not informed the arresting officers that he had in fact registered as a sex 
offender in January 2001 or that a receipt reflecting that registration was in his 
nightstand drawer.   
In rebuttal, the prosecution recalled the Palmdale clerk/technician who had 
testified earlier.  The technician testified that petitioner‘s description of both the 
exterior and interior of the sheriff‘s department building was inaccurate in many 
very substantial respects, including the layout of the interior of the building and 
the size, shape, and layout of the room in which she worked and in which she 
registered sex offenders.  The prosecution also recalled one of the arresting 
officers, who testified that although he informed petitioner that he was being 
arrested for failure to register as a sex offender, petitioner had not offered to 
provide any type of documentation to prove that he had in fact registered.   
At the conclusion of the trial and after several hours of deliberation, the 
jury returned a verdict acquitting petitioner of the charge of failing to register upon 
 
11 
his arrival in the jurisdiction, but convicting him of failing to update his 
registration within five working days of his birthday.7 
Prior to the sentencing hearing, petitioner admitted that he had been 
convicted of the three prior serious or violent felonies charged in the information 
(voluntary manslaughter, robbery, and aiding and abetting rape), and requested 
that the trial court, on its own motion, strike at least two of the prior convictions in 
the interest of justice.  In support of that request, petitioner emphasized the 
assertedly minor and nonaggravated nature of the triggering offense of which he 
had been convicted, characterizing his current criminal conduct as a mere ―nonact‖ 
and further arguing that, as applied to him, the punishment prescribed by the Three 
Strikes law would constitute cruel and unusual punishment.   
In ruling upon the request to strike priors, the trial court, in addition to 
reviewing petitioner‘s lengthy and serious prior criminal record and noting that the 
offense in this case occurred only a few months after petitioner‘s release on parole, 
stated with regard to the facts of the current offense:  ―With respect to the 
defendant‘s testimony that he went down to the Palmdale station and registered, 
                                              
7  
In his opening brief, petitioner asserts that his failure to update his 
registration at the time of his birthday ―arose from his confusion over having to 
register the same address twice during the same year.‖  The jury was specifically 
instructed, however, that in order to prove this offense, the prosecution was 
obligated to prove, among other matters, that ―[t]he defendant actually knew of his 
duty to update his registration on an annual basis, within five (5) working days of 
his birthday, with the local law enforcement agency in the city in which he resided 
. . . .‖  Thus, in convicting petitioner of this offense, the jury necessarily found 
beyond a reasonable doubt that defendant knew of his obligation to annually 
update his registration within five days of his birthday but failed to do so.  (See 
People v. Barker (2004) 34 Cal.4th 345, 350-358 [holding that a violation of the 
sex offender registration statutes requires actual knowledge of the duty to register 
but that one may violate the statute simply by forgetting to register after having 
been advised of the duty to do so].)   
 
12 
and that for some reason the paperwork was lost or not completed, or the registrar 
failed to input his registration into the computer.  I don‘t know if the jury accepted 
that testimony or not, but the court did not believe that testimony for a moment.  
So my review of evidence supports the fact that the only time that the defendant 
ever made an effort to register was either when he was in prison for a parole 
violation, or was taken to register by his parole agent.  The defendant is well 
aware of his obligation to register.  He had been told about it on a number of 
occasions.  He is the one that chose to risk the sanctions for having failed to 
register.‖  (Italics added.)   
Finding that ―[m]y review of the record indicates to me that [petitioner] has 
consistently refused to register as a sex offender,‖ the trial court refused to strike 
any of petitioner‘s prior serious or violent felony convictions and sentenced 
defendant as a third strike defendant, imposing a 25-year-to-life sentence under the 
Three Strikes law. 
In the course of its sentencing ruling, the trial court expressly distinguished 
the facts of petitioner‘s current offense from the facts involved in People v. Cluff 
(2001) 87 Cal.App.4th 991, a then recent Court of Appeal decision in which the 
appellate court concluded that the trial court had abused its discretion in refusing 
to strike prior convictions in a Three Strikes case in which the defendant‘s 
triggering offense was also a failure to update his sex registration within five days 
of his birthday.  The trial court in the present case stated in this regard:  ―With 
respect to the Court of Appeal‘s decision in People v. Cluff . . . , I think that is an 
appropriate disposition under the facts of that case, but the facts of this case appear 
to me to be in stark contrast to those in the Cluff case, because in the Cluff case 
that defendant made previous efforts to register and did register on previous 
occasions.‖   
 
13 
On appeal, the appellate court affirmed petitioner‘s conviction and 
sentence, specifically rejecting claims that (1) the trial court had abused its 
discretion in failing to strike two prior serious or violent felony convictions and 
(2) that the 25-year-to-life sentence imposed upon petitioner constituted cruel and 
unusual punishment.  (People v. Coley (May 13, 2003, B158564) [nonpub. opn.], 
review den. July 23, 2003, S116799.) 
Several years after the affirmance of petitioner‘s conviction and sentence 
became final, the Court of Appeal in Carmony II, supra, 127 Cal.App.4th 1066, 
concluded that the imposition of a 25-year-to-life sentence under the Three Strikes 
law upon a defendant who had been convicted of failing to annually update his sex 
registration within five days of his birthday violated the prohibition against cruel 
and/or unusual punishment contained in the federal and California Constitutions.  
We discuss the Carmony II decision below (post, at pp. 24-30). 
Thereafter, petitioner filed the present habeas corpus proceeding, 
contending that, as in Carmony II, supra, 127 Cal.App.4th 1066, his 25-year-to-
life sentence violated the prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment set forth in 
the Eighth Amendment of the United States Constitution.  Although, as noted, 
petitioner had raised an Eighth Amendment challenge to his sentence in his direct 
appeal and that claim had been rejected on appeal, and although a habeas corpus 
petition generally may not rely upon an issue that has been raised and rejected on 
appeal (see, e.g., In re Waltreus (1965) 62 Cal.2d 218, 225), California decisions 
have recognized an exception to this general rule in instances in which there has 
been a subsequent change in the law in petitioner‘s favor.  (See, e.g., In re Harris 
(1993) 5 Cal.4th 813, 841.)  Because the decision in Carmony II was decided after 
petitioner‘s appeal had become final, we determined that petitioner‘s Eighth 
Amendment claim was not procedurally barred, and we issued an order to show 
cause returnable before the Court of Appeal, with directions to consider the 
 
14 
question whether petitioner was entitled to relief in light of the decision in 
Carmony II.   
After briefing and argument, the Court of Appeal addressed petitioner‘s 
Eighth Amendment claim on the merits, concluding that the Court of Appeal 
decision in Carmony II, supra, 127 Cal.App.4th 1066, was wrongly decided and 
that petitioner‘s 25-year-to-life sentence did not violate the Eighth Amendment of 
the federal Constitution.  In light of the conflict between the Court of Appeal 
opinion in this case and the Court of Appeal decision in Carmony II, we granted 
review.8 
 
II. Review of Relevant United States Supreme Court 
Eighth Amendment Decisions 
The Eighth Amendment of the United States Constitution provides in full: 
―Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and 
unusual punishments inflicted.‖ 
Although it has always been uniformly accepted that the federal cruel and 
unusual punishment clause prohibits the infliction of certain modes of punishment 
(for example, inherently barbaric punishments such as ―punishments of torture‖ 
                                              
8  
In his habeas corpus petition, petitioner contended only that his sentence 
violated the cruel and unusual punishment clause of the Eighth Amendment of the 
federal Constitution, and did not raise any claim under the California Constitution.  
As a consequence, the Court of Appeal expressly limited its decision to a ruling on 
the Eighth Amendment question, and the petition for review sought review only of 
that federal constitutional issue.  Although in subsequent briefing in this court 
petitioner has argued that his sentence also violates the cruel or unusual 
punishment clause of the California Constitution, because the habeas corpus 
petition itself was limited to the federal constitutional issue and the Court of 
Appeal expressly confined its consideration and decision to that issue, we 
conclude that it is appropriate to limit our consideration and decision to the federal 
constitutional claim. 
 
15 
(see, e.g., Wilkerson v. Utah (1879) 99 U.S. 130, 136)), there has been some 
dispute, particularly outside the context of capital punishment, whether the 
provision also prohibits the imposition of punishment that is ―excessive‖ or 
―disproportionate‖ in relation to the offense or offenses for which the punishment 
is imposed.  Over the past two decades, several high court justices have expressed 
doubts whether the Eighth Amendment‘s cruel and unusual punishment clause was 
intended to grant courts any authority to evaluate the length of prison sentences 
enacted by legislative bodies to determine whether such sentences are excessive or 
disproportionate in light of the offense or offenses for which the sentences are 
imposed.  (See Harmelin v. Michigan (1991) 501 U.S. 957, 962-994 [separate opn. 
of Scalia, J., joined in relevant part by Rehnquist, C.J.] (Harmelin); Ewing, supra, 
538 U.S. at pp. 31-32 [conc. opn. of Scalia, J.]; Ewing, at p. 32 [conc. opn. of 
Thomas, J.].)  A majority of the high court, however, has consistently rejected this 
limited view of the scope of the federal cruel and unusual punishment clause, and 
it is now firmly established that ―[t]he concept of proportionality is central to the 
Eighth Amendment,‖ and that ―[e]mbodied in the Constitution‘s ban on cruel and 
unusual punishments is the ‗precept of justice that punishment for crime should be 
graduated and proportioned to [the] offense.‘  [Citation.]‖  (Graham v. Florida 
(2010) 560 U.S. ___, ___ [176 L.Ed.2d 825, 835] (Graham); see also Solem v. 
Helm (1983) 463 U.S. 277, 284-292 (Solem); Harmelin, supra, at pp. 996-1001, 
997 [conc. opn. of Kennedy, J., joined by O‘Connor and Souter, JJ.] [Eighth 
Amend. encompasses ―a narrow proportionality principle‖ that ―also applies to 
noncapital sentences‖]; Harmelin, at pp. 1009-1021 [dis. opn. of White, J., joined 
by Blackmun and Stevens, JJ.]; Harmelin, at p. 1027 [dis. opn. of Marshall, J.]; 
Ewing, supra, at pp. 20-24 [lead opn. of O‘Connor, J., joined by Rehnquist, C.J. 
and Kennedy, J.]; Ewing, at pp. 32-35 [dis. opn. of Stevens, J., joined by Souter, 
Ginsburg, and Breyer, JJ.].) 
 
16 
In past cases, the high court has addressed the claim that a sentence of 
imprisonment for a term of years is unconstitutionally excessive in a variety of 
contexts, but in view of the circumstances of the present case the most pertinent of 
the high court‘s past proportionality decisions are those that have considered the 
validity of lengthy terms of imprisonment imposed under ―habitual offender‖ or 
recidivist sentencing provisions analogous to California‘s Three Strikes law.  As 
we shall see, each of these cases was decided by a closely divided court and 
illustrates the particularly difficult nature of line drawing in this context. 
In Rummel v. Estelle (1980) 445 U.S. 263 (Rummel), the initial case in this 
line of decisions, the defendant had been sentenced to a term of life in prison with 
the possibility of parole under a Texas statute that mandated a life sentence for any 
person convicted of a third felony offense.  In Rummel itself, the defendant‘s 
triggering offense was a conviction for ―felony theft,‖ based upon the defendant‘s 
conduct of ―obtaining $120.75 by false pretenses.‖  (445 U.S. at p. 266.)  The 
defendant had two prior felony convictions, the first for ―fraudulent use of a credit 
card to obtain $80 worth of goods or services‖ (id. at p. 265) and the second 
for ―passing a forged check in the amount of $28.36.‖  (Ibid.)  In a five-to-four 
decision, the court in Rummel rejected the defendant‘s contention that a sentence 
of life imprisonment with the possibility of parole constituted cruel and unusual 
punishment as applied to the circumstances of his case.  In response to a criticism 
advanced by the dissenting opinion in that case, the court in Rummel 
acknowledged that a sentence for a term of years might be unconstitutionally 
disproportionate in a very extreme case — for example, ―if a legislature made 
overtime parking a felony punishable by life imprisonment‖ (445 U.S. at p. 274, 
fn. 11) — but the court concluded that the facts before it did not constitute such an 
extreme case.  The court held that ―[h]aving twice imprisoned him for felonies, 
Texas was entitled to place upon Rummel the onus of one who is simply unable to 
 
17 
bring his conduct within the social norms prescribed by the criminal law of the 
State.‖  (Id. at p. 284.) 
In Rummel, four justices dissented in an opinion authored by Justice 
Powell.  (Rummel, supra, 445 U.S. at pp. 285-307.)  The dissent emphasized that 
each of the defendant‘s felony convictions was for a nonviolent theft offense and 
that in total defendant had unlawfully defrauded others of only $230.  The dissent 
concluded that ―[t]he sentence imposed upon the petitioner would be viewed as 
grossly unjust by virtually every layman and lawyer‖ and that ―objective criteria 
clearly establish that a mandatory life sentence for defrauding persons of about 
$230 crosses any rationally drawn line separating punishment that lawfully may be 
imposed from that which is proscribed by the Eighth Amendment.‖  (445 U.S. at 
p. 307 (dis. opn. of Powell, J.).) 
Just three years after the decision in Rummel, supra, 445 U.S. 263, the 
United States Supreme Court, with Justice Powell now writing for a five-judge 
majority, reached a contrary conclusion in Solem, supra, 463 U.S. 277.  In Solem, 
the defendant had a prior criminal record of relatively minor, nonviolent crimes 
and was convicted in the current prosecution of a felony offense for ―uttering a ‗no 
account‘ check for $100.‖  (463 U.S. at p. 281.)  In Solem, however, the triggering 
offense was the defendant‘s seventh felony conviction, and the trial court 
sentenced him under South Dakota‘s recidivist sentencing provision to a term of 
life imprisonment, a term which, under South Dakota law, was not subject to 
parole. 
In analyzing whether the defendant‘s sentence violated the prohibition on 
cruel and unusual punishment set forth in the Eighth Amendment, the court in 
Solem first reviewed the history of the Eighth Amendment and concluded ―as a 
matter of principle that a criminal sentence must be proportionate to the crime for 
which the defendant has been convicted.‖  (Solem, supra, 463 U.S. at p. 290.)  At 
 
18 
the same time, the court in Solem cautioned that ―[r]eviewing courts, of course, 
should grant substantial deference to the broad authority that legislatures 
necessarily possess in determining the types and limits of punishments for crimes, 
as well as to the discretion that trial courts possess in sentencing convicted 
criminals‖ (ibid.), and further emphasized that ―a court‘s proportionality analysis 
under the Eighth Amendment should be guided by objective criteria, including 
(i) the gravity of the offense and the harshness of the penalty; (ii) the sentences 
imposed on other criminals in the same jurisdiction; and (iii) the sentences 
imposed for commission of the same crime in other jurisdictions.‖  (Solem, supra, 
at p. 292.)  Reviewing the sentence in question under these criteria, the majority in 
Solem determined (1) that the defendant‘s triggering offense ―was ‗one of the most 
passive felonies a person could commit‘ ‖ (id. at p. 296), (2) that ―[h]is prior 
offenses, although classified as felonies, were all relatively minor [and] 
nonviolent‖ (id. at pp. 296-297), (3) that his sentence — life without the 
possibility of parole — was ―far more severe‖ than the sentence considered in 
Rummel (Solem, supra, at p. 297) and was the same sentence that South Dakota 
imposed for much more serious offenses and upon much more culpable habitual 
offenders (id. at pp. 298-299), and, finally, (4) that it appeared that the defendant‘s 
sentence was more severe than the sentence that would have been imposed upon a 
similarly situated defendant in any other state.  (Id. at pp. 299-300.)  Under these 
circumstances, the court in Solem concluded that the defendant‘s sentence ―is 
significantly disproportionate to his crime, and is therefore prohibited by the 
Eighth Amendment.‖  (Id. at p. 303.)  The court in Solem, however, did not 
purport to overrule Rummel, expressly noting that the facts before it were 
distinguishable from Rummel because ―[w]hereas Rummel was eligible for a 
reasonably early parole, Helm, at age 36, was sentenced to life with no possibility 
of parole.‖  (Solem, supra, at p. 303, fn. 32.) 
 
19 
Four justices dissented in Solem, concluding that the majority opinion in 
that case was irreconcilable with the reasoning and conclusion in Rummel.  
Although the dissent acknowledged ―that in extraordinary cases — such as a life 
sentence for overtime parking — it might be permissible for a court to decide 
whether the sentence is grossly disproportionate to the crime‖ (Solem, supra, 463 
U.S. at p. 311, fn. 3 (dis. opn. of Burger, C.J.)), it concluded that given the 
defendant‘s lengthy criminal history the sentence imposed in Solem did not reflect 
―such an extraordinary case that reasonable men could not differ about the 
appropriateness of this punishment.‖  (Ibid.) 
In 2003, 20 years after the decision in Solem, the Supreme Court next 
addressed a cruel and unusual punishment challenge to a sentence imposed under a 
recidivist sentencing statute in Ewing, supra, 538 U.S. 11 — a case that, as we 
have already noted, arose under California‘s Three Strikes law.  In Ewing, the 
defendant had a lengthy prior criminal history that included one conviction of 
robbery (in which the defendant had threatened a victim with a knife) as well as 
numerous convictions for burglary, theft, and unlawful possession of drug 
paraphernalia and a firearm.  (See 538 U.S. at pp. 18-19.)  After serving several 
years in prison, the defendant in Ewing was paroled in 1999.  Ten months later, he 
stole three golf clubs, each priced at $399, from a pro shop at a golf course, 
walking out of the shop with the clubs concealed in his pants leg.  An employee 
who saw him limp out of the shop telephoned the police and the defendant was 
apprehended shortly thereafter in the golf course parking lot. 
In response to his most recent offense, the prosecution charged the 
defendant in Ewing under the Three Strikes law, alleging that the defendant had 
previously been convicted of four serious or violent felonies (robbery and three 
burglaries) and seeking the 25-year-to-life sentence authorized by the Three 
Strikes law.  After being convicted of one count of felony grand theft — an 
 
20 
offense treated as a ―wobbler‖ under California law (that is, an offense that may be 
punished as either a felony or a misdemeanor) — based on his theft of the three 
golf clubs, the defendant asked the trial court to reduce the grand theft conviction 
to a misdemeanor or, alternatively, to strike some or all of his prior convictions, so 
as to avoid a third strike sentence.  The trial court declined to reduce the grand 
theft conviction to a misdemeanor or to strike any of the prior serious or violent 
felony convictions, and sentenced the defendant to the 25-year-to-life sentence 
authorized by the Three Strikes law. 
On appeal, the defendant in Ewing contended that imposition of a 25-year-
to-life sentence for a conviction based on the nonviolent theft of three golf clubs 
constituted cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment.  
After the California Court of Appeal rejected the contention and affirmed the 
conviction and sentence and this court denied a petition for review, the United 
States Supreme Court granted certiorari and ultimately rejected defendant‘s cruel 
and unusual punishment claim by a five-to-four vote. 
In Ewing, the lead opinion, authored by Justice O‘Connor (and joined by 
Rehnquist, C.J. and Kennedy, J.), after briefly reviewing the decisions in Rummel, 
Solem, and two other decisions that addressed cruel and unusual punishment 
challenges to lengthy noncapital sentences that had been imposed outside the 
antirecidivist context (see Hutto v. Davis (1982) 454 U.S. 370 [rejecting Eighth 
Amend. challenge to 40-year sentence for distributing a small quantity of 
marijuana]; Harmelin, supra, 501 U.S. 957 [rejecting Eighth Amend. challenge to 
life-without-parole sentence for possessing over 650 gm. (1.5 lb.) cocaine]), 
proceeded to analyze the merits of the cruel and unusual punishment claim in 
Ewing using the approach that had been articulated and applied by Justice 
Kennedy in his concurring opinion in Harmelin.  (See Harmelin, supra, at 
pp. 996-1005 (conc. opn. of Kennedy, J.).)  As described in the high court‘s more 
 
21 
recent proportionality decision in Graham, supra, 176 L.Ed.2d 825, Justice 
Kennedy‘s concurring opinion in Harmelin had synthesized the court‘s prior 
decisions in this realm as embodying the general rule ―that the Eighth Amendment 
contains a ‗narrow proportionality principle,‘ that ‗does not require strict 
proportionality between crime and sentence‘ but rather ‗forbids only extreme 
sentences that are ―grossly disproportionate‖ to the crime.‘ ‖  (Graham, supra, 176 
L.Ed.2d at p. 836.)  Justice Kennedy‘s concurring opinion in Harmelin further 
went on to explain how that principle is to be applied.  As summarized in Graham, 
under the approach set forth in the Harmelin concurrence, ―[a] court must begin by 
comparing the gravity of the offense and severity of the sentence.  [Citation.]  ‗[I]n 
the rare case in which [this] threshold comparison . . . leads to an inference of 
gross disproportionality‘ the court should then compare the defendant‘s sentence 
with the sentences received by other offenders in the same jurisdiction and with 
the sentences imposed for the same crime in other jurisdictions.  [Citation.]  If this 
comparative analysis ‗validate[s] an initial judgment that [the] sentence is grossly 
disproportionate,‘ the sentence is cruel and unusual.  [Citation.]‖  (Graham, supra, 
at p. 836.) 
Applying this analysis in Ewing, Justice O‘Connor‘s opinion turned first to 
an evaluation of the gravity of the defendant‘s offense compared to the severity of 
the penalty.  (Ewing, supra, 538 U.S. at p. 28.)  The opinion initially observed that 
―[e]ven standing alone, Ewing‘s theft‖ of nearly $1,200 worth of merchandise 
―should not be taken lightly.  His crime was certainly not ‗one of the most passive 
felonies a person could commit.‘ ‖  (Ibid.)  The opinion further emphasized, 
however, that ―[i]n weighing the gravity of Ewing‘s offense, we must place on the 
scales not only his current felony, but also his long history of felony recidivism.  
Any other approach would fail to accord proper deference to the policy judgments 
that find expression in the legislature‘s choice of sanctions.  In imposing a three 
 
22 
strikes sentence, the State‘s interest is not merely punishing the offense of 
conviction, or the ‗triggering‘ offense:  ‗[I]t is in addition the interest . . . in 
dealing in a harsher manner with those who by repeated criminal acts have shown 
that they are simply incapable of conforming to the norms of society as established 
by its criminal law.‘ ‖  (Id. at p. 29, italics added.) 
Although Justice O‘Connor‘s opinion in Ewing recognized that the 25-year-
to-life sentence imposed upon Ewing ―is a long one‖ (Ewing, supra, 538 U.S. at 
p. 30), the opinion concluded that the sentence was justified ―by the State‘s public-
safety interest in incapacitating and deterring recidivist felons, and amply 
supported by [Ewing‘s] own long, serious criminal record.‖  (Id. at pp. 29-30.)  
The opinion explained that Ewing‘s sentence ―reflects a rational legislative 
judgment, entitled to deference, that offenders who have committed serious or 
violent felonies and who continue to commit felonies must be incapacitated.  The 
State of California ‗was entitled to place upon [Ewing] the onus of one who is 
simply unable to bring his conduct within the social norms prescribed by the 
criminal law of the State.‘ ‖  (Id. at p. 30, quoting Rummel, supra, 445 U.S. at 
p. 284.) 
Determining that ―Ewing‘s is not ‗the rare case in which a threshold 
comparison of the crime committed and the sentence imposed leads to an 
inference of gross disproportionality‘ ‖ (Ewing, supra, 538 U.S. at p. 30), Justice 
O‘Connor‘s opinion concluded, ―Ewing‘s sentence of 25 years to life in prison, 
imposed for the offense of felony grand theft under the three strikes law . . . does 
not violate the Eighth Amendment‘s prohibition on cruel and unusual 
punishments.‖  (Id. at pp. 30-31.) 
In Ewing, two justices — Justices Scalia and Thomas — each wrote a 
separate concurring opinion, both agreeing that Ewing‘s sentence did not violate 
the Eighth Amendment but basing their concurrence in the judgment on the view 
 
23 
that the Eighth Amendment contains no proportionality principle at all.  (See 
Ewing, supra, 538 U.S. at pp. 31-32 (conc. opn. of Scalia, J.); id. at p. 32 (conc. 
opn. of Thomas, J.).)  The three justices who signed Justice O‘Connor‘s opinion 
and the two concurring justices comprised the five-justice majority in Ewing. 
Four justices dissented in Ewing.  Like Justice O‘Connor‘s opinion, the 
dissenting opinion by Justice Breyer, joined by Justices Stevens, Souter, and 
Ginsburg, applied the analytical framework set forth in Justice Kennedy‘s 
concurring opinion in Harmelin (Ewing, supra, 538 U.S. at p. 36 (dis. opn. of 
Breyer, J.)),9 but unlike the lead opinion the dissent, in applying that approach, 
concluded that the case before it did constitute one of the rare cases ―in which a 
court can say with reasonable confidence that the punishment is ‗grossly 
disproportionate‘ to the crime.‖  (Ewing, supra, 538 U.S. at p. 37 (dis. opn. of 
Breyer, J.).)  In reaching that conclusion, the dissent, after considering the ―[t]hree 
kinds of sentence-related characteristics‖ that it believed ―define the relevant 
comparative spectrum‖ — ―(a) the length of the prison term in real time, i.e., the 
time that the offender is likely actually to spend in prison; (b) the sentence-
triggering criminal conduct, i.e., the offender‘s actual behavior or other offense-
related circumstances; and (c) the offender‘s criminal history‖ (id. at p. 37) — 
                                              
9  
Justice Breyer‘s dissenting opinion noted that ―for present purposes‖ it was 
applying Justice Kennedy‘s analytical framework in Harmelin.  (Ewing, supra, 
538 U.S. at p. 36.)  In a brief separate dissenting opinion, joined by Justices 
Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer, Justice Stevens observed that, while he agreed with 
Justice Breyer that Ewing‘s sentence was grossly disproportionate even under 
Harmelin’s narrow proportionality framework, ―it is not clear that this case is 
controlled by Harmelin, which considered the proportionality of a life sentence 
imposed on a drug offender who had no prior felony convictions.  Rather, the 
three-factor analysis established in Solem v. Helm, 463 U.S. 277, 290-291 (1983), 
which specifically addressed recidivist sentencing, seems more directly on point.‖  
(438 U.S. at p. 32, fn. 1 (dis. opn. of Stevens, J.).)  
 
24 
determined that the circumstances presented in Ewing fell between the 
circumstances presented in the court‘s previous recidivist sentencing decisions in 
Rummel and Solem, and ultimately found that, as in Solem, ―Ewing‘s sentence (life 
imprisonment with a minimum term of 25 years) is grossly disproportionate to the 
triggering offense conduct — stealing three golf clubs — Ewing‘s recidivism 
notwithstanding.‖  (Ewing, supra, at p. 53 (dis. opn. of Breyer, J.).)10 
III.  Review of Relevant Post-Ewing Decisions 
A.  Carmony II 
Two years after the United States Supreme Court‘s decision in Ewing, 
supra, 538 U.S. 11, a panel of the California Court of Appeal was faced with the 
                                              
10  
In Lockyer v. Andrade (2003) 538 U.S. 63 (Andrade) — a companion case 
to Ewing — the Supreme Court, in another five-to-four decision, reversed a 
decision of the Ninth Circuit which had overturned a decision of the California 
Court of Appeal upholding the imposition of two consecutive 25-year-to-life 
sentences under California‘s Three Strikes law upon a defendant whose triggering 
felony convictions were each for petty theft with a prior arising from the 
defendant‘s theft of videotapes from two Kmart stores on two occasions.  
Although the majority in Andrade found that it was ― ‗clearly established‘ ‖ under 
prior Supreme Court precedent that ―[a] gross disproportionality principle is 
applicable to sentences for terms of years‖ (538 U.S. at p. 72), it concluded that ―it 
was not an unreasonable application of our clearly established law for the 
California Court of Appeal to affirm Andrade‘s sentence of two consecutive terms 
of 25 years to life in prison.‖  (Id. at p. 77.) 
 
The four justices who dissented in Ewing also dissented in Andrade, joining 
in a dissenting opinion authored by Justice Souter.  (Andrade, supra, 538 U.S. at 
pp. 77-83.)  Justice Souter reasoned that whether or not one accepts the state‘s 
judgment that 25 years of incapacitation prior to parole eligibility is appropriate 
when a defendant with two serious or violent felony convictions commits another 
felony, ―that policy cannot reasonably justify the imposition of a consecutive 25-
year minimum for a second minor felony committed soon after the first triggering 
offense. . . .  [T]he argument that repeating a trivial crime justifies doubling a 25-
year minimum incapacitation sentence based on a threat to the public does not 
raise a seriously debatable point on which judgments might reasonably differ.‖  
(Id. at pp. 81-82 (dis. opn. of Souter, J.).) 
 
25 
question whether a 25-year-to-life sentence under the Three Strikes law violated 
either the federal constitutional prohibition on cruel and unusual punishments or 
the state constitutional prohibition on cruel or unusual punishment, when imposed 
upon a defendant whose triggering offense was the failure to update his sex 
offender registration within five working days of his birthday.  (Carmony II, 
supra, 127 Cal.App.4th 1066.) 
Keith Carmony, the defendant in Carmony II, had been convicted in 1983 
of oral copulation by force or fear with a minor under the age of 14 years and as a 
consequence was required to register as a sex offender.  Upon his release from 
prison on September 16, 1999, Carmony promptly registered as a sex offender as 
required by law.  A week later, on September 23, 1999, after moving to a new 
residence, Carmony registered again, informing the authorities of his new address.  
Carmony‘s birthday fell on October 22 — the following month — and although 
his parole officer reminded him that he was required to update his registration 
annually within five working days of his birthday, Carmony — who continued to 
reside at the same address — forgot to reregister within five days of his birthday.  
On November 23, 1999, a month after Carmony‘s birthday, Carmony‘s parole 
officer went to Carmony‘s registered residential address and arrested him there for 
failing to comply with the annual registration requirement. 
The Court of Appeal in Carmony II pointed out that ―[d]efendant had 
recently married, maintained a residence, participated in Alcoholics Anonymous, 
sought job training and placement, and was employed.  Just prior to the current 
offense, he worked as a forklift operator for Hartsell Trucking in Redding and was 
employed by them until November 24, 1999, the day following his arrest for the 
present offense.‖  (127 Cal.App.4th at p. 1073.) 
In response to the current charge, Carmony admitted that he had failed to 
reregister within five working days of his birthday and pled guilty to that offense.  
 
26 
He also admitted that he had previously been convicted of three serious or violent 
felonies, but requested that the trial court strike at least two of those prior 
convictions to avoid a mandatory 25-year-to-life sentence under the Three Strikes 
law.  The trial court declined to strike any of the prior convictions and sentenced 
him to a 25-year-to-life sentence under the Three Strikes law.11 
On appeal, the Court of Appeal had initially concluded that the trial court 
had abused the discretion afforded by the Three Strikes law in refusing to strike 
any of his prior convictions in the interest of justice (see People v. Superior Court 
(Romero) (1996) 13 Cal.4th 497) and reversed the sentence on that basis; as a 
consequence, the appellate court did not reach the question whether the 25-year-
to-life sentence constituted cruel and/or unusual punishment.  We granted review.  
After first concluding that a trial court‘s refusal to strike a prior under the Three 
Strikes law is properly reviewable under an abuse of discretion standard (Carmony 
I, supra, 33 Cal.4th at pp. 373-376), this court held that in light of Carmony‘s prior 
record, the Court of Appeal had erred in finding that the trial court had abused its 
discretion in refusing to strike the prior convictions in that case.  (33 Cal.4th at 
pp. 376-380.)  At the same time, our opinion explicitly noted that ―[w]e do not . . . 
address the issue of whether the sentence violates the constitutional guarantees 
against cruel and/or unusual punishment or double jeopardy, and leave the 
resolution of this issue for the Court of Appeal on remand.‖  (Id. at p. 380, fn. 6.)12 
                                              
11  
Carmony also admitted that he had suffered a prior prison term, and the 
trial court sentenced him to an additional one year term for the prior prison term, 
resulting in an aggregate term of imprisonment of 26 years to life. 
12  
In Carmony I (in which the majority opinion was authored by Brown, J.), 
Justice Moreno authored a concurring opinion, joined by Justice Chin.  (Carmony 
I, supra, 33 Cal.4th at pp. 380-381.)  Although agreeing that the trial court had not 
abused its discretion under section 1385 in failing to strike at least two prior 
convictions, the concurring opinion observed that ―it is difficult to escape the 
 
(footnote continued on next page) 
 
27 
On remand, the Court of Appeal addressed the constitutional issue in its 
decision in Carmony II, supra, 127 Cal.App.4th 1066, and concluded, in a two-to-
one decision, that, under the circumstances of that case, the 25-year-to-life 
sentence imposed under the Three Strikes law violated both the federal 
Constitution‘s prohibition of cruel and unusual punishments and the state 
Constitution‘s prohibition of cruel or unusual punishment.  (Carmony II, supra, at 
pp. 1074-1989.) 
In addressing the federal constitutional question through application of the 
approach endorsed by the lead opinion in Ewing, supra, 538 U.S 11, the court in 
Carmony II first discussed the relative gravity of the defendant‘s triggering 
offense.  The court observed in this regard:  ―While a violation of section 290 [the 
sex offender registration provision] is classified as a felony, the instant offense 
was a passive, nonviolent, regulatory offense that posed no direct or immediate 
danger to society.  Defendant committed this offense by violating the annual 
registration requirement . . . , having correctly registered the proper information 
the month before.  Obviously, no change had occurred in the intervening period 
and defendant‘s parole agent was aware of this fact.  Thus, because defendant did 
not evade or intend to evade law enforcement officers, his offense was the most 
                                                                                                                                                              
(footnote continued from previous page) 
 
conclusion that the electorate that enacted the Three Strikes law did not intend to 
impose a life sentence on someone whose last offense was a technical violation of 
the sex offender registration statute — failing to register within five days of his 
birthday although he had registered a month earlier and had not changed his 
address since then — that posed no danger to the public. . . .  [Citation.]  Subject 
to the caveat that the sentence may yet be overturned on constitutional grounds, I 
reluctantly concur in the majority opinion.‖  (33 Cal.4th at p. 381 (conc. opn. of 
Moreno, J.).) 
 
28 
technical and harmless violation of the registration law we have seen.‖  (Carmony 
II, supra, 127 Cal.App.4th at p. 1078.) 
After reviewing the legislative history of the specific provision imposing 
the annual registration requirement, the court in Carmony II explained that ―the 
available legislative history suggests the annual registration requirement was 
intended to address the problem of offenders who fail to notify authorities of an 
address change because they are no longer under active parole supervision.  
Although this requirement serves a legitimate purpose, it is nevertheless a backup 
measure to ensure that authorities have current accurate information.  In this case, 
when defendant failed to register within five days of his birthday, he was still on 
parole, had recently updated his registration, had not moved or changed any other 
required registration information during the one month since he registered, and 
was in contact with his parole officer.  Therefore, his failure to register was 
completely harmless and no worse than a breach of an overtime parking 
ordinance.‖  (Carmony II, supra, 127 Cal.App.4th at p. 1079.)13 
The majority in Carmony II then considered the severity of the sentence 
that had been imposed upon the defendant, noting that the defendant ―was 
sentenced to a term of 25 years to life in prison‖ and that ―[i]n real terms, [the 
                                              
13  
In the course of its opinion, the majority in Carmony II distinguished the 
prior Court of Appeal decision in People v. Meeks (2004) 123 Cal.App.4th 695, 
which had upheld a 25-year-to-life sentence under the Three Strikes law imposed 
upon a defendant whose triggering offense was a willful failure to register within 
five working days of an address change.  The court in Carmony II noted that ―the 
offense committed by Meeks was not the technical violation committed by 
[Carmony].  Meeks failed to register after changing his residence and therefore, 
unlike in the present case, law enforcement authorities did not have Meeks‘s 
correct address and information.‖  (Carmony II, supra, 127 Cal.App.4th at 
p. 1082, fn. 11.)  
 
29 
defendant] must serve 25 years in prison before he is eligible for parole.‖  
(Carmony II, supra, 127 Cal.App.4th at p. 1079.)  The court stated that ―[i]t is 
beyond dispute that a life sentence is grossly disproportionate to the offense just 
described.‖  (Ibid.) 
The court in Carmony II recognized that in determining the validity of the 
sentence under the Eighth Amendment it must take into consideration that the 
defendant was a repeat offender whom the Legislature may punish more severely 
than it punishes a first-time offender.  The majority opinion in Carmony II 
reasoned, however, that because ―the double jeopardy clause prohibits successive 
punishment for the same offense,‖ the ―policy of the clause . . . circumscribes the 
relevance of recidivism,‖ and ―[t]o the extent the ‗punishment greatly exceeds that 
warranted by the [triggering] offense, it begins to look very much as if the 
offender is actually being punished again for his prior offenses.‘ ‖  (Carmony II, 
supra, 127 Cal.App.4th at p. 1080.)  The majority in Carmony II found that 
―[g]iven the minimal and completely harmless nature of defendant‘s [triggering] 
offense and the relatively light penalty prescribed for a simple violation of the 
registration requirements, defendant‘s prior serious and violent felonies almost 
wholly account for the extreme penalty imposed on defendant.‖  (Ibid.)  
Furthermore, because in the appellate court‘s view the defendant‘s triggering 
offense in that case ―reveals no tendency to commit additional offenses that pose a 
threat to public safety‖ (id. at p. 1081), the court concluded that ―a prison term of 
25 years to life is grossly disproportionate to the gravity of the duplicate 
registration offense‖ (ibid.) even taking into account the defendant‘s multiple 
serious prior convictions.  The court in Carmony II then compared the defendant‘s 
sentence with the sentences available for other offenses within California and for 
the sentences imposed under comparable circumstances in other states (id. at 
pp. 1081-1084), and ultimately concluded that ―this case is one of those rare cases 
 
30 
in which the harshness of the Three Strikes sentence is grossly disproportionate to 
the gravity of the predicate offense . . . and violates the cruel and unusual 
punishment clause of the United States Constitution.‖  (Id. at p. 1084.)14  This 
court denied a petition for review, with Justices Kennard and Baxter voting to 
grant review.   
B.  Gonzalez v. Duncan 
Three years after the Carmony II decision, a similar cruel and unusual 
punishment claim came before the federal Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit 
in Gonzalez v. Duncan, supra, 551 F.3d 875.  As in Carmony II, the defendant in 
Gonzalez had previously been convicted of a number of serious and violent 
felonies,15 but the defendant‘s triggering offense that had resulted in a 25-year-to-
                                              
14  
In Carmony II, one Court of Appeal justice dissented from the 
determination that the defendant‘s sentence violated the Eighth Amendment.  
(Carmony II, supra, 127 Cal.App.4th at pp. 1089-1092 (conc. & dis. opn. of 
Nicholson, J.).)  The dissenting justice disagreed with the majority‘s 
characterization of the defendant‘s current offense as a harmless technical 
violation of a regulatory law, observing, ―Once we catch a person who has failed 
to register, we know where he is.  That is fortunate, but it does not justify the 
violation of an important public safety statute.  We rightly place strict 
requirements on sex offenders so we can keep tabs on them. [¶] . . . [¶] . . . While 
it was fortuitous that defendant was found where he had last registered, the 
requirement to register at continuing intervals is rational and supported by the 
policy discussed above.‖  (Carmony II, supra, 127 Cal.App.4th at p. 1091.)  The 
dissenting justice also disagreed with the majority‘s view that the primary focus 
should be placed upon the defendant‘s current offense, explaining that ―[h]ere, 
defendant committed the felony of failing to register after having been convicted 
of two violent or serious felonies.  That is the relevant set of circumstances that 
must bear the weight of the penalty imposed.‖  (Ibid.) 
15  
The defendant in Gonzalez had previously been convicted of committing 
(1) a lewd act with a child under 14, (2) attempted rape by force, and (3) second-
degree robbery.  (Gonzalez, supra, 551 F.3d at p. 878.) 
 
31 
life sentence under the Three Strikes law was a conviction of failing to update his 
sex offender registration within five working days of his birthday. 
In analyzing the gravity of the defendant‘s offense in accordance with the 
controlling constitutional principles set forth by the United States Supreme Court 
in Ewing, supra, 538 U.S. 11, and Andrade, supra, 538 U.S. 63, the court in 
Gonzalez embraced the Carmony II court‘s characterization of the annual 
registration requirement as ―merely a ‗backup measure to ensure that authorities 
have current accurate information‘ ‖ and of a failure to comply with that 
requirement as ― ‗the most technical violation of the section 290 registration 
requirement.‘ ‖  (Gonzalez, supra, 551 F.3d at p. 884.)  The court in Gonzalez then 
stated:  ―Indeed, we are unable to discern any actual harm resulting from 
Gonzalez‘s failure to comply with the annual registration requirement.  Gonzalez 
updated his sex offender registration nine months before and three months after his 
February 24, 2001, birthday, and he remained at his last registered address 
throughout that time period.  There is nothing in the record remotely indicating 
that Gonzalez‘s failure to reregister the same address a third time in the same 
twelve month period could have interfered with the ability of police to monitor his 
activities.  The record confirms that Gonzalez was in fact ‗readily available for 
police surveillance‘:  Gonzalez was arrested ‗fairly close‘ to his registered address, 
and the arresting officers were familiar with Gonzalez and had spoken to him 
previously at that location. . . .  We conclude that ‗[t]he purpose of the registration 
statute was not undermined by [Gonzalez‘s] failure to annually update his 
registration.‘ ‖  (Id. at pp. 884-885, fn. omitted.) 
The court in Gonzalez recognized that ―California has a valid ‗public-safety 
interest in incapacitating and deterring recidivist felons‘ ‖ (Gonzalez, supra, 551 
F.3d at p. 886) and that, under Ewing, supra, 538 U.S. 11, it was required to 
consider the defendant‘s criminal history in determining the validity of the 
 
32 
defendant‘s sentence for Eighth Amendment purposes.  Further, the court in 
Gonzalez acknowledged that ―Gonzalez‘s criminal history is extensive‖ and that 
―[his] prior convictions, which include both crimes of violence and sexual 
predation, are very serious.‖  (Gonzalez, supra, at p. 886.) 
The court in Gonzalez explained, however, that ―we are unable to discern 
any rational relationship between Gonzalez‘s failure to update his sex offender 
registration annually and the probability that he will recidivate as a violent 
criminal or sex offender. . . .  [¶]  Gonzalez‘s present offense does not reveal any 
propensity to recidivate.  California certainly may be ‗justified in punishing a 
recidivist more severely than it punishes a first offender,‘ [citation], where ‗ ―the 
latest crime . . . is considered to be an aggravated offense because [it is] a 
repetitive one,‖ ‘ [citation].  However, what California has done here is 
fundamentally different.  It has imposed an extraordinarily harsh sentence on 
Gonzalez based on a violation of a technical regulatory requirement that resulted 
in no social harm and to which little or no moral culpability attaches.  Absent 
some connection between Gonzalez‘s past violent and sexual offenses, his present 
regulatory violation, and his propensity to recidivate as a violent or sexual 
offender, we cannot conclude that California‘s interest in deterring and 
incapacitating recidivist offenders justifies the severity of the indeterminate life 
sentence imposed.‖  (Gonzalez, supra, 551 F.3d at p. 887.) 
Concluding, for the foregoing reasons, that Gonzalez‘s sentence ―raises an 
inference of gross disproportionality‖ (Gonzalez, supra, 551 F.3d at p. 887), the 
court in Gonzalez went on to undertake a comparison of Gonzalez‘s sentence with 
the sentences imposed for other crimes in California and for the same crime in 
other states.  (Id. at pp. 887-888.)  After conducting that comparison, the court 
found that it confirmed the view that Gonzalez‘s sentence was grossly 
disproportionate and thus violated the Eighth Amendment.  (Id. at p. 889; see also 
 
33 
Bradshaw v. State (Ga. 2008) 671 S.E.2d 485, 488-493 [mandatory sentence of 
life imprisonment imposed under a recidivist sentencing provision for failure to 
comply with sex offender registration requirement constitutes cruel and unusual 
punishment in violation of the Eighth Amend. as applied to a defendant whose 
conduct reflected a good faith effort to comply with the requirement and no intent 
to evade detection].) 
C.  People v. Nichols 
One year after the decision in Gonzalez and four years after the decision in 
Carmony II, in the case of People v. Nichols (2009) 176 Cal.App.4th 428 
(Nichols), another panel of the Court of Appeal, Third Appellate District (the same 
district that had decided Carmony II), faced the constitutionality of a third strike 
sentence imposed for another sex offender registration claim.  The triggering 
offense in Nichols was the defendant‘s failure to comply with the distinct 
provision of the sex offender registration statute requiring a sex offender to 
register a new address within five working days of a change of residence.  The 
defendant contended that the decision in Carmony II required the appellate court 
to find that the 25-year-to-life sentence imposed by the trial court in that case 
constituted cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment. 
The court in Nichols emphatically rejected the defendant‘s contention, 
pointing out that ―[t]he Carmony II court distinguished the seriousness of the 
registration offense before it with the one before the [court in People v. Meeks, 
supra, 123 Cal.App.4th 695].  The Carmony II court noted ‗the offense committed 
by Meeks was not the technical violation committed by defendant.  Meeks failed 
to register after changing his residence and therefore, unlike in the present case, 
law enforcement authorities did not have Meeks‘s correct address and 
information.‘ ‖  (Nichols, supra, 176 Cal.App.4th at p.  436, quoting Carmony II, 
supra, 127 Cal.App.4th at p. 1082, fn. 1.)  The court in Nichols continued:  ―It is 
 
34 
this distinction that supports the sentence given in this case.  Unlike the failure in 
Carmony II, defendant‘s failure to register thwarted the fundamental purpose of 
the registration law, thereby leaving the public at risk.  ‗The purpose of the sex 
offender registration law is to require that the offender identify his present address 
to law enforcement authorities so that he or she is readily available for police 
surveillance.‘ ‖  (Nichols, supra, 176 Cal.App.4th at p. 437, quoting Carmony II, 
supra, at p. 1072.) 
Reviewing the facts presented in the Nichols case, the court stated:  ―Here, 
for a period of over eight months, defendant‘s whereabouts were unknown.  Even 
his federal parole officer did not know where he was. . . .  Such blatant disregard 
of the registration act and complete undercutting of the act‘s purposes is a serious 
offense.‖  (Nichols, supra, 176 Cal.App.4th at p. 437.)  ―Defendant‘s failure to 
register when he left Rocklin and his thwarting the purpose of the registration act 
of being able to be located, coupled with the seriousness of his prior convictions 
and his sustained criminality, all demonstrate his sentence was not grossly 
disproportionate to his offense.‖  (Ibid.) 
D.  Crosby v. Schwartz 
Most recently, in Crosby v. Schwartz (9th Cir. 2012) 678 F.3d 784 
(Crosby), another three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit rejected a habeas corpus 
petitioner‘s contention that the 26-year-to-life sentence imposed upon him under 
the Three Strikes law violated the Eighth Amendment.  In that case, the petitioner 
had been convicted of both failing to annually update his sex offender registration 
within five days of his birthday and of failing to register within five days of a 
change of address, and the court, in rejecting the cruel and unusual punishment 
claim, emphasized that unlike the circumstances in the prior Ninth Circuit decision 
in Gonzalez, supra, 551 F.3d 875, the petitioner in Crosby had not committed ―a 
 
35 
mere technical offense‖ but rather had intentionally ―impeded the police‘s ability 
to find him for surveillance.‖  (Crosby, supra, at p. 794.)   
IV.  Application to Present Case 
In the briefs filed in this court, petitioner does not take issue with the 
distinction that has been drawn in Carmony II, supra, 127 Cal.App.4th 1066, 
Gonzalez, supra, 551 F.3d 875, Nichols, supra, 176 Cal.App.4th 428, and Crosby, 
supra, 678 F.3d. 784, between two categories of defendants who, these cases hold, 
may properly be treated differently for cruel and unusual punishment purposes.  
Thus, on the one hand, these decisions conclude that a 25-year-to-life sentence 
under the Three Strikes law is constitutional as applied to a defendant whose 
current address is unknown to law enforcement authorities and who has failed to 
comply with a crucial aspect of the sex offender registration requirements — such 
as a defendant‘s failure to register a current address upon arrival in a jurisdiction. 
On the other hand, the decisions conclude that such a sentence is unconstitutional 
as applied to a defendant who has provided law enforcement authorities with 
accurate information regarding his or her current address and has generally 
demonstrated a good faith effort to comply with the sex offender registration 
requirements but who, through a negligent oversight, has failed to affirmatively 
confirm the continued accuracy of his or her existing registration information by 
updating the information each year within five working days of his or her birthday. 
Indeed, in his opening brief, petitioner explicitly ―urges this Court to adopt 
the reasoning of the Third District [which decided both Carmony II and Nichols].  
The failure to re-register the same address in the same year does not thwart the 
fundamental purpose of the registration law.  It is a purely ‗passive, nonviolent, 
regulatory offense that posed no direct or immediate danger to society.‘  (People v. 
Nichols, supra, 176 Cal.App.4th at p. 435.)  On the other hand, registration 
violations that result in the police not knowing the whereabouts of a sexual 
 
36 
offender are sufficiently grave to serve as a trigger crime for a third strike 
sentence.‖   
In taking this position, of course, petitioner asserts that the present case 
falls within the former, rather than the latter, category; that is, that the 
circumstances of his offense are comparable to the circumstances in Carmony II 
and Gonzalez rather than to those in Nichols and Crosby.  In support of this 
position, petitioner relies on the fact that the jury convicted him only of the charge 
of failing to annually update his registration within five working days of his 
birthday and acquitted him of the charge of failing to register upon his arrival in 
the jurisdiction. 
In their answer brief, the People directly dispute petitioner‘s 
characterization of the factual circumstances underlying the triggering offense, 
asserting instead that this case ―concerns a petitioner who failed to register as a sex 
offender upon his release from state prison, failed to update his registration 
annually five months later, and failed to report to his parole agent at any time 
following his release from state prison.‖  In advancing this position, the People 
expressly rely upon the trial court‘s finding at the sentencing hearing that 
petitioner had not registered as a sex offender upon his release from prison in 
January 2001.  The People assert that the trial court‘s finding demonstrates that, 
with regard to the cruel and unusual punishment claim, this case is clearly 
distinguishable from Carmony II and Gonzalez and is analogous to Nichols and 
Crosby. 
Petitioner‘s reply brief does not respond to the People‘s reliance upon the 
trial court‘s finding at the sentencing hearing, and, in continuing to argue that this 
case is comparable to Carmony II and Gonzalez, relies exclusively on the 
circumstances that the jury convicted petitioner only of the offense of failing to 
 
37 
update his registration within five working days of his birthday, and acquitted 
petitioner of the charge of failing to register on arrival in the jurisdiction.   
For the reasons discussed below, we conclude that the circumstances 
surrounding petitioner‘s triggering offense distinguish this case from Carmony II 
and Gonzalez and are more comparable to Nichols and Crosby. 
First, the fact that the 25-year-to-life sentence at issue in this case was 
imposed on the basis of petitioner‘s conviction of the offense of failing to annually 
update his sex offender registration within five working days of his birthday is not, 
in itself, sufficient to establish that his cruel and unusual punishment claim is 
equivalent to the cruel and unusual punishment claims that were sustained in 
Carmony II and Gonzalez.  None of the United States Supreme Court decisions 
that has addressed an Eighth Amendment challenge to a lengthy sentence imposed 
under a recidivist sentencing statute based upon the alleged excessiveness or 
disproportionality of the sentence has focused upon the name or the elements of 
the offense of which the defendant was convicted in the abstract or upon the least 
culpable set of circumstances that potentially could be subjected to the punishment 
prescribed by the penal statute in question.  Instead, in determining whether a 
lengthy sentence imposed under a recidivist sentencing statute is 
unconstitutionally excessive or disproportionate, the governing decisions have 
looked to the actual conduct that the defendant has engaged in and that has 
resulted in the sentence that the defendant claims constitutes cruel and unusual 
punishment, determining whether the challenged sentence constitutes cruel and 
unusual punishment as applied to the specific circumstances involved in the case 
at issue.  (See, e.g., Rummel, supra, 445 U.S. 263 [considering specific value of 
property underlying defendant‘s theft offenses]; Solem, supra, 463 U.S. 277 
[same]; Ewing, supra, 538 U.S. 11 (plur. opn.) [same]; id. at p. 35 (dis. opn. of 
Breyer, J.) [same].)  Indeed, petitioner acknowledges in his briefing in this court 
 
38 
that the governing high court precedent requires ―that the circumstances of the 
triggering crime be assessed individually and on a case by case basis.‖ 
The triggering offense at issue here — failure to annually update one‘s sex 
offender registration within five working days of one‘s birthday — can be 
committed under a wide range of circumstances.  Some defendants — as in 
Carmony II and Gonzalez — who have properly registered their current address 
and whose overall conduct demonstrates a general good faith effort to comply with 
the sex offender registration requirements may commit this offense through a mere 
negligent oversight that does not adversely impact the fundamental purpose of the 
sex offender registration regime.  Other defendants, however, may violate this 
statutory provision by intentionally failing to update their sex offender registration 
within five working days of their birthday as part of a more general course of 
conduct that demonstrates a deliberate general unwillingness to comply with the 
sex offender registration requirements.  In analyzing a cruel and unusual 
punishment challenge to a sentence imposed upon a defendant convicted of this 
offense, a court may not simply look to the nature of the offense in the abstract, 
but must take into consideration all of the relevant specific circumstances under 
which the offense actually was committed. 
In some instances, the relevant circumstances relating to the defendant‘s 
commission of the offense in question may be clear and undisputed and thus may 
pose no problem for a court‘s Eighth Amendment analysis.  As the present case 
illustrates, however, in other instances the facts surrounding the defendant‘s 
commission of an offense may be vigorously contested and a general verdict 
finding the defendant guilty of this offense may not establish the particular 
circumstances under which the offense was committed. 
As petitioner points out, in this case not only was petitioner convicted only 
of, and sentenced upon, the offense of failing to update his sex offender 
 
39 
registration within five working days of his birthday, but the jury specifically 
acquitted him of the separate charge of failing to register as a sex offender upon 
his arrival in Palmdale.  Petitioner contends that his acquittal of this separate 
charge establishes that he had in fact properly registered as a sex offender at the 
Palmdale address where he was arrested and thus that his conduct was comparable 
to that of the defendants in Carmony II and Gonzalez.  We disagree.   
Petitioner‘s argument on this point fails to take into account the numerous 
federal and California decisions that uniformly hold that a jury verdict acquitting a 
defendant of a charged offense does not constitute a finding that the defendant is 
factually innocent of the offense or establish that any or all of the specific 
elements of the offense are not true.  (See, e.g., United States v. Watts (1997) 519 
U.S. 148, 155 (Watts) [unless specific findings are made, ―the jury cannot be said 
to have ‗necessarily rejected‘ any facts when it returns a general verdict . . .‖]; 
Dowling v. United States (1990) 493 U.S. 342, 349; People v. Towne (2008) 44 
Cal.4th 63, 86 (Towne) [―an acquittal merely establishes the existence of a 
reasonable doubt as to guilt.  Unless specific findings are made, ‗the jury cannot 
be said to have ―necessarily rejected‖ any facts when it returns a general verdict 
. . . .‘ ‖]; In re Coughlin (1976) 16 Cal.3d 52, 59 [―[T]he fact of an acquittal 
establishes only that the trier of fact entertained a reasonable doubt of defendant‘s 
guilt‖]; In re Dunham (1976) 16 Cal.3d 63, 66-67.) 
As the summary of the evidence presented at trial set forth above (ante, at 
p. 9) indicates, in challenging the prosecution‘s case with regard to the charge of 
failing to register upon arrival in Palmdale, the defense focused upon the 
recordkeeping and computer skills of the sheriff‘s department clerk, implying that 
there might be doubt as to the accuracy of the sex offender registration records 
kept by the Palmdale sheriff‘s office and reported to the Department of Justice.  
The jury‘s verdict of acquittal may indicate that the jury viewed this line of 
 
40 
defense counsel questioning and the clerk‘s responses to the questioning as raising 
a reasonable doubt with regard to defendant‘s guilt of this charge.  As the 
numerous cases cited in the preceding paragraph establish, the jury‘s general 
verdict of acquittal does not demonstrate that the jury determined that the evidence 
established that petitioner had in fact registered as a sex offender upon his release 
from prison, but only that the jury was of the view that the prosecution had not 
proved the elements of the charged offense beyond a reasonable doubt.  
Although the jury in this case made no specific factual findings with regard 
to whether petitioner had registered as a sex offender upon his arrival in Palmdale 
in January 2001 after his release from prison, as noted above (ante, at pp. 11-12), 
at the sentencing hearing in this matter after petitioner‘s conviction, the trial court 
did indicate its view with regard to that factual question.  With respect to 
petitioner‘s testimony at trial that he had registered at the Palmdale sheriff‘s 
department upon his release from prison and defense counsel‘s hypothesis that the 
paperwork had been lost or not completed, the trial court stated:  ―I don‘t know if 
the jury accepted that testimony or not, but the court did not believe that testimony 
for a moment.  So my review of [the] evidence supports the fact that the only time 
that the defendant ever made an effort to register was either when he was in prison 
for a parole violation, or was taken to register by his parole agent.  The defendant 
is well aware of his obligation to register.  He had been told about it on a number 
of occasions.  He is the one that chose to risk the sanctions for having failed to 
register.‖  (Italics added.)  The trial court relied upon its finding that petitioner had 
intentionally failed to register in declining to strike any of petitioner‘s prior 
convictions and imposing a 25-year-to-life sentence under the Three Strikes law, 
specifically distinguishing the facts of this case from the facts involved in People 
v. Cluff, supra, 87 Cal.App.4th 991.  In Cluff, the Court of Appeal found that the 
trial court had abused its discretion in failing to strike prior convictions so as to 
 
41 
avoid a third strike sentence in a case in which the defendant had properly 
registered his current address but had negligently failed to update his registration 
within five working days of his birthday.   
As noted, the People contend that in evaluating petitioner‘s cruel and 
unusual punishment claim this court may and should properly rely upon the trial 
court‘s finding with regard to the circumstances underlying petitioner‘s offense, 
and that, under the reasoning of Nichols, supra, 176 Cal.App.4th 428, and People 
v. Meeks, supra, 123 Cal.App.4th 695, this court should reject petitioner‘s Eighth 
Amendment challenge because petitioner, by intentionally failing to register and to 
provide law enforcement authorities with his current residential address, engaged 
in felonious conduct that was directly and substantially related to the antirecidivist 
purpose of the Three Strikes law. 
To our knowledge, no prior decision has considered the question whether, 
in analyzing a claim that a sentence constitutes cruel and unusual punishment 
under the Eighth Amendment, a court may rely upon a factual finding regarding 
the circumstances relating to the offense that is made by a trial court in the course 
of a sentencing hearing.16  For the reasons that follow, we conclude that it is 
                                              
16  
In Gonzalez, supra, 551 F.3d 875, as in the present case, the jury convicted 
the defendant of failing to annually update his sex offender registration within five 
working days of his birthday but acquitted him of failing to register upon a change 
of address.  In addressing the defendant‘s Eighth Amendment claim, the court in 
Gonzalez noted that the jury had acquitted the defendant of the failure-to-register-
on-change-of-address charge, and then stated that ―we adopt the jury‘s implicit 
determination that Gonzalez was living at his registered address throughout the 
relevant time period in this case.‖  (Gonzalez, supra, 551 F.3d at p. 884.) 
 
In relying upon the jury‘s acquittal in that manner, the court in Gonzalez 
did not consider the United States Supreme Court decisions, discussed above 
(ante, at p. 39), that explicitly hold that, unless the jury makes specific findings, 
―the jury cannot be said to have ‗necessarily rejected‘ any facts when it returns a 
general verdict.‖  (Watts, supra, 519 U.S. at p. 155; see, e.g., Dowling v. United 
 
(footnote continued on next page) 
 
42 
appropriate to rely upon such a trial court factual finding in deciding whether a 
sentence that has been imposed in a particular case constitutes cruel and unusual 
punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment. 
As already noted, although the People relied upon the trial court‘s findings 
regarding the circumstances of the offense in their answer brief, petitioner did not 
discuss the effect of the trial court‘s findings in his reply brief.  Prior to oral 
argument, we specifically directed the parties to be prepared at oral argument to 
discuss the question ―whether a trial court‘s factual finding at a sentencing hearing 
regarding the circumstances relating to a petitioner‘s triggering offense may affect 
the determination whether a sentence constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in 
violation of the Eighth Amendment of the federal Constitution.‖  In response, 
petitioner‘s counsel advised the court that at oral argument she would rely upon 
the case of People v. Coelho (2001) 89 Cal.App.4th 861 (Coelho) in addressing 
the court‘s question.  At oral argument, petitioner‘s counsel maintained that in 
evaluating an Eighth Amendment challenge to a sentence a court may only 
consider circumstances of the triggering offense that the jury has expressly found 
to be true beyond a reasonable doubt or that the trial court can determine from the 
record that the jury must have found true beyond a reasonable doubt, arguing that, 
as in Coelho, this requirement followed from the principles underlying a criminal 
defendant‘s federal constitutional right to a jury trial as set forth in the line of 
                                                                                                                                                              
(footnote continued from previous page) 
 
States, supra, 493 U.S. at p. 349.)  Moreover, unlike in the present case, in 
Gonzalez there is no indication that the trial court made any specific finding 
regarding the circumstances of the offense at the sentencing hearing or at any 
other time.  Thus, the Gonzalez court had no occasion to address the legal issue 
that is before us in this case.   
 
43 
United States Supreme Court decisions beginning with Apprendi v. New Jersey 
(2000) 530 U.S. 466 (Apprendi).17 
In Coelho, supra, 89 Cal.App.4th 861, the Court of Appeal, relying upon 
the principles underlying the Apprendi line of decisions, concluded that the 
provision of the Three Strikes law that requires a trial court to impose a 
consecutive Three Strikes sentence for each current offense of which a defendant 
is convicted that is ―not committed on the same occasion, and not arising from the 
same set of operative facts‖ as another current offense (see §§ 667, subd. (c)(6), 
(7), 1170.12, subd. (a)(6)(7)) should be interpreted to require a trial court to 
impose consecutive sentences only where the jury expressly found (or, in light of 
the record, must have found) beyond a reasonable doubt that its separate 
convictions were based on offenses that were not committed on the same occasion 
and did not arise from the same set of operative facts.  (Coelho, supra, 89 
Cal.App.4th at pp. 874-884.)  In the absence of such an explicit or implied jury 
finding, the court in Coelho held, a trial court is not required to impose 
consecutive Three Strike sentences, and must exercise its ordinary discretion in 
determining whether to impose consecutive or concurrent sentences.  (Id. at 
pp. 884-886.)18 
                                              
17  
Because the People relied upon the trial court‘s findings in their answer 
brief, petitioner could and should have raised any objection to a reliance upon the 
trial court‘s findings, including an objection based upon Apprendi, in his reply 
brief.  Accordingly, the provisions of Government Code section 68081 were fully 
complied with. 
 
18  
The Court of Appeal decision in Coelho, supra, 89 Cal.App.4th 861, 
preceded the United States Supreme Court decision in Oregon v. Ice (2009) 555 
U.S. 160, where the high court held the Apprendi line of decisions does not apply 
to factual findings that bear on the question whether multiple sentences are to be 
imposed consecutively or concurrently.  Because the issue is not presented here, 
 
(footnote continued on next page) 
 
44 
As we explain, the Court of Appeal‘s decision in Coelho, supra, 89 
Cal.App.4th 861, is inapposite because the Apprendi line of decisions does not 
apply to the present context.  Both the United States Supreme Court and this court 
have expressly held that a trial court, in exercising its discretion in sentencing a 
defendant on an offense of which he or she has been convicted, may take into 
account the court‘s own factual findings with regard to the defendant‘s conduct 
related to an offense of which the defendant has been acquitted, so long as the trial 
court properly finds that the evidence establishes such conduct by a preponderance 
of the evidence.  (See, e.g., Watts, supra, 519 U.S. 148, 155-157; Towne, supra, 44 
Cal.4th 63, 85-88.)  In Towne, which was decided after Apprendi, we specifically 
rejected the claim that the trial court‘s reliance upon its factual findings with 
regard to a charge of which the defendant had been acquitted by a jury violated the 
defendant‘s federal constitutional right to jury trial as established in Apprendi and 
its progeny, explaining that ―[p]ermitting a judge to consider evidence of conduct 
underlying counts of which the defendant was acquitted does not in any way 
undermine the jury‘s role in establishing, by its verdict, the maximum authorized 
sentence.‖  (Towne, supra, at p. 87.)  And in United States v. Booker (2005) 543 
U.S. 220, 244-268 (Booker), in an opinion by Justice Breyer that expressed the 
views of a majority of the court on the relevant point, the high court took note of 
its prior decision in Watts, supra, 519 U.S. 148 (Booker, at pp. 251-252), and 
explained that the constitutional principle established by the Apprendi line of 
decisions is not violated by a trial court‘s own factual findings regarding ―the real 
conduct that underlies the [defendant‘s] criminal conviction‖ (Booker, at p. 250) 
                                                                                                                                                              
(footnote continued from previous page) 
 
we express no view on the validity of the holding in Coelho in light of the high 
court‘s subsequent decision in Ice.   
 
45 
so long as, under the applicable statutory scheme, the findings do not mandate a 
particular sentence but leave the trial court free to exercise sentencing discretion.  
(Id. at pp. 259-265.)   
In the present case, as in Towne, supra, 44 Cal.4th 63, the trial court‘s 
reliance upon its view of the facts underlying the charge of which petitioner was 
acquitted, in exercising its discretion not to strike any of petitioner‘s prior serious 
or violent felony convictions, did not violate petitioner‘s constitutional right to 
jury trial as set forth in Apprendi and its progeny.  The trial court‘s finding in this 
regard did not mandate a particular sentence under the Three Strikes law; the court 
simply relied upon its factual determination regarding petitioner‘s course of 
conduct in exercising the discretion afforded by the Three Strikes statutory scheme 
in choosing a sentence within the maximum term statutorily authorized by the 
jury‘s verdict.  (See, e.g., Southern Union Co. v. United States (2012) ___ U.S. 
___, ___ [183 L.Ed.2d 318, 326] [under Apprendi, ―judges may exercise discretion 
in sentencing‖ so long as they do not ― ‗inflic[t] punishment that the jury‘s verdict 
alone does not allow‘ ‖].)   
The high court‘s Eighth Amendment precedents provide no support for a 
rule that, in a case challenging the constitutional validity of a sentence imposed 
under a recidivist sentencing statute such as the Three Strikes law, would limit a 
court‘s consideration of the actual circumstances of a defendant‘s offense only to 
facts that have been found by the jury or proved beyond a reasonable doubt.  
Inasmuch as the governing federal decisions establish that it is constitutionally 
permissible for a trial court, applying a preponderance of the evidence standard, to 
consider the court‘s own factual findings regarding the real conduct underlying a 
defendant‘s conviction in exercising its statutorily authorized discretion in 
choosing an appropriate sentence (see Watts, supra, 519 U.S. at p. 157; accord, 
Booker, supra, 543 U.S. at p. 261), there is no reasonable basis to suggest that the 
 
46 
Eighth Amendment should be interpreted to preclude a court from considering 
such findings in evaluating a cruel and unusual punishment challenge to that 
sentence and, instead, to require a trial or appellate court to adopt a factually 
unrealistic view of the circumstances of the offense when reviewing an Eighth 
Amendment claim.  Indeed, the limitation proposed by petitioner is particularly 
unpersuasive given the high court‘s repeated emphasis on the extremely narrow 
scope of the Eighth Amendment‘s proportionality principle in this context.  (See, 
e.g., Ewing, supra, at p. 30 [―Ewing‘s is not ‗the rare case in which a threshold 
comparison of the crime committed and the sentence imposed leads to an 
inference of gross disproportionality‘ ‖]; Andrade, supra, 538 U.S. at p. 77 [―The 
gross disproportionality principle reserves a constitutional violation for only the 
extraordinary case‖]).  Accordingly, petitioner‘s reliance upon Apprendi and its 
progeny is untenable.19   
                                              
19  
Contrary to the concurring opinions, we conclude that the prior decisions of 
the United States Supreme Court and this court that address and explain the scope 
and limited reach of the Apprendi line of cases clearly establish that petitioner‘s 
Apprendi claim lacks merit.  In a case such as this, in which the governing 
authorities make clear — as Justice Liu‘s concurring opinion acknowledges (conc. 
opn. of Liu, J., post, p. 3) — that Apprendi does not preclude a trial court‘s 
findings with regard to the circumstances of an offense from playing a crucial role 
in determining the sentence that is actually imposed upon the defendant within the 
statutory range of punishment authorized by the jury‘s verdict, it is simply 
illogical, and inconsistent with the high court‘s reasoning and conclusion in 
Ewing, supra, 538 U.S. 11, to maintain that Apprendi may or should be interpreted 
to preclude a court from looking to those trial court findings in comparing, for 
Eighth Amendment purposes, the gravity of the defendant‘s criminal conduct with 
the severity of the punishment imposed.  It is worth recalling that it was 
petitioner‘s request that the trial court strike several of his prior convictions for 
purposes of sentencing so as to bring him outside the reach of the Three Strikes 
law that led to the trial court‘s finding with respect to the circumstances of the 
offense.  Just as such a trial court finding would be relevant in determining the 
actual gravity of a defendant‘s conduct when the finding is favorable to the 
 
(footnote continued on next page) 
 
47 
Under California‘s Three Strikes law, the sentence that is actually imposed 
upon a defendant in a particular case is dependent not only upon the nature and 
number of the defendant‘s prior criminal convictions and whether he or she is 
convicted in the current prosecution of a felony offense, but also upon the 
prosecutor‘s exercise of prosecutorial discretion in determining how many prior 
convictions to charge in the case.  (§§ 667, subd. (f)(2), 1170.12, subd. (d)(2).)  In 
addition, and most significantly for the issue before us in this case, the sentence 
that is actually imposed under the Three Strikes law is frequently dependent upon 
the trial court‘s exercise of discretion in determining whether, in furtherance of 
                                                                                                                                                              
(footnote continued from previous page) 
 
defendant, logic and fairness dictate that such a finding is similarly relevant when 
the finding is unfavorable to the defendant.  Nothing in Ewing or Harmelin, supra, 
501 U.S. 957 provides any support for petitioner‘s position, and the hypothetical 
questions posed by Justice Liu‘s concurring opinion — describing issues not 
presented by this case — simply ignore the limits on the Apprendi line of cases set 
forth in the controlling precedent. 
 
Furthermore, although Justice Liu‘s concurring opinion asserts that the 
court‘s opinion ―does not actually resolve petitioner‘s Apprendi claim‖ (conc. opn. 
of Liu, J., post, pp. 2, 8), that assertion is simply incorrect.  Justice Liu‘s 
concurring opinion maintains that ―[l]ogically, a rejection of petitioner‘s claim on 
the merits must rest on a conclusion (1) that his intentional refusal to register is not 
a fact essential to the legality of his sentence under the Eighth Amendment or (2) 
that even if it were such an essential fact, Apprendi would not apply.‖  (Conc. opn. 
of Liu, J., post, at pp. 3-4.)  But the concurring opinion‘s effort to reduce our 
rejection of petitioner‘s argument to those two alternate conclusions incorrectly 
frames the issue.  We do not have to decide whether petitioner‘s ―intentional 
refusal to register [is or] is not a fact essential to the legality of his sentence under 
the Eighth Amendment‖ in order to resolve petitioner‘s Apprendi claim, because 
(1) petitioner has conceded that there is no Eighth Amendment violation if his 
refusal to register was intentional (see, ante, pp. 35-36), (2) the trial court found 
that petitioner‘s refusal to register was intentional, and (3) this opinion holds that 
the trial court‘s finding in this regard may properly be considered in an Eighth 
Amendment challenge and that such consideration does not violate Apprendi.  
Thus, this opinion fully resolves petitioner‘s Apprendi claim. 
 
48 
justice, to strike any of the serious or violent prior convictions that have been 
charged by the prosecutor and, if so, how many prior convictions to strike.  (See 
generally People v. Superior Court (Romero), supra, 13 Cal.4th 497; People v. 
Williams (1998) 17 Cal.4th 148.)  Among the factors that a trial court may 
properly consider in determining whether to strike a prior conviction under the 
Three Strikes law are ―the nature and circumstances of the defendant‘s present 
felonies . . . .‖  (People v. Williams, supra, at p. 161.)  Accordingly, a trial court‘s 
factual determinations with regard to the nature and circumstances of a 
defendant‘s triggering offense may play a significant role in determining the 
sentence that is actually imposed upon the defendant under the Three Strikes law.  
(See, e.g., People v. Garcia (1999) 20 Cal.4th 490, 499 (Garcia) [―A court might 
. . . be justified in striking prior conviction allegations with respect to a relatively 
minor current felony, while considering those prior convictions with respect to a 
serious or violent current felony‖].) 
In light of this statutory scheme, a court that is evaluating whether the 
sentence that has been imposed upon a defendant under the Three Strikes law 
constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment 
must be able to consider and take into account the trial court‘s factual findings 
regarding the circumstances related to the triggering offense.  In the present case, 
for example, the trial court‘s comments distinguishing the facts of the present case 
from the facts involved in People v. Cluff, supra, 87 Cal.App.4th 991, suggest that 
if the trial court had found that petitioner had registered his current Palmdale 
address upon his release from prison in January 2001 and had simply negligently 
failed to update that accurate registration within five working days of his May 
2001 birthday, the trial court may not have imposed the 25-year-to-life sentence 
that petitioner now challenges.  Thus, in order to understand the actual criminal 
conduct upon which a sentence that has been imposed under the Three Strikes law 
 
49 
is based, a court, in evaluating a claim of gross disproportionality under the Eighth 
Amendment, must take into account a trial court‘s factual findings regarding the 
circumstances of the triggering offense. 
Under section 1385, although a trial court is required to state on the record 
its reasons for striking a prior conviction (§ 1385, subd. (a)), there is no similar 
statutory requirement of an on-the-record statement of reasons when a court 
declines to strike a prior.  (See In re Large (2007) 41 Cal.4th 538, 550.)  But 
when, as in the present case, a trial court explicitly explains its reasons for 
declining to strike prior convictions for sentencing purposes, it is appropriate to 
rely upon the trial court‘s reasons and findings in evaluating petitioner‘s Eighth 
Amendment claim.  (Accord, Carmony I, supra, 33 Cal.4th at pp. 373, 378-379 
[relying upon trial court‘s statement of reasons in finding that court did not abuse 
its discretion under § 1385 in declining to strike priors]; Garcia, supra, 20 Cal.4th 
at pp. 494-503 [relying upon trial court‘s statement of reasons in finding that court 
did not abuse its discretion in declining to strike priors with respect to one count 
but in striking priors with respect to a separate count].)   
In the present case, in view of the evidence presented at trial, the record is 
clearly adequate to support the trial court‘s finding that petitioner failed to register 
at the Palmdale sheriff‘s department upon his release from prison in January 2001.  
As we have seen, the clerk in charge of registering all sex offenders at the 
Palmdale sheriff‘s department testified that she was positive that petitioner had not 
registered in Palmdale, and one of the arresting law enforcement officers testified 
that, at the time of his arrest, petitioner admitted that he had failed to register upon 
his release from prison because ―he wanted to try to get by through life without 
contact with the sheriff‘s department or parole.‖  Further, although petitioner 
denied making the statement attributed to him by the arresting officer and testified 
that he had registered in Palmdale upon his release from prison in January 2001 
 
50 
and had received a document attesting to that registration which he kept in the 
nightstand next to his bed, petitioner admitted that, at the time of his arrest, he did 
not inform the officers that he had in fact registered in the Palmdale sheriff‘s 
department or indicate that the documentation of the registration could be found in 
his nightstand.  The arresting officers testified that although other important papers 
belonging to defendant were found in the nightstand, no documentation of his 
registration as a sex offender was found there.  Finally, in addition to the evidence 
presented at trial, documentation submitted by the prosecution at the sentencing 
hearing established that, although he was required to do so, petitioner had failed to 
contact his parole officer upon his release from prison in January 2001.  Under 
these circumstances, the record is unquestionably adequate to support the trial 
court‘s rejection of petitioner‘s trial testimony that he had registered as a sex 
offender upon his arrival in Palmdale in January 2001. 
In view of the trial court‘s findings at the sentencing hearing, the 
circumstances of the triggering offense in this case are clearly distinguishable 
from the circumstances that underlay the decisions in Carmony II and Gonzalez.  
Because the trial court found that petitioner deliberately failed to register as a sex 
offender even though he knew he had an obligation to do so, petitioner‘s triggering 
offense demonstrated that, notwithstanding the significant punishment that he had 
incurred as a result of his prior serious and violent felony convictions, petitioner 
was still intentionally unwilling to comply with important legal requirements 
prescribed by the state‘s criminal laws.  As a consequence, petitioner‘s current 
criminal conduct and conviction clearly bore a rational and substantial relationship 
to the antirecidivist purposes of the Three Strikes law.  (Accord, In re Large, 
supra, 41 Cal.4th at p. 552.) 
Furthermore, as the United States Supreme Court explained in Ewing, 
supra, 538 U.S. 11, in determining the gravity of petitioner‘s conduct in evaluating 
 
51 
an Eighth Amendment challenge to a sentence imposed under a recidivist 
sentencing statute, we must consider not only petitioner‘s triggering offense but 
also the nature and extent of petitioner‘s criminal history.  (Ewing, supra, at p. 29 
[―In weighing the gravity of Ewing‘s offense, we must place on the scales not only 
his current felony, but also his long history of felony recidivism‖].)  In light of the 
particularly heinous nature of petitioner‘s prior criminal activity (see, ante, pp. 5-6 
& fn. 3), petitioner‘s present offense ― reflecting a deliberate decision by 
petitioner to refuse to comply with an important legal obligation ― may properly 
be viewed as an indicator of potentially significant future dangerousness.  Taking 
into account both the circumstances of petitioner‘s triggering offense and 
petitioner‘s very serious criminal history, we conclude that the 25-year-to-life 
sentence imposed upon petitioner does not constitute cruel and unusual 
punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment. 
 
V.  Disposition 
The Court of Appeal judgment, denying the petition for habeas corpus, is 
affirmed. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CANTIL-SAKAUYE, C. J. 
 
WE CONCUR: 
 
KENNARD, J. 
BAXTER, J. 
CHIN, J. 
CORRIGAN, J.
 
 
1 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CONCURRING OPINION BY WERDEGAR, J. 
 
 
I concur in the majority opinion except for its response to petitioner‘s 
belated claim under Apprendi v. New Jersey (2000) 530 U.S. 466, which petitioner 
in my view has forfeited by failing to raise it below.  I share Justice Liu‘s concern 
that the majority opinion, in choosing to address Apprendi‘s application to 
petitioner‘s sentence, does not fully respond to petitioner‘s argument.  (See conc. 
opn. of Liu, J., post.)   
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
WERDEGAR, J.
 
 
1 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CONCURRING OPINION BY LIU, J. 
 
 
I join the opinion of the court except for its treatment of petitioner‘s claim 
that the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial, as interpreted by Apprendi v. New 
Jersey (2000) 530 U.S. 466 (Apprendi) and related precedent, constrains our 
consideration of the circumstances of his triggering offense.  (Maj. opn, ante, at 
pp. 42–47.)  As explained below, I would not decide the merits of petitioner‘s 
claim and instead would deem it forfeited. 
Petitioner was charged with two felony offenses:  failure to register as a sex 
offender upon arrival in a jurisdiction and failure to update his sex offender 
registration within five working days of his birthday.  The jury acquitted petitioner 
of the former offense and convicted him of the latter.  Before the sentencing 
hearing, petitioner asked the trial court to strike at least two of his three prior 
felony convictions.  He relied on the assertedly minor and nonaggravated nature of 
his conviction for failing to update his registration and argued that, in his case, a 
25-year-to-life sentence would constitute cruel and unusual punishment in 
violation of the Eighth Amendment.  In denying this request, the trial court relied 
in significant part on its finding that petitioner had intentionally failed to register 
upon his arrival in Palmdale, despite the jury‘s acquittal of petitioner on that 
count.  The trial court subsequently imposed a 25-year-to-life sentence. 
 
 
2 
Petitioner did not object to the trial court‘s finding or to the trial court‘s 
reliance on that finding in denying his request to strike his prior convictions.  Nor 
did petitioner raise an Apprendi claim in the Court of Appeal or in any of his 
briefing in this court — not even after the Attorney General, in her answer brief, 
cited the trial court‘s finding as a reason to deny petitioner relief.  Only after this 
court directed the parties to be prepared to discuss at oral argument the 
significance of the trial court‘s finding to the Eighth Amendment challenge did 
petitioner raise his Apprendi claim.  No lower courts have previously considered 
the issue.  Accordingly, I would reject petitioner‘s claim as forfeited.  (People v. 
Heard (2003) 31 Cal.4th 946, 972, fn. 12.)   
Although today‘s opinion considers the merits of petitioner‘s Apprendi 
claim, its discussion does not actually resolve that claim despite the court‘s 
assertion to the contrary (maj. opn., ante, at p. 47, fn. 19).  The court says ―the 
Apprendi line of decisions does not apply to the present context.  Both the United 
States Supreme Court and this court have expressly held that a trial court, in 
exercising its discretion in sentencing a defendant on an offense of which he or she 
has been convicted, may take into account the court‘s own factual findings with 
regard to the defendant‘s conduct related to an offense of which the defendant has 
been acquitted, so long as the trial court properly finds that the evidence 
establishes such conduct by a preponderance of the evidence.  (See, e.g., [United 
States v.] Watts [(1987)] 519 U.S. 148, 155-157; [People v.] Towne [(2008)] 44 
Cal.4th 63, 85–88.)‖  (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 44.)  According to the court, ―the 
constitutional principle established by the Apprendi line of decisions is not 
violated by a trial court‘s own factual findings regarding ‗the real conduct that 
underlies the [defendant‘s] criminal conviction‘ ([United States v. Booker (2005) 
543 U.S. 220, 250]) so long as, under the applicable statutory scheme, the findings 
do not mandate a particular sentence but leave the trial court free to exercise 
 
 
3 
sentencing discretion.  (Id. at pp. 259-265.)‖  (Maj. opn., ante, at pp. 44–45.)  
These precedents ―clearly establish that petitioner‘s Apprendi claim lacks merit,‖ 
the court says, because the trial court‘s finding of petitioner‘s intentional failure to 
register ―did not mandate a particular sentence under the Three Strikes law; the 
court simply relied upon its factual determination regarding petitioner‘s course of 
conduct in exercising the discretion afforded by the Three Strikes statutory scheme 
in choosing a sentence within the maximum term statutorily authorized by the 
jury‘s verdict.‖  (Id. at pp. 45, 46, fn. 19.) 
The court is undoubtedly correct that under Watts, Towne, and Booker, a 
trial court may consider its own findings in exercising its sentencing discretion 
within the maximum term lawfully authorized by the jury‘s verdict.  But those 
cases did not consider, much less answer, whether Apprendi‘s requirement of a 
jury finding applies to a fact essential to the legality of a sentence under the Eighth 
Amendment.  Petitioner‘s claim is not that Apprendi constrains the trial court‘s 
sentencing discretion within the lawfully authorized range; of course it doesn‘t.  
His claim is that Apprendi constrains the trial court‘s sentencing discretion under 
the Three Strikes law when a 25-year-to-life sentence would exceed the lawful 
maximum — that is, it would violate the Eighth Amendment — but for the finding 
of an essential fact, namely, his intentional failure to register upon his arrival in 
Palmdale.  In Towne, we said that Apprendi applies ― ‗to a fact that is ―legally 
essential to the punishment‖ [citation], that is, to ―any fact that exposes a 
defendant to a greater potential sentence‖ than is authorized by the jury‘s verdict 
alone [citation].‘ ‖  (People v. Towne, supra, 44 Cal.4th at p. 86.)  That is what 
petitioner is arguing here:  because a 25-year-to-life sentence would be 
unconstitutional but for a finding that he intentionally refused to register, that 
finding must be made by a jury beyond a reasonable doubt. 
 
 
4 
Logically, a rejection of petitioner‘s claim on the merits must rest on a 
conclusion (1) that his intentional refusal to register is not a fact essential to the 
legality of his sentence under the Eighth Amendment or (2) that even if it were 
such an essential fact, Apprendi would not apply. 
As to the first possibility, the court explains that petitioner‘s intentional 
failure to register is a major factor supporting its ―conclu[sion] that the 
circumstances surrounding petitioner‘s triggering offense distinguish this case 
from [People v. Carmony (2005) 127 Cal.App.4th 1066] and Gonzalez [v. Duncan 
(9th Cir. 2008) 551 F.3d 875] and are more comparable to [People v.] Nichols 
[(2009) 176 Cal.App.4th 428] and Crosby [v. Schwartz (9th Cir. 2012) 678 F.3d 
784].‖  (Maj. opn., ante, at p. 37; see id. at pp. 37–40.)  But the court does not say 
one way or the other whether the fact of petitioner‘s intentional failure to register 
is determinative of the Eighth Amendment issue.  (See id. at p. 51 [―Taking into 
account both the circumstances of petitioner‘s triggering offense and petitioner‘s 
very serious criminal history, we conclude that the 25-year-to-life sentence 
imposed upon petitioner does not constitute cruel and unusual punishment in 
violation of the Eighth Amendment.‖].) 
There would be no need to conclude that petitioner‘s intentional failure to 
register is not a fact essential to the legality of his sentence under the Eighth 
Amendment if the court were to conclude instead that even if that fact were 
essential, Apprendi still does not apply.  But today‘s opinion does not say that 
either, and the issue is not an easy one. 
The main argument for Apprendi‘s inapplicability in this context seems to 
be that Apprendi applies to situations where the facts authorizing a particular 
sentence are legislatively specified.  (See Apprendi, supra, 530 U.S. at p. 490 
[―Other than the fact of a prior conviction, any fact that increases the penalty for a 
crime beyond the prescribed statutory maximum must be submitted to a jury, and 
 
 
5 
proved beyond a reasonable doubt.‖  (Italics added.)].)  In the Eighth Amendment 
context, by contrast, the facts relevant to the legality of a sentence are specified by 
a court.  It is certainly plausible that the Apprendi principle applies only to those 
facts that a legislature enacting the majority will, and not a court interpreting the 
Eighth Amendment, deems essential to authorize a particular maximum sentence.  
But there are serious counterarguments.  In Ring v. Arizona (2002) 536 U.S. 
584 (Ring), the United States Supreme Court held that aggravating factors required 
for imposition of the death penalty must be found by a jury, not by a judge.  
Although the aggravating factors in Ring were statutorily specified, they were 
specified by statute only because the high court‘s Eighth Amendment 
jurisprudence had required legislatures to specify such factors to distinguish death-
eligible from death-ineligible crimes.  (See id. at p. 606.)  Justice Scalia, who has 
long disagreed with that aspect of the high court‘s Eighth Amendment 
jurisprudence, observed that Ring posed for him the following ―quandary‖:  
―Should I continue to apply the last-stated principle when I know that the only 
reason the fact is essential is that this Court has mistakenly said that the 
Constitution requires state law to impose such ‗aggravating factors‘?‖  (Id. at 
pp. 610–611 (conc. opn. by Scalia, J.).)  Justice Scalia resolved his quandary by 
joining the Ring majority in applying Apprendi.  In light of Ring, it is debatable 
whether the Apprendi principle extends not only to statutorily prescribed minimum 
facts, but also to minimum facts with constitutional origins. 
Take another example.  The high court in Enmund v. Florida (1982) 458 
U.S. 782, 797 held that the Eighth Amendment forbids imposition of the death 
penalty on a defendant ―who does not himself kill, attempt to kill, or intend that a 
killing take place or that lethal force will be employed.‖  (See also Tison v. 
Arizona (1987) 481 U.S. 137, 158 [concluding that ―major participation in the 
felony committed, combined with reckless indifference to human life,‖ satisfied 
 
 
6 
Enmund].)  Assume there are three states with the following laws.  The first state, 
even before Enmund, had adopted a statute requiring a finding that a defendant 
killed, attempted to kill, or intended that a killing occur in order to render the 
defendant death-eligible.  The second, in response to Enmund, enacted an identical 
statute on the assumption that it was required to do so.  The third enacts no 
legislation but, under Enmund, still may not impose the death penalty on a 
defendant who did not kill, attempt to kill, or intend a killing occur.  The statutory 
findings required by the first two states are undoubtedly subject to Apprendi.  Can 
it really be that the same findings in the third state are not, simply because the 
third state has not implemented Enmund through a legislative enactment?  Ring 
emphasized that ―the dispositive question . . . ‗is one not of form, but of effect.‘ ‖  
(Ring, supra, 536 U.S. at p. 602, quoting Apprendi, supra, 530 U.S. at p. 494.)  
And although Cabana v. Bullock (1986) 474 U.S. 376 held that the Sixth 
Amendment does not require an Enmund finding to be made by a jury, that case 
preceded Apprendi and Ring.  (See Ring, supra, 536 U.S. at pp. 598, 609 [finding 
Walton v. Arizona (1990) 497 U.S. 639 ―irreconcilable‖ with Apprendi and noting 
that ―Walton drew support from Cabana v. Bullock‖].) 
Booker also suggests that the applicability of Apprendi‘s principle is not 
limited to legislatively prescribed facts that are essential to punishment.  There, the 
high court considered whether the Apprendi principle applied to the federal 
sentencing guidelines.  The Attorney General argued that Apprendi did not apply 
to the guidelines because, among other reasons, they were promulgated by the 
United States Sentencing Commission, not by Congress.  (United States v. Booker, 
supra, 543 U.S. at p. 237 (Booker); see Mistretta v. United States (1989) 488 U.S. 
361, 368 [U.S. Sentencing Com. is an independent agency located in the federal 
judicial branch].)  The high court rejected this argument as ―lack[ing] 
constitutional significance.‖  (Booker, at p. 237.)  It was sufficient for purposes of 
 
 
7 
Apprendi that the guidelines set forth facts essential to imposing particular 
sentences.  (Booker, at p. 238.)  ―Regardless of whether Congress or a Sentencing 
Commission concluded that a particular fact must be proved in order to sentence a 
defendant within a particular range,‖ the fact must be found by a jury beyond a 
reasonable doubt.  (Ibid.) 
The high court in Booker expressly and approvingly noted that its 
conclusion went beyond the four corners of Apprendi:  ―The Government correctly 
notes that in Apprendi we referred to ‗ ―any fact that increases the penalty for a 
crime beyond the prescribed statutory maximum . . . .‖ ‘  Brief for United States 15 
(quoting Apprendi, 530 U.S., at 490 (emphasis in Brief for United States)).  The 
simple answer, of course, is that we were only considering a statute in that case 
. . . .  [¶] More important than the language used in our holding in Apprendi are the 
principles we sought to vindicate.  Those principles are unquestionably applicable 
to the Guidelines.  They are not the product of recent innovations in our 
jurisprudence, but rather have their genesis in the ideals our constitutional tradition 
assimilated from the common law.  [Citation.]  The Framers of the Constitution 
understood the threat of ‗judicial despotism‘ that could arise from ‗arbitrary 
punishments upon arbitrary convictions‘ without the benefit of a jury in criminal 
cases.  The Federalist No. 83, p. 499 (C. Rossiter ed. 1961) (A. Hamilton). . . .  
Regardless of whether the legal basis of the accusation is in a statute or in 
guidelines promulgated by an independent commission, the principles behind the 
jury trial right are equally applicable.‖  (Booker, supra, 543 U.S. at pp. 238–239.)  
Booker further suggests the absence of any bright line limiting Apprendi‘s 
applicability to essential facts established by a legislative enactment. 
The entirety of the court‘s discussion of petitioner‘s Apprendi claim is 
premised on the notion that a 25-year-to-life sentence is a lawfully authorized 
maximum sentence for petitioner‘s third-strike felony.  The court‘s embrace of 
 
 
8 
that premise is revealed in its statement that ―[j]ust as such a trial court finding 
[concerning the circumstances of the offense] would be relevant in determining 
the actual gravity of a defendant‘s conduct when the finding is favorable to the 
defendant, logic and fairness dictate that such a finding is similarly relevant when 
the finding is unfavorable to the defendant.‖  (Maj. opn., ante, at pp. 46–47, 
fn. 19.)  That statement is only true when a trial court is exercising its discretion to 
choose a sentence up to and including the lawfully authorized maximum.  
However, petitioner‘s Apprendi claim fundamentally rests on the proposition that 
a 25-year-to-life sentence, though authorized by the Three Strikes law, would be 
unauthorized by the Eighth Amendment but for the fact that petitioner 
intentionally failed to register upon his arrival in Palmdale.  Because the court 
neither disagrees with that proposition nor finds the Apprendi principle 
inapplicable despite that proposition, today‘s opinion does not actually resolve 
petitioner‘s Apprendi claim. 
In sum, petitioner raised the Apprendi claim only at the last minute when 
prompted to do so by this court.  Accordingly, I would reject the claim as forfeited 
instead of considering it on the merits.  In all other respects, I join the opinion of 
the court. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
LIU, J. 
 
 
See next page for addresses and telephone numbers for counsel who argued in Supreme Court. 
 
Name of Opinion In re Coley 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Unpublished Opinion 
Original Appeal 
Original Proceeding 
Review Granted XXX 187 Cal.App.4th 138 
Rehearing Granted 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Opinion No. S185303 
Date Filed: August 30, 2012 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Court: Superior 
County: Los Angeles 
Judge: Dorothy L. Shubin 
 
__________________________________________________________________________________ 
 
Counsel: 
 
Nancy L. Tetreault, under appointment by the Supreme Court, for Petitioner Willie Clifford Coley. 
 
Michael Vitiello, Patrick Blood and Gary Mandinach for California State Public Defenders Association as 
Amicus Curiae on behalf of Petitioner Willie Clifford Coley. 
 
Richard Such for California Attorneys for Criminal Justice as Amicus Curiae on behalf of Petitioner Willie 
Clifford Coley. 
 
Edmund G. Brown, Jr., and Kamala D. Harris, Attorneys General, Dane R. Gillette, Chief Assistant 
Attorney General, Pamela C. Hamanaka, Assistant Attorney General, Lawrence M. Daniels, Victoria B. 
Wilson, Janet E. Neeley and Noah P. Hill, Deputy Attorneys General, for Respondent State of California. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Counsel who argued in Supreme Court (not intended for publication with opinion): 
 
Nancy L. Tetreault 
346 No. Larchmont Blvd., Suite100 
Los Angeles, CA  90004 
(310) 832-6233 
 
Noah P. Hill 
Deputy Attorney General 
300 South Spring Street, Suite 1702 
Los Angeles, CA  90013 
(213) 897-8884