Opinion ID: 883852
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: federal proportionality review

Text: Enmund v. Florida (1982), 458 U.S. 782, 102 S.Ct. 3368, 73 L.Ed.2d 1140 and Tison v. Arizona (1987), 481 U.S. 137, 107 S.Ct. 1676, 95 L.Ed.2d 127 mark the starting point for federal proportionality review in the context of accomplice liability. In Enmund, the defendant drove a getaway car and his two colleagues killed two intended robbery victims. The Florida court sentenced the defendant to death for his conviction of murder, based on felony-murder and accomplice-liability theories. Enmund, 458 U.S. at 786, 102 S.Ct. at 3370-71. The United States Supreme Court held that death is a disproportionate penalty for one who neither took life, attempted to take life, nor intended to take life. Enmund, 458 U.S. at 787, 801, 102 S.Ct. at 3371, 3378. The Court applied federal proportionality principles found in Lockett, 438 U.S. 586, 98 S.Ct. 2954, and Woodson, 428 U.S. 280, 96 S.Ct. 2978, and focused its inquiry on Enmund's personal culpability. The Court concluded that: Enmund did not kill or intend to kill and thus his culpability is plainly different from that of the robbers who killed; yet the State treated them alike and attributed to Enmund the culpability of those who killed the [victims]. This was impermissible under the Eighth Amendment. Enmund, 458 U.S. at 798, 102 S.Ct. at 3377. In 1987, the Court decided Tison, 481 U.S. 137, 107 S.Ct. 1676. Tison did not overrule Enmund; however, it arguably restricted its scope. Although the Tison brothers, like Enmund, did not kill or attempt to kill, their case was unlike Enmund's case in that their participation in the crime was judged major and their mental state highly culpable,  one that was characterized as showing reckless indifference to human life. Tison, 481 U.S. at 157-58, 107 S.Ct. at 1687-89. The Tison defendants were brothers who had helped arrange the escape from prison of their father and his cell mate, both convicted murderers. Their getaway car broke down and the group decided to steal another car from a passing motorist. A family stopped to help the group and the group forced them off the highway and down a dirt road. The defendants' father told his sons to return to the car for some water and when they returned the defendants witnessed their father and his cell mate shotgun the family to death. The defendants were tried, convicted, and sentenced to death under Arizona's felony-murder and accomplice liability statutes. Tison, 481 U.S. at 139-42, 107 S.Ct. at 1678-80. On appeal, the defendants argued that their death sentences were disproportionate, and therefore, in violation of the Eighth Amendment, as construed in Enmund. The Supreme Court disagreed and found that Enmund left open the intermediate case of the defendant whose participation is major and whose mental state is one of reckless indifference to the value of human life. Tison, 481 U.S. at 152, 107 S.Ct. at 1685. The Court addressed the defendants' contention that they did not, in Enmund's terms, kill, attempt to kill, or intend to kill, when it stated: A narrow focus on the question of whether or not a given defendant intended to kill, however, is a highly unsatisfactory means of definitively distinguishing the most culpable and dangerous of murderers. Many who intend to, and do, kill are not criminally liable at all  those who act in self-defense or with other justification or excuse.... On the other hand, some nonintentional murderers may be among the most dangerous and inhumane of all  the person who tortures another not caring whether the victim lives or dies, or the robber who shoots someone in the course of the robbery, utterly indifferent to the fact that the desire to rob may have the unintended consequence of killing the victim as well as taking the victim's property. This reckless indifference to the value of human life may be every bit as shocking to the moral sense as an `intent to kill.' ... [W]e hold that the reckless disregard for human life implicit in knowingly engaging in criminal activities known to carry a grave risk of death represents a highly culpable mental state, a mental state that may be taken into account in making a capital sentencing judgment when that conduct causes its natural, though also not inevitable, lethal result. Tison, 481 U.S. at 157-58, 107 S.Ct. at 1687-88. Therefore, because the Tisons' participation in the underlying crime was deemed substantial, in that each was actively involved in every element of the kidnapping-robbery and was physically present during the entire sequence of criminal activity culminating in the murder, and because actual armed escape and kidnapping involved a reckless indifference to human life, the Court held that the Tisons' conduct did not fall within the confines of Enmund. Tison, 481 U.S. at 158, 107 S.Ct. at 1688. On the basis of Enmund and Tison, [i]t is now clear, as a matter of federal proportionality principles, that capital punishment may be imposed on one who commits a homicide without the purpose or knowledge that death will result, at least to the extent that the defendant's conduct can be characterized as recklessly indifferent to human life. State v. Gerald (1988), 113 N.J. 40, 549 A.2d 792, 810. However, this approach has been criticized by both courts and scholars. As one author stated: [T]he . . . lack of an identifiable core inherent in the Tison rule renders it incapable of carrying out any constitutionally meaningful delineation between classes of felony murder accomplices because every felony murder accomplice arguably is recklessly indifferent. .... . . . Simply because a court can say that a defendant was recklessly indifferent does not mean that a death penalty is not grossly disproportionate under the eighth amendment. Only by considering all of the factors in a case can a court make this decision. Richard A. Rosen, Felony Murder and the Eighth Amendment Jurisprudence of Death, 31 B.C.L.Rev. 1103, 1163, 1167 (1990). Another criticized Tison for its failure to distinguish between those felons who should be sentenced to death from those who should not: By failing to define the terms of its new standard, such as major participation or reckless indifference for human life, the Tison Court did not clearly differentiate those felony murderers who should not receive the death penalty from those who should. Thus, by manipulating the facts, or the terms of the new standard, lower courts are free to impose the death penalty on all felony murderers unless the court is presented with a fact pattern identical to that in the Enmund decision. She continues: The Tison Court's imposition of the death penalty with only superficial regard to the defendant's blameworthiness has effectively allowed courts to disregard the defendant's state of mind or level of culpability in their evaluation of death sentences. Many courts have simply inferred the reckless indifference to human life, required by Tison from a defendant's major participation in a felony, and have found the Tison standards are thus satisfied. By disregarding the teachings of Furman [ v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238, 92 S.Ct. 2726, 33 L.Ed.2d 346 (1972)], Gregg, and Coker on how punishment must be proportionate to the crime, courts are imposing the death penalty arbitrarily and without regard to individual culpability, a result which would appear to overreach the Court's intent in Tison and violate the eighth amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. Note, Constitutionalizing the Death Penalty for Accomplices to Felony Murder, 26 Am. Crim.L.Rev. 463, 482, 489-490. This concern is echoed by others who criticize Tison for its new standards. For example, one author deplores the Court's use of the term recklessness: Not only is the Court's new language likely to lead to disparate applications among the states, but the standard also is inconsistent with the major principle of Furman and recognized in Enmund. Inherent in Enmund 's requirement of an individualized consideration of culpability is the idea that the death penalty, typically a punishment reserved for first-degree murder, should not be inflicted on one whose level of culpability is not equivalent to that of other death penalty recipients. Thus, Enmund prohibited using the element of participation in the felony to supply the intent requirement for first-degree murder at the sentencing stage. . . . . The Tison Court further confuses the issue by collapsing the element of a high level of participation in the underlying felony into the reckless indifference element.... Collapsing the issues in this way endangers the individualized consideration of culpability required in death penalty cases. . . . Note, Overstepping Precedent? Tison v. Arizona Imposes the Death Penalty on Felony Murder Accomplices, 66 N.C.L.Rev. 817, 835-36. In addition, some scholars criticize the Tison Court for its failure to address the two acceptable goals of capital punishment  deterrence and retribution: If neither [deterrence nor retribution] is realized then the penalty is nothing more than the purposeless and needless imposition of pain and suffering. Without intent to kill, which is commonly considered to establish the highest degree of culpability, it is questionable that the death penalty, the most extreme form of retribution, is proportionate. As for deterrence, the Enmund Court made clear that only those who premeditate and deliberate can be deterred. The Court stated if a person does not intend that life will be taken, or that lethal force will be employed by others, the possibility that the death penalty will be imposed for vicarious felony murder will not `enter into the cold calculus that precedes the decision to act.' Note, Overstepping Precedent?, 66 N.C.L.Rev. at 833 (footnotes omitted). Other scholars have lamented the application of the death penalty to the nontriggerman accomplice. As Richard Garnett stated: [T]he nontriggerman convicted of felony murder is three times removed from the locus of blame: the killing is murder by reason of the felony murder rule, the defendant is responsible for the killing under accomplice liability principles, and he faces the executioner because of the manner in which another person killed. Such a defendant may be at the outer reaches of personal culpability, yet still face death. Richard W. Garnett, Depravity Thrice Removed: Using the Heinous, Cruel, or Depraved Factor to Aggravate Convictions of Nontriggermen Accomplices in Capital Cases, 103 Yale L.J. 2471, 2473 (1994). Courts, too, have criticized the state of federal proportionality review in the post- Tison era. As the New Jersey Supreme Court noted in Gerald: The failure to distinguish, for purpose of punishment, those who intend the death of their victim from those who do not does violence to the basic principle stated [in Tison ] that the more purposeful the conduct, the more serious is the offense, and, therefore, the more severely it ought to be punished. Tison, 481 U.S. at 156, 107 S.Ct. at 1687. [4] Gerald, 549 A.2d at 815. In Vernon Kills On Top I, we cited Tison for the proposition that major participation in the felony committed, combined with reckless indifference to human life, is sufficient to satisfy the Enmund culpability requirement, and concluded that the fact that [Vernon] did not deliver the final fatal blows does not preclude imposition of the death penalty. Vernon Kills On Top I, 243 Mont. at 106, 793 P.2d at 1307. This Court then considered (despite Vernon's failure to argue the issue) the statutory requirement that the sentence not be excessive or disproportionate to the penalty imposed in similar cases, considering both the crimes and the defendants. The Court's brief discussion on proportionality included a list of the cases to which it had compared Vernon's sentence. Vernon Kills On Top I, 243 Mont. at 108, 793 P.2d at 1308. These included: State v. Lester Kills On Top (1990), 241 Mont. 378, 787 P.2d 336; State v. Dawson (1988), 233 Mont. 345, 761 P.2d 352; State v. Keefe (1988), 232 Mont. 258, 759 P.2d 128; State v. Smith (1985), 217 Mont. 461, 705 P.2d 1087; State v. Fitzpatrick (1980), 186 Mont. 187, 606 P.2d 1343; State v. Coleman (1979), 185 Mont. 299, 605 P.2d 1000; State v. McKenzie (1976), 171 Mont. 278, 557 P.2d 1023. The court noted that each of the cases, except Keefe, involved a death penalty imposed for the aggravated kidnapping and subsequent death of a victim. Vernon Kills On Top I, 243 Mont. at 109, 793 P.2d at 1308. This Court concluded that Vernon was a major participant in the crimes committed, and that he exhibited a reckless disregard for human life. Vernon Kills On Top I, 243 Mont. at 109, 793 P.2d at 1309. Our prior review, however, was flawed based on even the Tison standard. First, the cases the Court compared are markedly dissimilar to Vernon's case because, while Vernon was not present at the actual murder and arguably displayed no intent to kill the victim, the defendant in each of the comparable cases was the principle actor (and not the nontriggerman) in the actual killing. [5] In addition, Vernon's sentence was not compared to that of Diane Bull Coming, who, based on everyone's testimony, including her own, was more directly involved in Etchemendy's death than Vernon. Second, Vernon's case presents a situation more similar to the facts of Enmund than the facts of Tison. The defendants in Tison provided firearms to convicted murderers to aid their escape from prison and were admittedly willing to kill, if necessary, in furtherance of that escape. In addition, the Tison court attached significance to the fact that the defendants were physically present when the murders were committed. Justice O'Connor, speaking for the majority, emphasized: Far from merely sitting in a car away from the actual scene of the murders acting as the getaway driver to a robbery, each petitioner was actively involved in every element of the kidnapping-robbery and was physically present during the entire sequence of criminal activity culminating in the murder of the Lyons family and the subsequent flight. Tison, 481 U.S. at 158, 107 S.Ct. at 1688 (emphasis added). For these reasons we reverse our prior conclusion that based on a review for proportionality pursuant to the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the State proved sufficient culpability on the part of Vernon for the death of John Martin Etchemendy, Jr., to justify imposition of a death sentence. However, because we conclude that Tison does not provide sufficient guidance for future determination of who can and who cannot be constitutionally sentenced to death under Montana's Constitution, we choose to afford clearer protection consistent with the standard in Enmund under Montana's Constitution, and therefore, the following discussion is necessary.