Opinion ID: 1907308
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: RING and FURMAN

Text: As I have previously stated, I believe that the United States Supreme Court's decision in Ring is clearly the most significant death penalty decision since the Court's seminal decision in Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238, 92 S.Ct. 2726, 33 L.Ed.2d 346 (1972). See Bottoson v. Moore, 833 So.2d 693, 703 (Fla.2002) (Anstead, C.J., concurring in result only). In fact, the Supreme Court's decision in Ring represents the convergence of two separate lines of cases involving important constitutional safeguards in death penalty jurisprudence. [15] The first set of safeguards sprang from the Supreme Court's Furman decision and subsequent cases which held that the Eighth Amendment requires states to adopt safeguards protecting against arbitrary and capricious impositions of the death sentence. See, e.g., Loving v. United States, 517 U.S. 748, 755, 116 S.Ct. 1737, 135 L.Ed.2d 36 (1996); Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153, 176-78, 96 S.Ct. 2909, 49 L.Ed.2d 859 (1976); Proffitt v. Florida, 428 U.S. 242, 252-53, 96 S.Ct. 2960, 49 L.Ed.2d 913 (1976). As a result of Furman and its progeny, states began adopt[ing] various narrowing factors that limit the class of offenders upon which the sentencer is authorized to impose the death penalty. Sawyer v. Whitley, 505 U.S. 333, 341-42, 112 S.Ct. 2514, 120 L.Ed.2d 269 (1992). [16] These narrowing factors are usually set out in a list of aggravating factors that might be utilized in sentencing in cases where the death penalty is authorized as a permissible and possible sanction. The second line of cases is based on the Sixth Amendment right to a trial by jury and the extent to which the Sixth Amendment requires a jury, and not a judge, to determine the existence of any facts necessary to sentence an individual for an enhanced crime. See Ring v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 584, 122 S.Ct. 2428, 153 L.Ed.2d 556 (2002); Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466, 120 S.Ct. 2348, 147 L.Ed.2d 435 (2000); Jones v. United States, 526 U.S. 227, 119 S.Ct. 1215, 143 L.Ed.2d 311 (1999). In rejecting Arizona's argument that judges could determine the existence of the facts necessary to permit a sentence of death, the U.S. Supreme Court in Ring commented on how the Eighth and Sixth Amendment lines of cases complement one another, first by reiterating the states' responses to Furman: States have constructed elaborate sentencing procedures in death cases, Arizona emphasizes, because of constraints we have said the Eighth Amendment places on capital sentencing. Brief for Respondent 21-25 (citing Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238, 92 S.Ct. 2726, 33 L.Ed.2d 346 (1972) (per curiam)); see also Maynard v. Cartwright, 486 U.S. 356, 362, 108 S.Ct. 1853, 100 L.Ed.2d 372 (1988) (Since Furman, our cases have insisted that the channeling and limiting of the sentencer's discretion in imposing the death penalty is a fundamental constitutional requirement for sufficiently minimizing the risk of wholly arbitrary and capricious action.); Apprendi, 530 U.S., at 522-23, 120 S.Ct. 2348 (Thomas, J., concurring) ([I]n the area of capital punishment, unlike any other area, we have imposed special constraints on a legislature's ability to determine what facts shall lead to what punishmentwe have restricted the legislature's ability to define crimes.). Ring, 536 U.S. at 606, 122 S.Ct. 2428. The Court then went on to expressly reject [t]he notion `that the Eighth Amendment's restriction on a state legislature's ability to define capital crimes should be compensated for by permitting States more leeway under the Fifth and Sixth Amendments in proving an aggravating fact necessary to a capital sentence.' Id. (quoting Apprendi, 530 U.S. at 539, 120 S.Ct. 2348 (O'Connor, J., dissenting)). The Court noted that in various settings it had interpreted the Constitution to require the addition of an element or elements to the definition of a criminal offense in order to narrow its scope. Id. The Court concluded that [i]f a legislature ... add[ed an] element we held constitutionally required, surely the Sixth Amendment guarantee would apply to that element. We see no reason to differentiate capital crimes from all others in this regard. Id. at 607, 122 S.Ct. 2428. Under Florida's death penalty scheme, the aggravating factors or elements necessary to impose the death penalty are found at the penalty phase of the trial, after a jury has determined general guilt of the underlying offense. See §§ 775.082, 782.084, 921.141(3), Fla. Stat. (1989). Hence, the narrowing functions required by the Eighth Amendment occur during the penalty phase, which under Florida's statutory scheme expressly directs that a judge rather than the jury determine the existence of aggravating factors necessary for a death sentence to be imposed. Because of the way Florida's statutory death sentencing scheme is written and operates to vest this authority in a judge rather than a jury, it directly conflicts with these two lines of Supreme Court cases, especially to the extent that it allows a judge to override a jury's recommendation in favor of life.