Opinion ID: 1601898
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 9

Heading: omission of the aggravating factors elevating the charge to a capital offense from indictment.

Text: ¶ 43. Simmons argues that his indictment is unconstitutional for failure to include and specify the aggravating factors used to sentence him to death. This issue was not raised at trial or on direct appeal and normally would be procedurally barred. However, Simmons primarily relies on Jones v. United States, 526 U.S. 227, 119 S.Ct. 1215, 143 L.Ed.2d 311 (1999), Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466, 120 S.Ct. 2348, 147 L.Ed.2d 435 (2000), and Ring v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 584, 122 S.Ct. 2428, 153 L.Ed.2d 556 (2002), as intervening decisions which would nullify the procedural bar. ¶ 44. In Jones v. United States the United States Supreme Court considered a federal carjacking statute. The Supreme Court found in Jones that the carjacking statute, which allowed three different punishments increasing in severity depending on the degree of violence used or physical harm accomplished by the carjacker, could result in three distinct offenses, all of which had to be charged in the carjacker's indictment: [U]nder the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment and the notice and jury trial guarantees of the Sixth Amendment, any fact (other than prior conviction) that increases the maximum penalty for a crime must be charged in an indictment, submitted to a jury, and proven beyond a reasonable doubt. Jones, 526 U.S. at 243 n. 6, 119 S.Ct. 1215 (emphasis added). ¶ 45. Jones was followed by Apprendi. Apprendi fired several shots into the home of an African-American family in Vineland, New Jersey. Apprendi was indicted on numerous state charges of shooting and possession of firearms. He eventually pled guilty to two counts of possession of a firearm for unlawful purpose and one count of possession of an explosive. After the judge accepted the guilty pleas, the prosecutor moved for an enhanced sentence on one of the counts on the basis that it was a hate crime. The judge concurred and rendered an enhanced sentence on twelve years on that particular count, with shorter concurrent sentences on the other two counts. ¶ 46. Relying in part on Jones, Apprendi argued that he was entitled to have the finding on enhancement decided by a jury. The Supreme Court agreed, stating: 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 proved beyond a reasonable doubt. Apprendi, 530 U.S. at 490, 120 S.Ct. 2348. However, the Court specifically stated that Apprendi has not here asserted a constitutional claim based on the omission of any reference to sentence enhancement or racial bias in the indictment.... We thus do not address the indictment question separately today. Apprendi, 530 U.S. at 477 n. 3, 120 S.Ct. 2348. ¶ 47. The Court found in Apprendi that New Jersey's statutory scheme would allow a jury to convict a defendant of a second degree offense of possession of a prohibited weapon, and then, in a separate subsequent proceeding, allow a judge to impose a punishment usually reserved for first degree crimes made on the judge's finding based on a preponderance of the evidence. The Apprendi Court finally stated that its decision did not apply to capital sentencing cases, even those cases where the judge was the one deciding whether to sentence the defendant to death or some lesser sentence, citing Walton v. Arizona, 497 U.S. 639, 110 S.Ct. 3047, 111 L.Ed.2d 511(1990), where the Arizona capital sentencing process had been upheld. ¶ 48. In 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court decided Ring v. Arizona . Ring addressed the issue of whether the Arizona capital sentencing process as upheld in 1990 in Walton v. Arizona , that of a jury deciding guilt and a judge making findings on aggravating factors, could survive the Apprendi decision. The Supreme Court decided it could not. Despite the efforts in Apprendi to distinguish non-capital enhancement cases from aggravating circumstances in capital cases in this context, the Supreme Court in Ring found that there was no difference. [W]e overrule Walton to the extent that it allows a sentencing judge, sitting without a jury, to find an aggravating circumstance necessary for imposition of the death penalty. See 497 U.S., at 647-649, 110 S.Ct. 3047. Because Arizona's enumerated aggravating factors operate as the functional equivalent of an element of a greater offense, Apprendi, 530 U.S., at 494, n. 19, 120 S.Ct. 2348, the Sixth Amendment requires that they be found by a jury.    The guarantees of jury trial in the Federal and State Constitutions reflect a profound judgment about the way in which law should be enforced and justice administered.... If the defendant preferred the common-sense judgment of a jury to the more tutored but perhaps less sympathetic reaction of the single judge, he was to have it. Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U.S. 145, 155-156, 88 S.Ct. 1444, 20 L.Ed.2d 491 (1968). The right to trial by jury guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment would be senselessly diminished if it encompassed the factfinding necessary to increase a defendant's sentence by two years, but not the factfinding necessary to put him to death. We hold that the Sixth Amendment applies to both. Ring, 536 U.S. at 609,122 S.Ct. 2428. ¶ 49. Simmons's argument is that because Ring found the Apprendi decision persuasive on the issue of Arizona's enumerated aggravating factors operating as the functional equivalent of an element of a greater offense, the Supreme Court necessarily adopted every other rule stated in Apprendi for state capital sentencing proceedings, specifically the rule first cited in Jones v. United States, that the Constitution requires that aggravating factors be listed in indictments. We find this argument is incorrect. Ring only found juries must find aggravating factors: Ring's claim is tightly delineated: He contends only that the Sixth Amendment required jury findings on the aggravating circumstances asserted against him.... Finally, Ring does not contend that his indictment was constitutionally defective. See Apprendi, 530 U.S. at 477 n. 3, 120 S.Ct. 2348 (Fourteenth Amendment has not ... been construed to include the Fifth Amendment right to `presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury'). Ring, 536 U.S. at 597 n. 4,122 S.Ct. 2428.
¶ 50. Simmons's argues: Although Mississippi's capital sentencing scheme is not identical in all respects to the Arizona scheme rejected by the United States Supreme Court in Ring, the two schemes are identical in the respects relevant to this case. This is incorrect. The two sentencing schemes are different in the only respect relevant to Ring, that of who finds aggravating circumstances that lead to the death sentence. Under Arizona's scheme, the judge did this, and for this reason Arizona's scheme was found to be unconstitutional. Under this state's statutory scheme, and in Simmons's case the jury found the aggravating circumstances. We hold that there is no infirmity under Ring.
¶ 51. Simmons sums up his argument concerning the alleged problems with his indictment by repeating it here. Simmons cites United States v. Fell, 217 F.Supp.2d 469 (D.Vt.2002), and United States v. Lentz, 225 F.Supp.2d 672 (E.D.Va.2002). In Fell, 217 F.Supp.2d at 483, the court found the following: Although the Ring decision explicitly did not discuss whether a defendant was entitled to grand jury indictment on the facts that, if proven, would justify a sentence of death, see Ring, 536 U.S. at 597 n. 4, 122 S.Ct. at 2437 n. 4, the clear implication of the decision, resting as squarely as it does on Jones, is that in a federal capital case the Fifth Amendment right to a grand jury indictment will apply. This is not a federal capital case, and there is nothing to show that this Fifth Amendment right is applicable to a state capital case. Lentz makes the same finding, but once again deals with the Federal Death Penalty Act, or FDPA. ¶ 52. Simmons also relies on the United States Supreme Court decision of Allen v. United States, 536 U.S. 953, 122 S.Ct. 2653, 153 L.Ed.2d 830 (2002). In a memorandum decision, the Supreme Court stated the following: The judgment [in Allen ] is vacated and the case is remanded to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit for further consideration in light of Ring v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 584, 122 S.Ct. 2428, 153 L.Ed.2d 556 (2002). ¶ 53. One issue raised in Allen was the issue Simmons raises here, that of his indictment being defective because it did not contain the aggravating factors. The Eighth Circuit in Allen found that Allen's indictment was not defective even though it did not contain the aggravating factors. If this is the basis on which Allen is being reversed, it seems odd to cite Ring v. Arizona to do it. The question of what an indictment must contain in a state capital case was not before the Ring court. In Apprendi v. New Jersey, the Supreme Court stated that the Fifth Amendment right to indictment had never been applied to the states through the Fourteenth Amendment. Absent more explicit direction, we find that the Supreme Court has not ruled that state capital defendants have a constitutional right to have all aggravating circumstances listed in their indictments. We find that this issue is without merit.