Opinion ID: 842329
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: blakely v. washington

Text: The Supreme Court took its biggest step in defining the expression statutory maximum in Blakely. In that case, the defendant pleaded guilty of second-degree kidnapping involving domestic violence and the use of a firearm. The standard sentencing range for the offense was four years and one month to four years and five months in prison. Blakely, 542 U.S. at 298-299, 124 S.Ct. 2531. But under Washington State's sentencing guidelines, a court could impose a sentence above the standard range if it found substantial and compelling reasons to justify an exceptional sentence. Id. at 299, 124 S.Ct. 2531. The defendant had admitted no relevant facts other than having committed acts in violation of the elements of the crime. Id. But the sentencing court imposed an exceptional sentence of 7½ years [11] after hearing the complainant's version of the kidnapping. The sentencing court based this departure on a finding that the defendant had exhibited deliberate cruelty. This was a statutorily enumerated ground for departure in domestic violence cases in Washington. Id. at 300, 124 S.Ct. 2531. Washington argued that its system did not present a Sixth Amendment problem because state law provided an absolute maximum sentence of ten years' imprisonment and in no instance could an exceptional sentence exceed this length. Id. at 303, 124 S.Ct. 2531. Washington contended that ten years was the true statutory maximum for purposes of Sixth Amendment review. But the Supreme Court rejected this argument. Instead, it defined the statutory maximum as the maximum sentence that can be imposed without judicial fact-finding: Our precedents make clear, however, that the statutory maximum for Apprendi purposes is the maximum sentence a judge may impose solely on the basis of the facts reflected in the jury verdict or admitted by the defendant. In other words, the relevant statutory maximum is not the maximum sentence a judge may impose after finding additional facts, but the maximum he may impose without any additional findings. When a judge inflicts punishment that the jury's verdict alone does not allow, the jury has not found all the facts which the law makes essential to the punishment, and the judge exceeds his proper authority. [ Id. at 303-304, 124 S.Ct. 2531 (emphasis in original; citations omitted).] Hence, for Sixth Amendment purposes, the maximum sentence was not ten years. It was four years and five months. This was because that sentence was the maximum the court could have imposed solely on the basis of the facts the defendant admitted when pleading guilty. Id. at 304, 124 S.Ct. 2531. The Supreme Court concluded that its determination was the only one that would properly effectuate the people's control of the judiciary as intended by the Framers of the United States Constitution: Ultimately, our decision cannot turn on whether or to what degree trial by jury impairs the efficiency or fairness of criminal justice. One can certainly argue that both these values would be better served by leaving justice entirely in the hands of professionals; many nations of the world, particularly those following civil-law traditions, take just that course. There is not one shred of doubt, however, about the Framers' paradigm for criminal justice: not the civil-law ideal of administrative perfection, but the common-law ideal of limited state power accomplished by strict division of authority between judge and jury. As Apprendi held, every defendant has the right to insist that the prosecutor prove to a jury all facts legally essential to the punishment. [ Id. at 313, 124 S.Ct. 2531 (emphasis in original).]