Opinion ID: 1901039
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Cruel and Unusual Punishment Under State Constitutions.

Text: 1. Introduction. Most state constitutions contain cruel and unusual punishment provisions that are similar, if not identical, to the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause of the Eighth Amendment. [6] In construing the meaning of these state constitutional provisions, state courts are free to develop their own independent approaches to state constitutional doctrine. Some state supreme courts have followed the lead of the United States Supreme Court and adopted approaches to state constitutional provisions that mirror the developing federal law and have achieved similar results. See Adaway v. State, 902 So.2d 746, 747-52 (Fla.2005) (upholding life sentence for thirty-six-year-old engaging in oral sex with eleven-year-old under state and federal constitutions by comparing seriousness of crime with offenses in Harmelin and Ewing.) Some have gone even further and held that a sentence that falls within the legislatively-established range of sentences cannot be declared cruel and unusual. See Price v. State, 898 So.2d 641, 655 (Miss.2005). Other state courts, however, have adopted a more searching approach to cruel and unusual punishment. [7] 2. Acceptance of federal framework with independent application. One line of state supreme court cases departs from United States Supreme Court precedent by generally adopting the Supreme Court's [8] analytical framework for cruel-and-unusual-punishment claims but applying it in a more stringent fashion. For instance, in People v. Bullock, 440 Mich. 15, 485 N.W.2d 866, 870-71 (1992), the Michigan Supreme Court reviewed the same drug-sentencing statute upheld by the United States Supreme Court in Harmelin under its state constitution. The Michigan Supreme Court generally accepted the principles developed by the Supreme Court, but emphasized that it was free to follow what the court considered the better-reasoned dissenting opinions. Bullock, 485 N.W.2d at 870-74. The court then proceeded to rely heavily on Justice White's dissenting opinion in Harmelin, emphasizing that `punishment must be tailored to a defendant's personal responsibility and moral guilt.' Id. at 876 (quoting Harmelin, 501 U.S. at 1023, 111 S.Ct. at 2716, 115 L.Ed.2d at 883) (White, J., dissenting); see also State v. Fain, 94 Wash.2d 387, 617 P.2d 720, 723, 725-28 (1980) (generally applying the framework developed by the United States Supreme Court but relying in part on dissent in Rummel to reach a different result); Wanstreet v. Bordenkircher, 166 W.Va. 523, 276 S.E.2d 205, 212-14 (1981) (invalidating life sentence under recidivist statute using Solem -type review). 3. Validity of as-applied challenge. Many state courts have also considered whether a criminal defendant may attack a sentence as cruel and unusual punishment as applied. Under an as-applied attack, a criminal statute imposing a certain sentence is not facially invalid in all circumstances, but only as applied under the facts and circumstances in a particular case. Many state courts, particularly post- Ewing, have allowed as-applied attacks based on individualized facts and circumstances. See Graham, 982 So.2d at 48 (discussing difference in cruel and unusual punishment context between facial attack and attack as applied); Humphrey v. Wilson, 282 Ga. 520, 652 S.E.2d 501, 510 (2007) (citing narrow age difference and fact that fifteen-year-old girl initiated oral sex as factors in invalidating sentence as cruel and unusual); People v. Miller, 202 Ill.2d 328, 269 Ill.Dec. 503, 781 N.E.2d 300, 306-09 (2002) (finding application of statutes that treat fifteen-year-old who stood as a lookout during the shooting and had only a moment to consider his participation, but never handled a gun, the same as the shooter in imposing life in prison without possibility of parole unconstitutional under state constitution); Kills on Top v. State, 279 Mont. 384, 928 P.2d 182, 206-07 (1996) (finding individualized determination beyond reckless indifference required to determine validity of death penalty in felony murder context); Naovarath v. State, 105 Nev. 525, 779 P.2d 944, 948-49 (1989) (invalidating as cruel and unusual punishment a life sentence without possibility of parole on thirteen-year-old in light of specific facts). 4. State cases considering Roper outside capital context. A number of state cases have considered the application of Roper outside the context of capital punishment. The case that is closest to the present controversy is State v. Rideout, 182 Vt. 113, 933 A.2d 706 (2007). In Rideout, the defendant was convicted of two counts of lewd and lascivious conduct with a child and one count of furnishing drugs to a child. Rideout, 933 A.2d at 708. He was subsequently sentenced under a Vermont habitual offender statute to two concurrent sentences of twenty to fifty years. Id. at 710. The defendant asserted that the sentence as applied to him constituted cruel and unusual punishment because four of his six predicate felonies occurred when he was sixteen years of age. Id. at 713. The Rideout court rejected the claim. Id. at 716. The court cited extensive federal and state case law prior to Roper generally standing for the proposition that convictions of minors in adult court may be used to enhance sentences of adults convicted of crimes. Id. at 715. The Rideout court distinguished cases refusing to allow juvenile adjudications to count toward habitual offender status on the ground that they were based upon the lack of procedural protections in juvenile court, specifically, the right to a jury trial. Id. at 715-16. The Rideout court distinguished Roper, noting the imposition of the death penalty and not imprisonment was a distinction critical to Roper 's reasoning. Id. at 718. Further, citing Witte v. United States, 515 U.S. 389, 400, 115 S.Ct. 2199, 2206, 132 L.Ed.2d 351, 364 (1995), the Rideout court noted that the defendant in Roper was sentenced to death solely for an offense committed while he was a minor, whereas in Rideout, the defendant was receiving a sentence for an adult crime even though the adult sentence was enhanced by crimes committed as a minor. Id. at 719. According to the Rideout court, Roper was premised, in part, on the opportunity for minor offenders to mend their ways. Id. The Rideout court noted that when dealing with recidivist adult offenders, with juvenile records, that possibility has largely gone by. Id. A few other state court cases have considered whether a Roper -type analysis applies outside the death penalty for juvenile conduct. These cases have generally declined to extend Roper to other contexts. See State v. Allen, 289 Conn. 550, 958 A.2d 1214, 1233-36 (2008) (declining to extend Roper to eighteen-year-old sentenced to life without possibility of parole); Wallace v. State, 956 A.2d 630, 641 (Del.2008) (declining to extend Roper to fifteen-year-old defendant sentenced to life in prison); England v. State, 940 So.2d 389, 406-07 (Fla.2006) (finding use of juvenile convictions as aggravating factors supporting death penalty not contrary to Roper). 5. Case law involving challenges to nonviolent sex crimes generally. State courts have invalidated lengthy sentences for nonviolent sex crimes. In State v. Davis, 206 Ariz. 377, 79 P.3d 64, 66-67 (2003), a twenty-year-old defendant was sentenced to a mandatory minimum of fifty-two years without the possibility of parole as a result of his conviction on four counts of statutory rape for engaging in consensual sex with two post-pubescent teenage girls. After reviewing recent Supreme Court cases, the Davis court overruled its prior precedent and held that the court could undertake an individualized analysis of the penalty under the facts of the case. Davis, 79 P.3d at 71. The Davis court found under the facts of the case that the threshold test of gross disproportionality had been met, noting that Davis was caught in the very broad sweep of a statute which makes any sexual conduct with a person younger than fifteen years old by a person older than eighteen years old a dangerous crime against children, whether the offense is a rape-incest by a step-parent who forces sex on a trusting ward or a pedophile who uncontrollably preys upon young children . . . or the more benign boyfriend-girlfriend situation in which one party is older than eighteen and the other younger than fifteen. Id. at 72 (quoting State v. Taylor, 160 Ariz. 415, 773 P.2d 974, 976 (1989)). The court noted that the fact that other courts impose lengthy sentences for sex crimes demonstrate[s] why, when considering the proportionality of a sentence imposed, this court must look beyond the nomenclature of the crime charged and consider the facts of each particular case. Id. at 74.