Opinion ID: 2676607
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Kansas Sentencing Guidelines

Text: Kansas’s rather unusual criminal sentencing scheme lies at the heart of the current dispute. While we now abandon Hill’s holding, we do not quibble with Hill’s description of Kansas’s sentencing parameters. In general, Kansas criminal statutes do not contain explicit maximum penalties (e.g. “Burglary is punishable by no more than ten years . . . .”). See, e.g., Kan. Stat. Ann. § 21-6201 (2010). Instead, [t]he determination of a felony sentence [in Kansas] is based on two factors: the current crime of conviction and the offender’s prior criminal history. The Kansas sentencing guidelines employ a grid, which is a two-dimensional chart.[ 1] The grid’s vertical axis lists the various levels of crime severity, ranging from I to IX for non-drug offenses. The horizontal axis is the criminal history scale, which classifies various criminal histories. To determine an offender’s presumptive sentence, one must consult the grid box at the juncture of the severity level of the crime for which the defendant was convicted and the offender’s criminal history category. . . . On June 6, 2002, Kansas adopted new sentencing provisions . . . eradicat[ing] the trial court’s discretion to sentence a defendant to an 1 The chart for non-drug offenses is attached to this opinion. See Appendix; cf. Kan. Stat. Ann. § 21-6804 (2013) (statutory basis for the chart). 2 upward departure [from the presumptive sentence] based on aggravating factors. Instead, upward departures are permitted where by unanimous vote, the jury finds beyond a reasonable doubt that one or more specific factors exist that may serve to enhance the maximum sentence. The state must seek an upward departure sentence not less than thirty days prior to trial. The court must then determine if any facts or factors that would increase the sentence beyond the statutory maximum need to be presented to the jury and proved beyond a reasonable doubt. As a consequence, upward departures are . . . constitutional in Kansas, but they require new procedures and a jury finding. Hill, 539 F.3d at 1215–16 (internal quotation marks, citations, and footnote omitted).