Court Opinion

ID: 9785183
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 21:07:03.876224+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:08.446893
License: Public Domain

Johnson, J.,
¶ 40. dissenting. To define crimes and fix corresponding punishments is a quintessential legislative function. To define identical crimes and affix strikingly different punishments is a perversion of that function. No just and reasonable purpose could be served by such a statutory scheme, nor, tellingly, does the majority here even attempt to advance one. “Prosecutorial discretion” to select from among different offenses for reasons related to proof, resources, or remedial objectives provides no answer to the simple question: What legitimate purpose is served by defining two identical offenses with significantly different punitive consequences? The answer, in my view, is none. Accordingly, I respectfully dissent.
¶ 41. Before addressing this issue, however, it is necessary to correct a misleading suggestion in the majority opinion that defendant’s claims under the Vermont Constitution were somehow inadequately preserved. While acknowledging that we must address defendant’s “claim that the Vermont Constitution offers him a higher level of protection,” ante, ¶ 26, the majority nevertheless states that defendant’s equal protection claim under the Vermont Constitution was not “properly preserved,” ante, ¶ 27 n.6. The argument appears to have two components. First, the majority notes that defendant’s motion to dismiss did not expressly cite to Article 7 of Chapter I of the Vermont Constitution, our equal-protection equivalent to the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. This argument exalts form over substance. Defendant’s motion expressly asserted that “[u]nder the Vermont Constitution, equal protection of the laws requires that statutory classifications of crimes be based on differences that are real in fact and reasonably related to the general purposes of criminal legislation and that such protection is lacking if different statutes proscribe the same criminal conduct with disparate criminal sanctions.” No formal citation to Article 7 was necessary to fully *329appreciate that defendant was raising an equal protection claim under the Vermont Constitution.
¶ 42. Nor is there any particular template for an adequate state constitutional argument. We have, to be sure, urged advocates to mine a variety of sources when available, including historical materials, textual analysis, “economic and sociological materials,” “sibling state” decisions interpreting similar constitutional clauses, and any other arguments available to the “imaginative lawyer.” State v. Jewett, 146 Vt. 221, 227-28, 500 A.2d 223, 237 (1985). None of these, however, is required. While mere mention of the Vermont Constitution may not suffice to preserve a claim, there is no reason in theory why a claimant may not legitimately rely on the language of the Vermont Constitution and reasoned argument for a construction different from that of the federal courts construing the same or similar language in the Federal Constitution. I say “in theory” because defendant’s trial motion here, while hardly exhaustive, certainly went well beyond mere reasoned argument. Defendant relied on a number of sister-state decisions rejecting, on independent state grounds, the Supreme Court’s holding in United States v. Batchelder, 442 U.S. 114 (1979), and a leading criminal law commentator who has criticized the high court’s reasoning and argued that “[njotwithstanding Batchelder, a state might well conclude as a matter of state constitutional law that equal protection of the laws” is violated where “different statutes proscribe the same criminal conduct with disparate criminal sanctions.” 4 W. LaFave, et al., Criminal Procedure § 13.7(a), at 259 (3d ed. 2007) (quotation omitted). There is simply no question, therefore, that defendant’s state claims were adequately preserved.
¶ 43. Turning to those claims, defendant asserts that the existence of two criminal statutes with identical elements but different penalties violates due process and equal protection because they serve no legitimate purpose and leave a prosecutor with no principled basis on which to choose between the two identical-element crimes. The majority readily acknowledges that the portions of the two statutes at issue which punish murder committed in perpetrating or attempting to perpetrate sexual assault “have exactly the same elements. In other words, the State is put to the same proof if it charges first degree murder, sexual assault under § 2301 or aggravated murder under § 2311(a)(8).” Ante, ¶ 21. Indeed, the State here has conceded that *330“the statutes proscribe identical conduct, and that only the penalties differ.” Id.
¶ 44. The majority nevertheless finds no constitutional infirmity in such a scheme on the strength of the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Batchelder. There, the high court addressed a claim that the existence of identical provisions in two statutes, each of which prohibited convicted felons from receiving firearms but carried different penalties, violated a defendant’s due process and equal protection rights. The defendant argued that he was entitled to be sentenced under the more lenient provision when his conduct violated both statutes. The Court rejected the argument, concluding that there was essentially “no appreciable difference between the discretion a prosecutor exercises when deciding whether to charge under one of two statutes with different elements and the discretion he exercises when choosing one of two statutes with identical elements.” 442 U.S. at 125. Traditional prosecutorial discretion, in other words, justified any disparate treatment of offenders absent proof of selective or invidious prosecution.
¶ 45. Albeit grudgingly, the majority here recognizes that while Batchelder’s broad language forecloses defendant’s requested relief under the Fourteenth Amendment, it does not preclude his claim under the Common Benefits Clause of the Vermont Constitution, which is distinct from the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause and requires a more rigorous review than the highly deferential rational-basis standard applied under an equal-protection analysis not involving fundamental rights. Baker v. State, 170 Vt. 194, 201-04, 744 A.2d 864, 870-71 (1999) (stating that Common Benefits Clause “differs markedly from the federal Equal Protection Clause in its language, historical origins, purpose, and development”). Rather than adopt the somewhat rigid tiered analysis employed by the federal rational-basis/strict scrutiny tests, we clarified in Baker that Vermont courts have a duty “to evaluate the object and effect of state laws” and to “engage in a meaningful, case-specific analysis to ensure that any exclusion from the general benefit and protection of the law would bear a just and reasonable relation to the legislative goals.” Id. at 204, 744 A.2d at 872. Thus, the question here is whether the statutory classification bears a just and reasonable relation to a legitimate governmental goal.
¶ 46. The statutory scheme at issue obviously creates two distinct classes of similarly-situated individuals, those charged with *331sexual assault first-degree murder under 13 V.S.A. §2301 and those — like defendant — charged with aggravated murder under § 2311(a)(8), and attaches significantly different penalties to the two crimes. The majority’s assertion that the legislation creates no classification because all are “equally subject to the same legislatively conferred prosecutorial discretion,” ante, ¶ 28, ignores the plain fact that the statutes affix disparate punitive consequences to identical conduct.
¶ 47. Turning to the purported governmental purpose for the classification, the State posits “prosecutorial discretion,” asserting that the Legislature intended to grant prosecutors the discretion to choose different punishments by charging under either § 2301 or § 2311(a)(8). Indeed, the State devotes much of its argument to listing the reasons why a prosecutor’s discretion to charge under either murder statute is no different from the discretion to pick and choose among any applicable criminal statute, so long as the choice is not motivated by an illegal consideration, such as race or gender. The majority essentially adopts this position, finding that the discretion “to charge aggravated murder in this case, rather than felony murder, is of no more practical concern than the unfettered and broad discretion exercised daily by Vermont prosecutors.” Ante, ¶ 29.
¶ 48. The argument is entirely unpersuasive. Prosecutorial discretion may represent a legitimate governmental goal where the prosecutorial choice involves statutes criminalizing similar but distinct behaviors, and the charging decision turns on considerations of proof, strategy, resources, and remedial objectives. But the situation here involves two classes of defendants who have committed identical element crimes and the prosecutorial choice turns on little more than whim. Indeed, to describe a prosecutor’s charging decision in these circumstances as a “choice” is almost meaningless — where there are no elements of proof or other standards involved, there is simply nothing to inform the charging decision. The result offends the very core principles of our criminal justice system: fair notice to the accused and evenhandedness in his or her treatment. See Kolender v. Lawson, 461 U.S. 352, 358 (1983) (“Where the legislature fails to provide such minimal guidelines [to govern law enforcement], a criminal statute may permit a standardless sweep that allows policemen, prosecutors, and juries to pursue their personal predilections.” (quotation omitted)).
*332¶49. In focusing on whether prosecutorial discretion justifies any choice in charging so long as it is not motivated by impermissible considerations such as race or gender, the majority overlooks the inherent arbitrariness of the statutory scheme itself. A New York court addressing a statutory scheme that treated juvenile misdemeanants differently depending on the forum in which the charge happened to be brought explained the crucial distinction this way:
But, prosecutorial discretion, broad and virtually unencumbered though it may be, cannot of itself provide a rational basis for a statutory classification. Prosecutorial discretion can determine in which forum a charge is brought, or the gravity of a charge, or whether a prosecution proceeds at all. Prosecutorial discretion cannot however determine the appropriate powers of a given court, or its jurisdiction, or its sentencing options, if any. The legislature does that, within parameters laid down by the constitution. For the legislature constitutionally to mandate a certain sentence for a certain act committed by a certain class of persons when the matter is before one court, and to provide for something different when the matter is before another court, there must be a rational basis for the distinction.
People v. Robert Z., 511 N.Y.S.2d 473, 479 (Cnty. Ct. 1986) (citations omitted). The court ultimately concluded that there was no rational basis for treating offenders differently, concluding that “the guise of prosecutorial discretion” could not be used to circumvent “the rational basis for the statute’s constitutional viability.” Id.
¶ 50. The disconnect between the statutory classification and the governmental goal becomes even clearer here when the legitimate interests underlying prosecutorial discretion are examined. Consider the common scenario of overlapping (as opposed to identical) statutes with both different elements and penalties. There, a prosecutor’s choice between the statute requiring proof of an additional element and the statute without that added element necessarily involves considerations of proof, strategy, resources, and overall law enforcement objectives. We have quite properly refused to judicially micromanage routine prosecutorial choices of this nature. See State v. Wesco, Inc., 2006 VT 93, ¶ 11, 180 Vt. 345, *333911 A.2d 281 (“Because prosecutors function as delegates of the executive, they retain broad discretion to enforce the law including — so long as probable cause is present — the decisions whether to prosecute in any given case and what charge to file.”); State v. Calhoun, No. 92, 987, 2005 WL 3289391, at *7 (Kan. Ct. App. Dec. 2, 2005) (“When deciding to charge a crime under one of two statutes containing different elements, the prosecutor has to examine the evidence and determine under which statute the evidence falls”).
¶ 51. Such practical considerations are notably absent, however, where the “choice” involves identical-element statutes with different penalties. See LaFave, supra, § 13.7(a), at 256 (“Where statutes are identical except for punishment, the prosecutor finds not the slightest shred of guidance.” (quotation omitted)). Indeed, as noted, in such cases the traditional justifications for affording prosecutors broad discretion literally have no application, and allowing prosecutors to “choose” between identical-element crimes solely on the basis of punitive consequences pushes prosecutorial discretion to the breaking point. The two statutes before us cannot pass constitutional muster for much the same reason that unfettered prosecutorial choices have failed in other contexts: there is no principled basis under the statutes to choose one over the other. See, e.g., In re Miller, 2009 VT 36, ¶ 23, 185 Vt. 550, 975 A.2d 1226 (“Although a degree of prosecutorial discretion is acceptable, we are skeptical of statutes that appear to afford the prosecution a choice of two penalties of such disparate nature.” (quotations and citations omitted)); In re G.T., 170 Vt. 507, 514, 758 A.2d 301, 306 (2000) (noting that despite the importance of prosecutorial discretion, “[i]t is one thing to give discretion in enforcing a legislatively defined crime; it is quite another to give prosecutors the power to define the crime”). Indeed, even assuming that the State’s charging decision is made in complete good faith, it is inherently and unavoidably arbitrary where standards to govern the choice are lacking.
¶ 52. Instructively, a number of states have found equal protection violations under their own constitutions where — as here — two identical criminal statutes impose different penalties. In State v. Campbell, 106 P.3d 1129 (Kan. 2005), for instance, the Kansas Supreme Court addressed an equal protection claim challenging two criminal statutes prohibiting identical conduct but with different penalties — one statute prohibited knowing possession of *334ephedrine or pseudoephedrine with the intent to use the product to manufacture a controlled substance while the other prohibited knowing possession of drug paraphernalia with the intent to use it to manufacture a controlled substance. The court departed from Batchelder and held that where two criminal statutes have identical elements but different penalties a defendant convicted of either crime can only be sentenced under the lesser penalty. Id. at 1139. Importantly, the court’s decision was grounded on its conclusion that there was no legitimate basis for allowing a prosecutor the discretion to charge one crime over another based solely on the penalty, noting that “the prosecutor should not be given the discretion to effectively make a sentencing decision without the benefit of sentencing information or expertise.” Id.
¶ 53. Similarly, in People v. Marcy, 628 P.2d 69, 74-75 (Colo. 1981) (en banc), the Colorado Supreme Court also declined to follow Batchelder under the Colorado Constitution and concluded that elements found in its first-degree murder by extreme indifference and second-degree murder criminal statutes were indistinguishable because each statute required an act performed knowingly resulting in death. Allowing duplicative criminal statutes to impose different penalties for the same conduct, the court observed, “irrationally discriminate[s] against an accused” and violates equal protection guarantees. Id. at 74. The Hawaii Supreme Court reached the same conclusion under the Hawaii Constitution in State v. Hoang, holding that where “the same act committed under the same circumstances is, by virtue of the prosecution’s charging option or whim, punishable either as a felony or as a misdemeanor, under either of the two statutory provisions, precisely because the elements of proof essential to either conviction are exactly the same” equal protection is violated. 947 P.2d 360, 370 (Haw. 1997) (quotations omitted).
¶ 54. The overarching principle at stake in these decisions — as in the case before us — is simply this: that we are a government of laws and not of men. This principle is elegantly expressed in the Vermont Constitution as follows: “That all power being originally inherent in and consequently derived from the people, therefore, all officers of government, whether legislative or executive, are their trustees and servants; and at all times, in a legal way, accountable to them.” Vt. Const. ch. I, art. 6. A legislative scheme that permits the State to bring criminal charges against its citizens arbitrarily and without adequate standards is a gov*335ernment not of laws, but of men. We countenance such a result at our peril.
¶ 55. Therefore, I would hold that the statutory scheme at issue violates defendant’s right to equal protection of the law under the Vermont Constitution. Of course, determining the appropriate remedy for a constitutional violation of this nature presents a separate, though no less important, issue. Defendant’s assertion that the charge under § 2311(a)(8) should be dismissed and the case retried under § 2301 is unpersuasive. At trial, all sides agreed that the motion to dismiss could be addressed at the end of the case because prosecution under either of the applicable statutes involved the same elements, evidence, and issues of proof and differed only as to sentence. The jury’s ultimate conclusion that defendant was guilty of aggravated murder under § 2311(a)(8) is equivalent to a finding of guilt under § 2301, and that verdict should not be disturbed on appeal.
¶ 56. The more logical and appropriate remedy, rather, is to remand for a resentencing of defendant under the lesser sentencing scheme. Indeed, this is the settled rule in at least one other jurisdiction that has rejected Batchelder to hold that, where separate criminal statutes have identical elements but different sentencing schemes, “the decision as to which penalty to seek cannot be a matter of prosecutorial whimsy in charging.” State v. Clements, 734 P.2d 1096, 1100 (Kan. 1987). Thus, where statutes define “identical offenses, a defendant can only be sentenced under the lesser penalty.” Id. This rule has come to be known as the “identical offense sentencing doctrine,” State v. Reyna, 234 P.3d 761, 780 (Kan. 2010); State v. Thompson, 200 P.3d 22, 33 (Kan. 2009), and provides simply that: ‘Where two criminal offenses have identical elements but are classified differently for purposes of imposing a penalty, a defendant convicted of either crime may be sentenced only under the lesser penalty provision.” State v. Nunn, 768 P.2d 268, 284 (Kan. 1989).
¶ 57. The doctrine is similar to the settled “rule of lenity,” although its rationale differs somewhat. The latter is predicated on the fundamental right to adequate notice of what conduct may give rise to criminal punishment, and the concomitant obligation to resolve any statutory ambiguity in favor of the accused. See State v. LaBounty, 2005 VT 124, ¶ 4, 179 Vt. 199, 892 A.2d 203 (“In interpreting a criminal statute, the rule of lenity requires us to resolve any ambiguity in favor of the defendant.”); State v. Oliver, *336151 Vt. 626, 629, 563 A.2d 1002, 1004 (1989) (“Penal statutes . . . are to be strictly construed in a manner favorable to the accused.”).
¶ 58. Here, the ambiguity was not in the wording of the statutes or the scope of the conduct proscribed. The flaw here went deeper, to the fundamental fairness of the charging decision itself, and the inherent arbitrariness of a statutory scheme unhinged from any objective charging criteria, and circumscribed by nothing more than “prosecutorial whimsy.” That is the fundamental nature of the constitutional violation in this case, and the reason why — as the Kansas Supreme Court has recognized — a defendant charged and convicted under these circumstances may be sentenced only under the lesser penalty provision.
¶ 59. Accordingly, I would remand the case to the trial court for the purpose of resentencing defendant under the first-degree murder statute.
¶ 60. I am authorized to state that Justice Dooley joins this dissent.