Court Opinion

ID: 9505152
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-06 20:01:42.091073+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:04:18.006316
License: Public Domain

SHEPARD, Chief Justice,
concurring.
For the last several decades at least, Indiana law has assigned to judges the duty to decide sentences in criminal cases. Appellate court review of such trial court decisions has been highly deferential, but we have undertaken to review and revise sentences when persuaded that the trial court’s sentence is “inappropriate.”
As for death penalty and life without parole cases, the legislature has now largely shifted the sentencing decision from judges and assigned it instead to juries. I am inclined to think that we should be even less ready to set aside the sentencing judgment of jurors, and that the standard we adopted during the era of judicial sen*767tencing should probably not apply to second-guess Indiana juries.
The parties here have not joined this question, however, and there appears no reason to reverse the jury’s decision. Accordingly, I join in the Court’s opinion.