In the US (or in any particular jurisdiction within the US you’d like to mention), if a defendant is found guilty and given a maximum sentence, where the maximization of the sentence was done explicitly just because the Judge didn’t like something about the defendant not materially related to the crime, can this be any kind of grounds for appeal?
Suppose for example a guy is found guilty of theft for taking a six pack from a grocery store, and he could get anywhere from three months probation to five years in prison, and the judge gave him five years because he doesn’t approve of drinking alcohol.
Well, the OP contains the word “explicitly” for a reason!
I am asking whether, if the judge says explicity “I’m giving you the max because I don’t approve of drinking alcohol” when it is perfectly legal to drink alcohol (just not to steal it), is this going to be grounds for appeal possibly?
If the judge departs from sentencing guidelines (in jurisdictions that have them), he must explain why. Personal animus is generally not going to be a valid ground for departure.
Excessive sentencing is grounds for appeal, but my understanding is that it is rarely successful. It would have to be really disproportionate to merit the attention of an appeals court, and most jurisdictions already have statutory sentencing guidelines within which the judge must work, anyway.
The usual response of the prosecution is to point out that it was the elected Legislature of the state that set the sentence as “up to 5 years” – how was it ‘excessive’ when it was specifically in the range that the people (via their elected representatives) had determined as appropriate for the crime?
Because if the particular offence isn’t top of the range for the crime, why should it attract a top-of-the range sentence? You can have theft of a bottle of carbonated water, or theft of a million-dollar painting. If the maximum sentence for theft is 14 years, and a judge imposes 14 years for theft of a bottle of water, a first offence, no aggravating circumstances, expect an appeal on the grounds that the sentence is excessive, given the attendant circumstances of the offence.
Theft of a bottle of water is petty theft or pilfering, while theft of a million-dollar painting is felony theft or grand theft in the first degree. Significantly different crimes. Most states have various different degrees of theft, with appropriate differing levels of penalties. Minnesota Statutes, for example, have 5 degrees of theft, with penalties ranging from 20 years in prison down to a $1000 fine.
Depends entirely on the laws of the jurisdiction concerned, surely? In my jurisdiction (Western Australia) the general offence is simply “stealing”, regardless of the value of the thing stolen, and the maximum penalty is seven years. (There are a small number of exceptions where the maximum penalty is more than seven years, but they depend on the nature of the thing stolen, not its value - testamentary instruments, aircraft, etc. But even in those cases it’s all the same offence - stealing contrary to Criminal Code s. 378).
But even in a jurisdiction which has a range of different stealing offences, I think my point stands. If the legislature provides a range of sentences (any range) for a particular offence (any offence) then it’s simply not true to say that top of the range can never be “excessive”. The whole point about providing a sentencing range is that its recognised that sentences of different severity may be appropriate to different instances of the offence, and applying a top-of-the-range sentence to a bottom-of-the-range instance of the offence is grounds for an appeal against excessively sentence.
No its not. The Appeal would be allowed in half a minute and the Prosecutor who tried to argue that on its own would be looking for a new job.
The usual response would be that the enhanced sentence was justified because of some other fact, many priors for instance, need for deterrence in that case, special vulnerability of victim, violation of position of trust, abuse of position of power.
Something. Otherwise, its an abuse of discretion by a judge. Just because you have the power to do something, does not mean that you can exersize it as per you whims.
I agree - the sentence should be proportionate to the crime and circumstances. A lawyer I talked to once discussing these sorts of cases mentioned that he would appeal a sentence if it strayed excessively from what typical for the circumstances. Quite often, the appeal court would agree with him - he said too many losses or reduced sentences on appeal was usually the message to a judge to smarten up.
