PLA: Legal Research

Contemporary Issue Research Paper

Professor Jason Fiesta
October 29, 2013

Florida Sentencing Guidelines

by:
Hajira Ahmed
Guillermo Lopez
Daniella Saettone
Joseph Jones
Knox Anderson

Sentencing Guidelines were instilled into the justice system as civil crimes were
gradually developing at the time. Eventually, causes of action and laws were being formed into
statutes; still being followed today. As a society, we evolved from a messy bureaucracy to a
nearly maintained legal system. About two centuries ago, the founding fathers had established a
constitution that was drafted during a time where the people were skeptic of the stability of the
government. Guidelines were established to keep the people on the right side of the law. There
are two factors that the judicial system has taken in order to prevent crime, deterrence by
example and incapacitation.
It is a common sense idea that some people who otherwise would break the law when
doing so was to their advantage or when it seemed for some other reason desirable
would nevertheless resist temptation and stay on the right side of the law because of the
living example of what may happen to those who commit crimes. (von Gross, Hyman
187)
Sentencing is a judicial process that is determined by the laws interpretation of statutes
and local legislation; it is defined as ...the imposition of a punishment on an offender following
conviction for a criminal offense (Champion 2). Whereas dictated in the present day courts,
such crimes are not justly sentenced, due to circumstances of evidence, testimonies, and hearsay
that are permitted in the court. The purpose of sentencing is to justly indict an accused of the
crime and uphold consequences for it; this is a way to show the citizens and the nation that the
law is meant to be observed and followed. However, sentencing guidelines and interpretations of
the law are being questioned. Since its establishment, there have been many problems with the
guidelines and very little room to rectify mistakes. Several factors that highlights how sentencing
guidelines are not working are: overcrowding prisons, lack of supervision of offenders at prisons,

lack of sufficient parole guidelines and seriousness in passed offenders and released felons, and
wrongfully convicted offenders. Dean John Champions, a professor of criminal justice at Texas
A&M University, explains that incarcerating anyone who committed a crime is not the best
option. He states, ...judicial discretion is necessary to discern which offenders should be
incarcerated and which should receive alternative sentences. Jail and prison overcrowding is
pervasive, and the problem is growing worse (Champions 35).
It is good that the accused and parties in a court have their rights, but when there is faulty
evidence or mixture of biased hearsay, where do the courts draw the line? How does can the
judge determine if the accuseds offense is equivalent to the crime that theyve committed.
Majority of the crimes that are committed are either major felonies or minor misdemeanors. An
example of a felony in the state of Florida would be possessing half an ounce of marijuana, but is
it right to sentence someone up to ten years for that possession? Some interpretations vary from
state to state, but the highest authority will always be at the federal level. Could be that the
varying interpretation of the law that give judges freedom to sentence? Could it be the idea that
sentencing is greatly influenced by political views? These questions are simply based off of
theory, but what we would like to do is demonstrate how the guidelines are flawed.
The sentencing system can be examined through the many different sources of its rules
and standards. Structured sentencing has failed to be widely accepted in Florida and has endured
many changes during the last twenty years. Prior to 1983, judicial discretion was predominantly
used. Sanctions for the decision ranged from fines to being sent to the state prison. The statutory
maximums at the time were composed of thirty years for a 1st degree, fifteen years for a second
degree felony,and five years for a third degree felony.The Florida Supreme court recognized the
importance of structured sentencing and made changes accordingly. Their goal was to provide a

uniform set of standards to guide the court to make the proper decision. In 1983 the changes
were enacted in the system, guidelines were then set in place that implemented the structure for
all felony convictions. The supreme court ruled parole to be eliminated, except for capital crimes.
A reduction in sentences by one-third and house arrest laws passed. The Supreme Court
proceeded to create habitual offender laws, which meant that repeat offenders could be sentenced
to longer prison terms with no early prison release (Hogenmuller). They began to take action on
prioritizing prisoner bed space, set forth a plan by restructuring the sentencing guidelines. In
order to maintain, control, and regulate felons in prison, the Supreme Court created a law called
Prison Releasee Reoffender Act. This act stated that prisoners who were released and committed
another felony within the time span of three years from their release date were subject to
immediately return to prison and would need to serve 100% of their sentence. Unforeseen factors
began to deteriorate the guidelines set forth in 1983 with the growth in state population, cocaine
epidemic on the rise (Part 1) As a result actual time served in prison declined due to boarding
issues. The 1994 sentencing guidelines were created with the knowledge that prison resources
are limited, should be used for serious offenses. The structure of the 1994 sentencing guidelines
differed from the original guidelines by ranking all non capital felonies in ten different severity
levels, each felony offense is assigned to a level according to the severity of the offense. The
rankings had a point value which in turn determined the sanction, and length of sentence. A
database was created to allow for accurate, legible and time efficient preparation of the score
sheet. The database was named SAGES, the acronym stood for Sentencing Analysis and
Guidelines Entry System. Legislation passed the Truth-In-Sentencing Law requiring all offenders
sentenced to prison to serve a bare minimum of 85% of their sentence. All previous sentencing
guidelines were repealed for crimes committed on or after October 1998. The criminal

punishment code came into effect that year, featured both structured and unstructured sentencing
policies. If the ranking score exceeded fifty two points state prison was mandated, if the
offenders point value was forty four points or less they could receive a non-state prison sanction.
Florida Statute 921, requires the department of corrections to develop the scoresheet, any
revisions thereof to be sent for approval to the Supreme Court. Florida Statute also requires the
department to prepare scoresheets, provide legislature with annual trends in sentencing.
Florida has some of the strongest mandatory minimum sentencing laws in the United
States. The best example of mandatory sentencing involves the ten to twenty year life sentencing
guidelines. Under this, possessing a firearm during a crime is a minimum of a ten year sentence.
Shooting the firearm is a minimum of a twenty year sentence, and shooting someone regardless
of the outcome of the victim is twenty-five years to life in prison. With this, prosecutors have
great leeway in deciding what charges to bring forward in an attempt to combat crime. Using
information provided by the Florida Department of Corrections, we can track the number of
inmates incarcerated from 1999, which is the year this law went into effect, up until June 30th of
2013.
According to the Department of Corrections, the fiscal year 1998 to 1999, the state of
Florida had 1,929 inmates incarcerated for the offense of Robbery with a weapon, 1,052 inmates
for the offense of Armed Burglary, and 1,129 inmates for Weapons Charge (Possessing, Firing).
In Fiscal Year 2012-2013, the state of Florida had 2350 inmates incarcerated for the offense of
Robbery with a weapon, 1,332 inmates for Armed Burglary and 1,161 inmates for Weapons
Charges. All three offenses saw a net gain in the number of inmates incarcerated since the
mandatory minimum law went into effect. Just by using those statistics, it appears that
discouragement through mandatory sentencing does not work.

By looking at the statistics for the number of inmates currently incarcerated versus when
the law takes effect, we can gain a broader understanding of how mandatory minimum
sentencing affects the entire criminal justice system. In Fiscal Year 1998 to 1999, there were
68,599 inmates in the Florida Prison system. In Fiscal Year 2012 to 2013 there were 100,884
inmates, an increase of 32,285 inmates into the prison system.
To put this into better perspective, between 2000 and 2012, Florida saw an estimated
3,335,190 new residents. So for each 100 new residents that arrived in Florida, one of them was
whisked away to prison, furthering the strain on a set of limited resources. Mandatory Minimum
Sentencing removes the judicial process out of the judicial system and places more and more
responsibility on the prosecutors office in a misguided effort to clean the streets and remove
violent offenders. However, the stats provided by the Florida Department of Justice only show
that more and more people are being arrested for these crimes. Wouldnt mandatory minimum
sentencing show a decrease in these types of crimes as people are deterred from committing
them if they know the outcome is a guaranteed jail term?
For years there has been public outcry over the sentencing of criminals. Too long, too
short, too harsh, too subjective and so the argument went. With mandatory sentencing in place
the debate is over, well not quite. It seems that we continually hear about a case where someone
was released after a short period of time and committed another crime or how a person was
convicted of a crime and due to mandatory sentencing guidelines they are faced with a sentence
that may be disproportionate to the criminal act.
One such case has been making headline here in Florida recently. In The State of Florida
vs. Marrissa Danielle Alexander case # 16-2010-CF-8579-AXXX-MA, which took place shortly
after the George Zimmerman trial and has caused some public outcry to reexamine both

mandatory sentencing guidelines as well as the Florida statutes commonly referred to as the
Stand Your Ground laws. In the Alexander case she was denied her motion of immunity from
prosecution and motion to dismiss. Circuit Judge Elizabeth A. Senterfitt wrote in her opinion that
Alexander had not proved by a preponderance of the evidence her justification of using deadly
force. This ruling and her subsequent conviction of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon,
which under Floridas 10/20/life sentencing guidelines earned her a sentence of 20 years. This
case drew national attention for many reasons; one being her previously clean record, and the
other the history of violence that she had suffered at the hands of the alleged victim. Because of
these two mitigating factors the public was outraged at the length of her sentence when is widely
believed that her intentions were to warn and not harm the alleged victim (Finout).
On September 26, 2013 her appeal of her conviction was overturned by the First District
Court of Appeals. Her conviction however was not overturned because of any of the public
outcry or because the sentence was too long. Her conviction was remanded for a new trial
because the jurys instructions on self-defense were erroneous. In the instructions to the jury the
phrase beyond a reasonable doubt was added in the aggravated battery charge against the
defendant. The court had previously ruled in Murray v State, 937 So. 2d 277 (Fla. DCA 2006)
which was on point with this case, that the burden of beyond a reasonable doubt did not shift
to the defendant in cases of self-defense. They merely had to present evidence that the jury could
then decide for themselves whether reasonable doubt existed as to whether they were defending
themselves or not. While this ruling does nothing for the issue of whether or not sentencing
guidelines should be addressed it has brought the issue to the forefront and with the new trial,
allows for what was possible an injustice to be rectified.
Another case that brought the attention to both the sentencing guidelines and the Stand

Your Ground laws was the George Zimmerman trial. While the outcome in this case was much
different, the reality was if he had been convicted of a lesser offense he still faced a stiff penalty
under the sentencing guidelines of Florida. When juries convict persons of crimes they are not
made aware of what each conviction will carry as a sentence for each charge. Perhaps if the jury
had known what the sentencing for convicting Alexander would be they would not have
convicted her in the first place.
It is not just the State of Florida who has mandatory sentencing guidelines; Attorney
General Eric Holder has recently addressed the minimum sentencing guidelines of the Federal
Government. In his speech to the American Bar Association, he stated that the prisons need to
punish, deter and rehabilitate, but not to merely warehouse and forget. This has long been a
debate among those who believe in longer, stricter sentencing and those who believe that it more
important to address the source and work to break the cycle that leads to criminal behavior.
While we can never stamp out crime, we can do our part to ensure justice, whether that mean
longer sentences for some or shorter for others. Each case is unique and the mitigating
circumstances that surround it should be a factor when it comes to the punishment phase of
criminal convictions.
There still remains much controversy on the sentencing guidelines in the State of Florida.
In Florida, there is a lot of debate on how long an accused should be sentenced depending on the
crime that was performed. Some criminals who committed a major offense are sentenced for
minimal years of jail time and even resulting on the charges been dropped. For the public, these
guidelines for sentencing criminals and accused are unfair and also unsafe for their community to
live in.
In a recent Florida case, thirty-eight year old Russell Joseph Hunt pleaded guilty to four

charges of control or intentionally view sexual performance by a child and five counts of
computer pornography and child exploitation (Freeman). He also admitted the possession of
naked photos sent by a teenage girl. The Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Sandra McSorley
sentenced Hunt to ten years of probation and also required him to spend his first year in county
jail. Hunt was to serve to forty-five years in prison for his convictions, but it appears that there
were two big factors that were able to lesser the years in prison. Firstly, Hunt qualified for
treatment of a mental disorder unrelated to substance or addiction and secondly ...he showed
sincere remorse for the crimes (Freeman Sun Sentinel). Because of these two factors, the State
Attorney had agreed to drop both counts.
The Hunt case shows how scathing Florida sentencing guidelines could be and might not
be the best for society as a whole. Neighborhood safety for children in the state is crucial and
vitally important for the publics awareness. The decision of this case has brought a lot of
attention to the community due to the fact that Hunt was given only one year in jail for his
offenses; making the community worry about other related cases.
Another case that has brought much attention is the case of fifty-eight year old Ronald
William Brown, ... arrested last year on charges of possessing child pornography and was
conspiring to kidnap a child (Murdock). Brown worked in a churchs ministry and had the
desire to rape, carve and cook the body parts of a young boy (Murdock). Brown was sentenced
twenty years in federal prison on child porn charges. However, evidence was found on one of his
personal computer when he chatted with other people in a forum who had the same desires. The
court also found two hundred pictures of naked children in his computer. Due to the sentencing
guidelines Brown will be free after twenty years in prison and might even continue on the search
to find the perfect candidate for his cannibalism lifestyle. Compared to the case of Hunt, both

cases show a lack of justice in our legal system for sentencing guidelines. Two-sex offenders,
which were prosecuted with almost the same amount of charges, were sentenced for a short
period of time.
The American Justice System is complex and controversial. Perhaps one reason we can
conclude to be the main problem, is involving too many political decisions into a sentencing.
People invoke their political opinion when they are analyzing a case to demonstrate appropriate
punishment; when, in reality, it is only causing more problems with sentencing. In order to deter
people from committing crime, punishment should be given free of political feelings and human
hubris. The morality of deterrence is a ...punishment on the basis of deterrence is inherently
unjust. For if an example is made of a person to induce others to avoid criminal actions then he
suffers not for what he has done but one account of other peoples tendency to do likewise1 As
culture changes, so do the statutes and the ruling of law, sentencing guidelines are subjected to
change as well, in hopes of better fitting a justly society.

1 Andenaes, Johannes. The Morality of Deterrence. 37. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Law Review, 1970. 649-64. Print.

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"Index to Statistics and Publications." (2010): n.pag. Florida Department of
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<http://www.dc.state.fl.us/pub/sg_annual/0001/intro.html>.
Finout, Gary. "Marissa Alexander, Woman Sentenced to 20 years for Firing a Warning Shot,
Get's
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Hogenmuller, John. "Structured Sentencing In Florida: Is The Experiment Over?." Law & Policy
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Lah, Kyung. "One-month prison ends for Montana Rapist."CNN.com [Billings, Montana] 26
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Murdock, Sebastian. "Ronald Brown, Pedophile Puppeteer, Sentenced To 20 Years." The
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United States. U.S Census Bureau. 2010 Census. 2010. Web.
<http://www.census.gov/2010census/>.
The State of Florida vs. Marrissa Danielle Alexander case # 16-2010-CF-8579-AXXX-MA