{"id":664,"date":"2012-04-17T16:06:51","date_gmt":"2012-04-17T20:06:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.miblaw.com\/lawschool\/?p=664"},"modified":"2012-04-19T14:28:40","modified_gmt":"2012-04-19T18:28:40","slug":"ewing-v-california","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.miblaw.com\/lawschool\/ewing-v-california\/","title":{"rendered":"Ewing v. California, 538 U.S. 11 (2003)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Case Name: <\/strong>Ewing v. California<br \/>\n<strong>Citation: <\/strong>538 U.S. 11 (2003)<\/p>\n<p><strong>Facts:<\/strong> The goal of the \u201cThree Strikes and You\u2019re Out\u201d law was to protect public safety by providing lengthy prison terms for habitual offers. Ewing had a record (mostly theft and battery \u2013 at least two serious or violent crimes) and was being sentenced for stealing about $1,200 worth of golf clubs. The judge had some discretion whether or not to sentence under Three Strikes but refused and sentenced Ewing to 25 years to life.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Issue: <\/strong>Whether the 8<sup>th<\/sup> Amendment prohibits the State of California from sentencing a repeat felon to a prison term of 25 years to life under the State\u2019s \u201cThree Strikes and You\u2019re Out.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Defendant\u2019s argument: <\/strong>Ewing&#8217;s 25 years to life sentence is disproportionate and is cruel and unusual punishment for theft charges. It does not match up with \u201cthe gravity of the offense and the harshness of the penalty.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>State\u2019s argument: <\/strong>This law targets the class of offenders who pose the greatest threat to public safety: career criminals. Also, statistics showed that the new law seemed to deter crime because the recidivism rate went down.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Holding: <\/strong>The sentence was affirmed.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Reasoning: <\/strong>Deference to the legislature \u2013 it is a legislative judgment that offenders who continue to commit violent or serious crimes be incapacitated. Spoke about the cruel and unusual clause contains a \u201cNarrow proportionality principle\u201d that \u201capplies to noncapital sentences.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><strong>Scalia\u2019s concurrence in judgment: <\/strong>Proportionality should only be tied to capital offenses. The plurality is evaluating policy (making it more difficult than it has to be).<\/p>\n<p><strong>Thomas\u2019 concurrence in the judgment: <\/strong>8<sup>th<\/sup> Amendment contains no proportionality principle<\/p>\n<p><strong>Dissent: <\/strong>Proportionality is required by the 8<sup>th<\/sup> Amendment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Case Name: Ewing v. California Citation: 538 U.S. 11 (2003) Facts: The goal of the \u201cThree Strikes and You\u2019re Out\u201d law was to protect public safety by providing lengthy prison terms for habitual offers. Ewing had a record (mostly theft and battery \u2013 at least two serious or violent crimes) and was being sentenced for &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.miblaw.com\/lawschool\/ewing-v-california\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Ewing v. California, 538 U.S. 11 (2003)&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[146,145],"tags":[157,155,158],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v15.1.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Ewing v. 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