CRIMINAL CASES TESTED FOR NEW SENTENCING

Washington (AP) - The Supreme Court is seeing the effects of last summer's
groundbreaking ruling that expands jury-trial rights in certain criminal
cases: a pile of appeals by defendants who say their sentences are unfair.

The justices ruled that virtually any question that could boost someone's
maximum sentence, such as whether a crime was motivated by racial hate,
must be decided by a trial jury. Judges no longer can decide such issues on
their own during sentencing.

In essence, the court said "the constitutional right to trial by jury means
what it says," said New York lawyer Gerald Lefcourt, former president of
the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. "That's been bedrock
U.S. justice since the Founding Fathers." "There are dozens of cases that
have come down the pike already" challenging sentences as a result of the
ruling, said Miami criminal defense lawyer Neal Sonnett.

The ruling, issued in June, said a New Jersey man who fired shots into a
black family's home was entitled to have a jury decide whether he acted out
of hate and could be sent to prison longer than the ordinary maximum.

New appeals citing that decision are rolling in to the Supreme Court, and
the justices already have ordered lower courts to take a new look at a
number of cases. Lower courts have decided some defendants are entitled to
a new sentencing.

Many of those cases involve drugs. Until now, judges often have decided
such issues as how much cocaine someone sold: More cocaine can lead to a
longer prison sentence. But many appeals say those decisions now must be
made by the jury if the drug quantity could boost the maximum sentence.

Other appeals say juries must decide such issues as the amount of loss in a
fraud case, or a defendant's use of a gun, if that factor would allow a
longer maximum prison term.

Monmouth County, N.J., prosecutor John Kaye said many state laws allow
higher maximum sentences if prosecutors show, for example, that someone is
a career criminal, is involved with a street gang or committed a crime by
using a stolen car. "All those things will be tested now," Kaye said,
adding that proving such issues to a jury instead of a judge would be "a
little harder, but we'll work with it."

The whole issue stems from the Constitution's Sixth Amendment guarantee of
a jury trial for criminal defendants. Even with that guarantee, trial
judges traditionally have had wide leeway to impose sentences by
considering all of a defendant's actions, even if they were not charged or
proved to the jury.