NCJ Number
138425
Journal
Judicature Volume: 75 Issue: 3 Dated: (October-November 1991) Pages: 143-153
Date Published
1991
Length
11 pages
Annotation
Appellate review has already profoundly changed sentencing policy in Alaska, and interaction between decisions made by Alaska's court of appeals since its inception in 1980 and new policies recommended by the sentencing commission will shape future sentencing practices.
Abstract
Alaska's appellate courts routinely review and modify criminal sentences under authority granted by statute. Before 1969, however, no statutory mechanism existed for the appellate review of criminal sentences. In 1969, the Alaska Legislature unanimously enacted a statute giving criminal defendants and the State the right to appeal a sentence to the Alaska Supreme Court. In 1975, the supreme court surveyed all sentence appeals it had decided in its first 5 years of sentence review. The supreme court reversed the trial court 32 percent of the time. Also in the first 5 years of sentence review, the supreme court attempted to develop sentencing criteria to guide trial judges. By 1975, sentence appeal filings were on the rise. Although the supreme court had decided only 60 sentence appeals during the first 5 years, 22 sentence appeals were filed in 1975 alone. The dramatic increase in sentence appeals was largely the result of Alaska's 1975 ban on plea bargaining. To solve the supreme court's workload problem, an intermediate court of appeals was proposed. In 1980, the legislature created a three-judge court of appeals and gave it mandatory jurisdiction in criminal and quasi-criminal matters, including sentence appeals. The court of appeals articulated benchmarks for first felony offenders sentenced for Class B felonies, aggravated Class A felonies, serious sexual offenses, second-degree murder, and consecutively imposed sentences. In general, appellate review of sentencing has profoundly changed sentencing policy in Alaska, and past experience suggests that appellate courts will continue to use their authority to participate actively in shaping Alaska's sentencing practices. 157 footnotes