stating that the “standard for holding that a sentence is disproportionate to the offense” is whether the sentence is “so disproportionate to the offense as to shock the moral sense of all reasonable persons as to what is right and proper”
How later courts described this case
- stating that the “standard for holding that a sentence is disproportionate to the offense” is whether the sentence is “so disproportionate to the offense as to shock the moral sense of all reasonable persons as to what is right and proper”
- stating that “[a]n objection on one ground is not sufficient to preserve some other objection”
- "The legislature has chosen to subject all such persons to the maximum potential penalty. Defendant's opinion makes sense, but so does that which we attribute to the legislature. There was a rational basis for the legislature to conclude that both classes of escapees are dangerous."
- ‘It is clear * * * that the legislature intends that Oregon courts sentence criminal defendants under the statutory scheme in force when a particular criminal act was committed. ’
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
FADELEY, J.,
dissenting.
I dissent for the reason stated in the first three paragraphs of the dissenting opinion in State v. Williams, 313 Or 19, 44-45 , 828 P2d 1006 (1992).
Specifically, the homicide in this case occurred at a time when the Oregon statute did not meet federal constitutional muster. The Supreme Court of the United States vacated the sentence and remanded a death penalty case to this court in Wagner v. Oregon, 492 US 914 , 109 S Ct 3235 , 106 L Ed 2d 583 (1989). Thereafter, this court, by a majority vote, added 100 words to the statute in an effort to save it from the constitutional infirmity. See State v. Moen, 309 Or 45, 102-04 , 786 P2d 111 (1990) (Fadeley J., dissenting, detailing the 100-word addition to statute). The statute had been initiated and adopted in 1984.1 do not believe this court had authority to make a substantial, significant, and after-the-fact addition to the 1984 statute that the people, by their vote adopting it, did not include. Thus, the majority has affirmed a sentence based on judicial amendment to a penalty statute.
Only the legislative branch may enact penal laws. I dissent.