Deck 7: Sentencing Reforms and the Supreme Court: Rodney L.Engen Ronald F.Wright

Question 1

With sentencing guidelines, an offender's punishment is mainly based on

A) The offender's rehabilitation.
B) The seriousness of the crime and the offender's criminal history.
C) The threat that the offender poses to the public.
D) The capacity of state prisons and jails.

Answer 1

B

Question 2

What philosophy of punishment provides the justification for indeterminate sentencing?

A) Rehabilitation.
B) Retribution.
C) Incapacitation.
D) Deterrence.

Answer 2

A

Question 3

Liberals and Conservatives agreed on one point about sentencing policies in the 1970s and 1980s. Which of the following best describes the area of agreement?

A) There was too little discretion in the system.
B) Judges and correctional officials needed more flexibility to decide punishment.
C) There was too much discretion in the system.
D) Increasing spending on rehabilitation would be more cost-effective than imprisonment.

Answer 3

C

Question 4

Which of these sentencing reforms reduced discretion in release decisions, like parole?

A) Determinate sentencing.
B) Presumptive sentencing.
C) Sentencing guidelines.
D) Indeterminate sentencing.

Question 5

What was unconstitutional about the sentences ordered in the Blakely and Booker cases?

A) They were based on facts that were proven at the sentence hearing.
B) They were longer than was allowed by law at the time.
C) They were based on evidence that was later found not to be true.
D) They were based on evidence that the juries in these cases did not hear.

Question 6

How did the Blakely ruling affect sentencing laws in Washington and other states?

A) Most states' sentencing guidelines were unconstitutional and are no longer in effect.
B) For any additional evidence to be used to increase the length of a prison sentence, prosecutors must present that evidence along with the criminal charges.
C) Judges cannot sentence any offender to more time in prison than the sentencing guideline range allows for the conviction offense.
D) Washington and other states may continue to use sentencing guidelines, but they are advisory only; judges are not required to follow them.

Question 7

Under presumptive sentencing guidelines, sentences outside the recommended range are called

A) Illegal sentences.
B) Departure sentences.
C) Disparity sentences.
D) Discretionary sentences.

Question 8

In federal courts, how did sentences after the Booker ruling compare with sentences before Booker?

A) There were more sentences above the guideline ranges after Booker.
B) There were more sentences below the guideline ranges after Booker.
C) There were roughly the same number of sentences above or below the guideline ranges after Booker.
D) There were more sentences above and below the guideline ranges after Booker.

Question 9

In Booker, the Court ruled that the federal sentencing guidelines violated defendants'

A) First Amendment right to free speech.
B) Fourth Amendment protection against unlawful search and seizure.
C) Sixth Amendment right to a trial by jury.
D) Eighth Amendment protection against cruel and unusual punishment.

Question 10

Based on current interpretation of the Sixth Amendment jury trial right, which of the following facts does not have to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt, just like an element of the crime?

A) The fact that the offender "brandished" a weapon during commission of the crime, triggering a mandatory minimum penalty.
B) The fact that the offender committed the crime with "deliberate cruelty," authorizing a sentence above the presumptive guideline range.
C) The exceptionally large amount of money that victims lost because of the defendant's fraud, making available the highest of three designated statutory penalties for fraud under state law.
D) The offender's prior criminal convictions that increase the available sentence for the current crime of conviction.