Blakely V. Washington - Effect On Subsequent Jurisprudence

Effect On Subsequent Jurisprudence

Although the Court expressly stated that it was not addressing the constitutionality of the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, it was hard to resist the conclusion that the Guidelines as then constituted were in jeopardy in light of the tremendous similarity between the structure of the federal Guidelines and the Washington Guidelines at issue in Blakely. Six weeks after the decision in this case, the Court agreed to review two cases involving the constitutionality of sentence enhancements under the federal Guidelines — United States v. Booker and a companion case, United States v. Fanfan — an extraordinary step for the Court to take during the summer months. The Court ordered the briefs in Booker to be submitted during the month of September 2004, and scheduled oral argument in Booker for the first day of the 2004 Term, Monday, October 4. The Court's opinion in Booker came out on January 12, 2005, and drastically changed the legal framework within which federal sentencing takes place.

Also, many states had to decide how Blakely applied to their sentencing systems. California, notably, concluded it did not affect its sentencing scheme in a case decided by the California Supreme Court called People v. Black. The U.S. Supreme Court later concluded that Blakely did apply in California, thereby overruling Black with its decision in Cunningham v. California.