Acquittals Can Boost Sentences, High Court Says

WASHINGTON — Criminals who are convicted in federal court may have their sentences increased because of other charges on which they were acquitted, the Supreme Court said Monday.

Sentencing judges have “broad discretion” to take into account information about a defendant’s background and character, the justices said. This includes charges that were not proven, either in the past or those filed at the same time as charges that resulted in guilty verdicts.

Moreover, an “acquittal on criminal charges does not prove that the defendant is innocent,” the high court said on a 7-2 vote. “It merely proves the existence of a reasonable doubt.”

Monday’s ruling (United States vs. Watts, 95-1906) means that a defendant who is convicted on one count and acquitted on a half dozen others could be sentenced as if he were convicted on all the charges.

The decision reverses the rule in California and the other West Coast states, where conduct that results in an acquittal cannot be used against a defendant.

“We would pervert our system of justice,” said the U.S. 9th Circuit of Appeals in 1991, “if we allowed a defendant to suffer punishment for a criminal charge for which he was acquitted.”

The 9th Circuit, based in San Francisco, stood alone among the 12 regional appeals court in adopting that rule.

In an appeal filed in May, Clinton administration lawyers complained that the 9th Circuit was ignoring the long-standing practice elsewhere. Without even bothering to hear arguments in the case, the Supreme Court granted the appeal and overturned the 9th Circuit’s policy.

“We hold that a jury’s verdict of acquittal does not prevent the sentencing [judge] from considering conduct underlying the acquitted charge, so long as that conduct has been proved by a preponderance of the evidence,” the court said in a 10-page unsigned opinion.

*

In dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens called it a “perverse result.” Justice Anthony M. Kennedy dissented separately, saying that the question is worthy of fuller consideration by the court.

The issue arises often in federal prosecutions, whether involving drugs, bank fraud or pornography, where defendants are indicted on multiple counts. Quite often, they are convicted on some counts and acquitted on others.

In other actions, the court:

* Let stand a New York state court ruling that said prison inmates cannot be forced to attend Alcoholics Anonymous classes because a belief in God is invoked at these meetings. A self-professed atheist said that a prison rule requiring attendance at such classes to win some privileges violates the constitution’s separation-of-church-and-state rule.

Monday’s dismissal of the state’s appeal probably says little about the high court’s view of the matter. The justices have been so badly split on religion cases of late that they have simply refused to hear any appeals raising the issue. The New York case was Coughlin vs. Griffin, 96-372.

* Heard arguments on whether state agencies can be sued for failing to collect money owed by “deadbeat dads.” A federal appeals court in California would allow such suits but the justices sounded as though they are inclined to reverse that decision (Blessing vs. Freestone, 95-1441).