Blakely v. Washington

Blakely v. Washington
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued March 23, 2004 Decided June 24, 2004
Full case name	Ralph Howard Blakely, Jr. v. Washington
Citations	542 U.S. 296 (more) 124 S. Ct. 2531; 159 L. Ed. 2d 403; 2004 U.S. LEXIS 4573; 72 U.S.L.W. 4546; 17 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. S 430
Case history
Prior	Defendant sentenced, Grant County Superior Court, 11-13-00; affirmed, 47 P.3d 149 (Wash. App. 2002); review denied, 62 P.3d 889 (Wash. 2003); cert. granted, 540 U.S. 965 (2003).
Subsequent	Rehearing denied, 125 S. Ct. 21 (2004)
Holding
The State of Washington's criminal sentencing system violated the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial, because it gave judges the ability to increase sentences based on their own determination of facts.
Court membership
Chief Justice William Rehnquist Associate Justices John P. Stevens · Sandra Day O'Connor Antonin Scalia · Anthony Kennedy David Souter · Clarence Thomas Ruth Bader Ginsburg · Stephen Breyer
Case opinions
Majority	Scalia, joined by Stevens, Souter, Thomas, Ginsburg
Dissent	O'Connor, joined by Breyer; Rehnquist, Kennedy (except as to Part IV-B)
Dissent	Kennedy, joined by Breyer
Dissent	Breyer, joined by O'Connor
Laws applied
U.S. Const. amend. VI; Washington Sentencing Reform Act

Blakely v. Washington, 542 U.S. 296 (2004), held that, in the context of mandatory sentencing guidelines under state law, the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial prohibited judges from enhancing criminal sentences based on facts other than those decided by the jury or admitted by the defendant. The landmark nature of the case was alluded to by Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, who characterized the decision as a "Number 10 earthquake".^[1]