TALLAHASSEE -- Florida's 1999 "three strikes" law mandating longer prison sentences for repeat felons was upheld Thursday in a 4-3 ruling by the state's Supreme Court.Florida's five midlevel appeals courts had been at odds over the constitutionality of the law. Two had concluded the Legislature violated the state constitutional requirement that bills deal with only one subject when it passed the law; three ruled there was no problem with the law's scope.
After the first ruling against the original law, state lawmakers came back in 2002 and passed the same provisions in five different bills.
Under them, judges must give defendants the maximum sentence for a third felony. For example, the top penalty for armed robbery is life in prison, so a "three-strike" offender convicted of that crime would have to get life.
Other provisions require a three-year minimum sentence for aggravated assault or battery of someone 65 or older, three years for assaulting a police officer and five years for battery of a police officer.
The law also makes possession of 25 pounds of marijuana -- half the prior minimum of 50 pounds -- enough to charge someone with trafficking. It also enhances penalties for repeat sexual batterers.
The get-tough-on-criminals measure was a centerpiece of Gov. Jeb Bush's 1998 gubernatorial campaign. Bush spokesman Jacob DiPietre said his boss was pleased by Thursday's ruling.
DiPietre said Florida's crime rate hit a 33-year low last year and that the three-strikes law, along with a 10-20-life law for criminals who carry guns when they attack, were key in reducing crimes.
Attorney General Charlie Crist called the decision "a huge victory for the safety of Floridians."
The key question before the courts is how to define "single subject," Chief Justice Barbara Pariente wrote for the majority, which included Justices Charles Wells, Raoul Cantero and Kenneth Bell.
Pariente wrote that "considerable deference" should be given to state lawmakers to determine the single subject. She pointed out that in about three out of every four cases since 1877, the Florida Supreme Court has upheld the constitutionality of a state law against a single-subject attack.
"Consistent with our earlier jurisprudence and the actual wording of our constitution, we reiterate that a court generally need look no further than the title of the act in question when defining a single subject," Pariente wrote.
The full title of the 1999 law, which lawmakers called the "Three-Strike Violent Felony Offender Act," runs two pages and almost a thousand words, Pariente wrote.
But she added, the short title of the law is "an act relating to sentencing." And the 14 sections of the law, which is 41 pages long, are all properly connected to the subject of sentencing, the court concluded.
Justice Peggy Quince wrote a dissenting opinion supported by Justices Harry Lee Anstead and R. Fred Lewis.
Thursday's decision came in an appeal by Corey Franklin, a 25-year-old sentenced to 40 years in prison four years ago.
A few months after the law took effect in July 1999, Franklin was involved in several violent crimes in Miami-Dade: armed robbery, carjacking, attempted murder. He had two felonies on his record: possession of cocaine and burglary of a dwelling.
In January 2002, the 2nd District Court of Appeal in Lakeland, handling a separate case, ruled the three-strikes law was unconstitutional.
Franklin appealed. But when his case got to the 3rd District Court of Appeal in Miami, that court came to the opposite conclusion, finding the law constitutional.
The conflict between the two DCAs sent the issue up the high court, which heard oral arguments last November.
Also Thursday, Florida's high court dismissed a challenge by inmate Cedric Green, who challenged the 2002 version of the provisions.
