Opinion
No. 66864
10-20-2015
CHAD LEWIS BROADWAY A/K/A CHAD LOUIS BROADWAY, Appellants, v. THE STATE OF NEVADA, Respondent.
An unpublished order shall not be regarded as precedent and shall not be cited as legal authority. SCR 123.
ORDER OF AFFIRMANCE
This is an appeal from a judgment of conviction entered pursuant to a guilty plea of possession of a stolen motor vehicle. Second Judicial District Court, Washoe County; Janet J. Berry, Judge.
Appellant Chad Broadway argues his sentence of 24 to 60 months in prison constitutes cruel and unusual punishment because it is disproportionate to the gravity of his offense and his prior criminal history. Broadway specifically asserts he was convicted of a non-violent offense, he was sentenced to a long prison term, and the prison term was imposed to run consecutively to the 12- to 34-month prison term he received in another case.
Regardless of its severity, a sentence that is within the statutory limits is not "'cruel and unusual punishment unless the statute fixing punishment is unconstitutional or the sentence is so unreasonably disproportionate to the offense as to shock the conscience.'" Blume v. State, 112 Nev. 472, 475, 915 P.2d 282, 284 (1996) (quoting Culverson v. State, 95 Nev. 433, 435, 596 P.2d 220, 221-22 (1979)); see also Harmelin v. Michigan, 501 U.S. 957, 1000-01 (1991) (plurality opinion) (explaining that the Eighth Amendment does not require strict proportionality between crime and sentence; it forbids only an extreme sentence that is grossly disproportionate to the crime). The sentence imposed is within the parameters provided by the relevant statutes, see NRS 176.035(1); NRS 193.130(2)(c); NRS 205.273(3), and Broadway does not allege that those statutes are unconstitutional. We conclude the sentence imposed is not so grossly disproportionate to the crime and Broadway's history of recidivism as to constitute cruel and unusual punishment. See Ewing v. California, 538 U.S. 11, 29 (2003) (plurality opinion).
Having concluded Broadway is not entitled to relief, we
ORDER the judgment of conviction AFFIRMED.
/s/_________, C.J.
Gibbons
/s/_________, J.
Tao
/s/_________, J.
Silver
cc: Hon. Janet J. Berry, District Judge
Law Offices of Lyn E. Beggs, PLLC
Attorney General/Carson City
Washoe County District Attorney
Washoe District Court Clerk