voluntary manslaughter

Howard Mahoney died intestate on May 6, 1961, of gunshot wounds. His wife, Charlotte Mahoney, was tried for the murder of Howard Mahoney in the Addison County Court and was convicted by jury of the crime of manslaughter in March, 1962. She is presently serving a sentence of not less than 12 nor more than 15 years at the Women’s Reformatory in Rutland. Howard Mahoney left no issue, and was survived by his wife and his father and mother. His father, Mark Mahoney, was appointed administrator of his estate which at the present time amounts to $3,885.89. After due notice and hearing, the Probate Court for the District of Franklin entered a judgment order decreeing the residue of the Estate of Howard Mahoney, in equal shares, to the father and mother of the decedent. An appeal from the judgment order and decree has been taken here by the appellant widow. The cause now before us is here on a direct appeal from the Probate Court. Findings of fact were made below from which it appears that the judgment of the probate court decreeing the estate of Howard Mahoney to his parents, rather than to his widow, was based upon a finding of the felonious killing of her husband by Mrs. Mahoney. The Probate Court used the record of the conviction of the appellant for manslaughter for its determination that the appellant had feloniously killed her husband. In Vermont, an indictment for murder can result in a jury conviction on either voluntary or involuntary manslaughter. The legislature has provided the sentences that may be passed upon a person convicted of manslaughter, but provides no definition of that offense, nor any statutory distinction between voluntary and involuntary manslaughter.

In 1994 California enacted its three strikes law providing an indeterminate term of 25 years to life for any defendant convicted of a felony who had previously been convicted of two or more serious or violent felonies. On March 12, 2000, Gary Albert Ewing entered the pro shop at the El Segundo Golf Course in Los Angeles County while on parole from a nine-year prison term. He left with three golf clubs priced at $399 each concealed in his pants leg. A shop employee alerted police, and officers apprehended Ewing in the parking lot. Ewing had a long criminal history. In 1984 at age 22 he pleaded guilty to theft and received six months suspended jail time, three years probation, and a fine. Between 1988 and 1993 he accumulated convictions for grand theft auto, petty theft with a prior, battery, burglary, drug paraphernalia possession, unlawful firearm possession, and trespass. In October and November 1993 Ewing committed three residential burglaries and one robbery at a Long Beach apartment complex over five weeks. A jury later convicted him of first-degree robbery and three counts of residential burglary. He received a sentence of nine years and eight months before being paroled in 1999. A jury convicted Ewing of one count of felony grand theft for the golf-club theft. At sentencing the prosecution alleged and the trial court found four prior serious or violent felony convictions arising from the Long Beach crimes. At the sentencing hearing, Ewing asked the court to reduce the grand theft conviction to a misdemeanor or to dismiss some or all of the prior strike allegations. The trial court declined both requests and imposed the mandatory 25-years-to-life term under the three strikes law. The California Court of Appeal affirmed in an unpublished opinion rejecting Ewing's claim that the sentence was grossly disproportionate. The California Supreme Court denied review. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari.

Respondent Pearce was convicted in a North Carolina court upon a charge of assault with intent to commit rape and sentenced to prison for a term of 12 to 15 years. Several years later the North Carolina Supreme Court reversed his conviction upon the ground that an involuntary confession had unconstitutionally been admitted in evidence against him. He was retried, convicted, and sentenced by the trial judge to an eight-year prison term, which when added to the time he had already spent in prison amounted to a longer total sentence than that originally imposed. Pearce then began this habeas corpus proceeding in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina, which held that the longer sentence imposed upon retrial was unconstitutional and void, and the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed. Respondent Rice pleaded guilty in an Alabama trial court to four separate charges of second-degree burglary and was sentenced to prison terms aggregating 10 years. Two and one-half years later the judgments were set aside in a state coram nobis proceeding upon the ground that Rice had not been accorded his constitutional right to counsel. He was retried upon three of the charges, convicted, and sentenced to prison terms aggregating 25 years with no credit given for the time he had already spent in prison. Rice then brought this habeas corpus proceeding in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Alabama. That court held that the state trial court had acted unconstitutionally in failing to give credit for time served and in imposing harsher sentences upon retrial. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed. The Supreme Court granted certiorari in both cases.