Cite as: 532 U. S. 36 (2001)
Syllabus
statute but not the full text, the judge twice told the jury that "life imprisonment means until the death of the defendant." During its sentencing deliberations, the jury asked the judge whether, and under what circumstances, someone convicted of murder could become eligible for parole. The judge responded that "[p]arole eligibility or ineligibility is not for your consideration." The jury unanimously found beyond a reasonable doubt the aggravating factor of murder while attempting armed robbery, and recommended the death penalty, which the judge imposed.
The South Carolina Supreme Court affirmed. Without considering whether the prosecutor's evidentiary submissions or closing argument in fact placed Shafer's future dangerousness at issue, the court held Simmons generally inapplicable to the State's "new sentencing scheme." Simmons is not triggered, the South Carolina court said, unless life without parole is the only legally available sentence alternative to death. Currently, the court observed, when a capital jury begins its sentencing deliberations, three alternative sentences are available: (1) death, (2) life without the possibility of parole, or (3) a mandatory minimum 30-year sentence. Since an alternative to death other than life without the possibility of parole exists, the court concluded, Simmons no longer constrains capital sentencing in South Carolina.
Held:
1. The South Carolina Supreme Court incorrectly interpreted Simmons when it declared the case inapplicable to South Carolina's current sentencing scheme. That court's reasoning might be persuasive if the jury's sentencing discretion actually encompassed the three choices the court identified: death, life without the possibility of parole, or a mandatory minimum 30-year sentence. But, that is not how the State's new scheme works. Under the law now governing sentencing proceedings, if the jury finds an aggravating circumstance, it must recommend a sentence, and its choices are limited to death and life without parole. When the jury makes the threshold determination whether a statutory aggravator exists, a tightly circumscribed factual inquiry, none of Simmons' due process concerns yet arise. At that stage, there are no "misunderstanding[s]" to avoid, no "false choice[s]" to guard against. See Simmons, 512 U. S., at 161 (plurality opinion). The jury, as aggravating circumstance factfinder, exercises no sentencing discretion itself. If no aggravator is found, the judge takes over and has sole authority to impose the mandatory minimum so heavily relied upon by the State Supreme Court. It is only when the jury endeavors the moral judgment whether to impose the death penalty that parole eligibility may become critical. Correspondingly, it is only at that stage that Simmons comes
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