Cite as: 538 U. S. 11 (2003)
Breyer, J., dissenting
slaughter). It reserves the sentence that it here imposes upon (former-burglar-now-golf-club-thief) Ewing for nonrecidivist, first-degree murderers. See § 190(a) (West Supp. 2003) (sentence of 25 years to life for first-degree murder).
As to other jurisdictions, we know the following: The United States, bound by the federal Sentencing Guidelines, would impose upon a recidivist, such as Ewing, a sentence that, in any ordinary case, would not exceed 18 months in prison. USSG § 2B1.1(a) (Nov. 1999) (assuming a base offense level of 6, a criminal history of VI, and no mitigating or aggravating adjustments); id., ch. 5, pt. A, Sentencing Table. The Guidelines, based in part upon a study of some 40,000 actual federal sentences, see supra, at 37, 41, reserve a Ewing-type sentence for Ewing-type recidivists who currently commit such crimes as murder, § 2A1.2; air piracy, § 2A5.1; robbery (involving the discharge of a firearm, serious bodily injury, and about $1 million), § 2B3.1; drug offenses involving more than, for example, 20 pounds of heroin, § 2D1.1; aggravated theft of more than $100 million, § 2B1.1; and other similar offenses. The Guidelines reserve 10 years of real prison time (with good time)—less than 40 percent of Ewing's sentence—for Ewing-type recidivists who go on to commit, for instance, voluntary manslaughter, § 2A1.3; aggravated assault with a firearm (causing serious bodily injury and motivated by money), § 2A2.2; kidnaping, § 2A4.1; residential burglary involving more than $5 million, § 2B2.1; drug offenses involving at least one pound of cocaine, § 2D1.1; and other similar offenses. Ewing also would not have been subject to the federal "three strikes" law, 18 U. S. C. § 3559(c), for which grand theft is not a triggering offense.
With three exceptions, see infra, at 46-47, we do not have before us information about actual time served by Ewing-type offenders in other States. We do know, however, that the law would make it legally impossible for a Ewing-type offender to serve more than 10 years in prison in 33 jurisdictions, as well as the federal courts, see Appendix,
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