Stockton v. Leeke

In unrelated cases, the appellants were convicted of safe-cracking with tools and each received a ten (10) year sentence on that conviction.

These cases have been consolidated on appeal from denials of post-conviction relief because each contains the common question of whether the ten (10) year minimum sentence for safecracking committed with tools provided by Section 16-11-390 of the South Carolina Code (1976), formerly ■ Section 16-337 of the 1962 Code, constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment of the United States Constitution.

The basic rule for an attack…