Levar Jermaine Taborn Tyson v. State of Florida

A third rail in Florida’s criminal sentencing process is touched when trial judges say they won’t consider or summarily reject otherwise lawful sentencing options due to their individual sentencing practices, such as a policy of only rounding up sentencing recommendations to the next year or categorically excluding an available sentencing alternative. Cromartie v. State, 70 So.3d 559, 564 (Fla. 2011) (trial judge’s. “policy of ‘rounding up,’ ” and thereby improperly increasing defendant’s length of incarceration, “violated [the defendant’s] right to due process”); Pressley v. State, 73 So.3d…