Southern Union Co. v. United States (567 U.S. 343)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 21, 2012 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 567 U.S. 343 · 132 S. Ct. 2344
- Decided
- June 21, 2012
- Term
- October Term 2011
- Vote
- 6–3
- Majority author
- Justice Sotomayor
- Issue area
- Criminal Procedure
- Disposition
- Reversed and remanded
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Liberal
Opinion excerpt
Justice Sotomayor delivered the opinion of the Court. The Sixth Amendment reserves to juries the determination of any fact, other than the fact of a prior conviction, that increases a criminal defendant’s maximum potential sentence. Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U. S. 466 (2000); Blakely v. Washington, 542 U. S. 296 (2004). We have applied this principle in numerous cases where the sentence was imprisonment or death. The question here is whether the same rule applies to sentences of criminal fines. We hold that it does. I Petitioner Southern Union Company is a natural gas distributor. Its subsidiary stored liquid mercury, a hazardous substance, at a facility in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. In September 2004, youths from a nearby apartment complex broke into the facility, played with the mercury, and spread it around the facility and complex. The complex’s residents were temporarily displaced during the cleanup and most underwent testing for mercury poisoning. In 2007, a grand jury indicted Southern Union on multiple counts of violating federal environmental statutes. As relevant here, the first count alleged that the company knowingly stored liquid mercury without a permit at the Paw-tucket facility “[fjrom on or about September 19, 2002 until on or about October 19, 2004,” App. 104, in violation of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976 (RCRA), see 90 Stat. 2812, as…
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