Whether a 90-year consecutive sentence for a 33-year-old first-time offender violates the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment

QUESTIONS PRESENTED FOR REVIEW 1. A sentence, even within range, is excessive when it imposes punishment grossly disproportionate to the severity of the evidence, or constitutes nothing more than the needless infliction of pain and suffering. So, do the 8th Amendment and the proportionality test required by Solem v. Helm, 463 U.S. 277, 103 S.Ct. 3001, 77 L.Ed.2d 637 (1983), bar as punitive a 90-year consecutive sentence — 30-year sentences each for racketeering and money laundering, and 15 years each for distribution of, and possession of, synthetic marijuana — as excessive and cruel and unusual punishment for a 33-yearold, first-time offender such that the term-of-year sentences, for constitutional purposes, constitute the same as a sentence of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole? See, e.g., Lockyer v. Andrade, 538 U.S. 63, 123 S.Ct. 1166, 155 L.Ed.2d 144 (2003). 2. In order to prove a defendant guilty of racketeering, the state must prove the existence of an “enterprise” as a separate element from “pattern of racketeering activity.” Therefore, does one commit racketeering when the state implicitly alleges by its indictment and fails to present evidence that the defendant knowingly participated in a prohibited pattern of racketeering activity, without proving the enterprise, separate elements required by United States v. Turkette, 452 US. 576, 583, 101 S.Ct. 2524, 252829, 69 L.Ed.2d 246 (1981)? li QUESTIONS PRESENTED FOR REVIEW — Continued 3. “Proceeds,” as used in money laundering statutes, means profits rather than gross receipts. United States v. Santos, 553 U.S. 507, 128 S.Ct. 2020, 170 L.Ed.2d 912 (2008). Therefore, does a state fail to prove money laundering and create a “merger problem” when it seizes cash and credit card receipts from a convenience store business but fails to differentiate between the proceeds for milk and gasoline and synthetic marijuana?