In 2009, he rejected a plea bargain to serve 25 years and went to trial. A federal jury convicted him of 10 robberies.
Because Smith had been charged under a "mandatory minimum" law, the judge could not weigh the trial testimony or consider that Smith had no previous convictions. Automatic penalties written by Congress kicked in.
So Smith was sentenced to two centuries, three decades, and two years.
The 232-year sentence was 10 times the average 2009 federal sentence for murder.
Critics call such extreme disparities a "trial tax," and say it amounts to a penalty for exercising the right to trial by jury.
"He needs to be punished," defense attorney Christopher D. Warren said in court, "but based on my experience, he hasn't done anything which requires him to die in a federal prison."
If Smith gets time off for good behavior, his 232-year sentence will be reduced to 197 years.
If he lives until 80, incarcerating Smith will cost taxpayers at least $1.1 million. There is no parole in the federal system.
The case of the former nightclub bouncer, 41, now in a maximum-security prison in Colorado, is one of an increasingly controversial group of federal cases involving laws that impose mandatory prison terms required by Congress. Federal prosecutors in Philadelphia make aggressive use of the laws.
Legal scholars and critics say mandatory penalties mean that those prosecutors - not judges - end up determining how much prison time a defendant receives by deciding what charges are filed and what deal is offered before a trial.
Smith was arrested by local police and initially charged in state courts, where a conviction would likely have meant a 10- or 20-year sentence.
