Nov

19

Seventh Circuit Overturns Sentence for Lack of Explanation

Posted by: | November 19, 2011 | Leave a Comment

Henry and Elizabeth Robertson were involved in a mortgage fraud scheme in the 1990′s.  Many years later, they were charged with and pled guilty to wire fraud for their part in the scheme.  Despite an unusual and compelling story of self-motivated rehabilitation, they were sentenced to 63 and 41 months of imprisonment, with almost no [...]

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Sep

23

Seventh Circuit Clarifies Sentencing of Wholesale Drug Traffickers, Encourages Dose-Based Approach

Posted by: | September 23, 2011 | Leave a Comment

Wholesalers often sell drugs in relatively pure form, with the knowledge that retailers will dilute the drugs before reselling them on the street. Indeed, some powerful drugs, like the painkiller fentanyl, must be substantially diluted before they can be safely consumed. For that reason, wholesalers may end up selling much smaller quantities than retailers, at [...]

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Aug

30

DOJ Changes Its Mind, Seventh Circuit Does Not

Posted by: | August 30, 2011 | Leave a Comment

As I discussed in this post, the Seventh Circuit earlier this year rejected retroactivity for the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010, which softened the mandatory minimum penalties for crack cocaine offenses.  In the Seventh Circuit’s view, any crack offenses committed prior to August 3, 2010, when the FSA was signed into law, must still be sentenced [...]

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Aug

20

Judge Must Explain New Sentencing Decision After Revocation of Supervised Release

Posted by: | August 20, 2011 | 1 Comment

As I described here and here, the Seventh Circuit has an interesting line of cases that attempt to establish some minimal standards for the way that district judges explain their sentences.  Add to that line the court’s decision last week in United States v. Robertson (No. 10-3543).  I think that Robertson is the court’s first decision to apply the explanation requirement to [...]

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Jul

1

Sentencing Commission Makes Crack Amendment Retroactive

Posted by: | July 1, 2011 | 1 Comment

The U.S. Sentencing Commission announced yesterday that the most important of the recent changes to the crack sentencing guidelines will be made retroactive, assuming Congress does nothing to block retroactivity before November 1.   Filling in the details, the Commission has now posted the unofficial “reader-friendly” version of its new retroactivity amendment.  The news is very good [...]

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Jun

16

Sentencing Judge May Not Lengthen Prison Term in Order to Promote Rehabilitation

Posted by: | June 16, 2011 | Leave a Comment

Earlier today, the United State Supreme Court ruled that federal judges may not impose or lengthen a defendant’s sentence in order to promote rehabilitation.  In Tapia v. United States (No. 10-5400), the district judge apparently selected a sentence at the very top of the recommended guidelines range in order to give Tapia time to complete the Bureau [...]

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Jun

11

Seventh Circuit Says Begay and Chambers Must Be Applied Retroactively

Posted by: | June 11, 2011 | Leave a Comment

Retroactivity has been in the news a lot lately, thanks to the U.S. Sentencing Commission’s ongoing consideration of whether to give already-sentenced defendants the benefit of more favorable crack guidelines. But crack defendants are not the only inmates serving extraordinarily long terms based on recently discarded aspects of federal sentencing law.  Earlier this week, the Seventh [...]

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Jun

9

Court Backs Away From Begay

Posted by: | June 9, 2011 | Leave a Comment

Is the Begay revolution over?  In its 2008 decision in Begay v. United States, the Supreme Court adopted a narrow construction of the Armed Career Criminal Act’s “residual clause,” limiting the ACCA’s reach to convictions for “purposeful, violent, and aggressive” crimes.  (For background, see this post.)  The following year, in Chambers v. United States, the Court again pared back [...]

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Jun

6

SCOTUS Rules That Current Penalties Do Not Govern Whether Prior Conviction Is ACCA Predicate

Posted by: | June 6, 2011 | Leave a Comment

I continue to be mystified by the Supreme Court’s jurisprudence on the Armed Career Criminal Act.  The Court has been remarkably active in taking ACCA cases in recent years, but I’m hard-pressed to see much coherence in the outcomes.  On the one hand, there is the Begay line of cases, which have substantially narrowed the definition [...]

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Jun

1

Sentencing Commission Seems Likely to Make Crack Amendment Retroactive, But Who Will Benefit?

Posted by: | June 1, 2011 | 3 Comments

I testified earlier today before the U.S. Sentencing Commission on retroactivity for the new crack amendment.  Here are a few off-the-cuff impressions.  (Warning: this post will probably seem like a lot of inside baseball to anyone who does not practice federal criminal law.)

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Mar

2

SCOTUS Says Judge May Consider Post-Sentencing Rehabilitation at Resentencing

Posted by: | March 2, 2011 | Leave a Comment

In a new decision earlier today, Pepper v. United States (No. 09-6822), the United States Supreme Court ruled that federal district judges may consider post-sentencing rehabilitation when a case is remanded for resentencing.  This may sound like a very technical question of criminal procedure, but the facts in Pepper nicely illustrate the human dimension to the question.  [...]

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Feb

16

Racial Disparities in the Federal Death Penalty: Uncovering the Key Role of Geography

Posted by: | February 16, 2011 | 1 Comment

The federal death penalty is plagued by two important types of disparity.  One is racial: as of last year, nearly half of federal death row inmates (28 of 57) were black.  The other is geographic: out of the 94 federal districts, just 16 have produced 75 percent of the death sentences, and nine have produced nearly [...]

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