This has gone on long enough. The present petitionIt's terrible to me that in a free society an individual can be sentenced to conduct for which he was found not guilty. How is this acceptable?
presents the nonhypothetical case the Court claimed to
have been waiting for. And it is a particularly appealing
case, because not only did no jury convict these defendants
of the offense the sentencing judge thought them guilty of,
but a jury acquitted them of that offense. Petitioners were
convicted of distributing drugs, but acquitted of conspiring
to distribute drugs. The sentencing judge found that
petitioners had engaged in the conspiracy of which the
jury acquitted them. The Guidelines, petitioners claim,
recommend sentences of between 27 and 71 months for
their distribution convictions. But in light of the conspiracy
finding, the court calculated much higher Guidelines
ranges, and sentenced Jones, Thurston, and Ball to 180,
194, and 225 months’ imprisonment.
On petitioners’ appeal, the D. C. Circuit held that even if
their sentences would have been substantively unreasonable
but for judge-found facts, their Sixth Amendment
rights were not violated. 744 F. 3d 1362, 1369 (2014). We
should grant certiorari to put an end to the unbroken
string of cases disregarding the Sixth Amendment—or to
eliminate the Sixth Amendment difficulty by acknowledging
that all sentences below the statutory maximum are
substantively reasonable.
The SDFLA Blog is dedicated to providing news and notes regarding federal practice in the Southern District of Florida. The New Times calls the blog "the definitive source on South Florida's federal court system." All tips on court happenings are welcome and will remain anonymous. Please email David Markus at dmarkus@markuslaw.com
It is not acceptable, especially if you really believe in the power of juries to decide cases and not be second guessed at every turn.
ReplyDeleteMarkus - 1
ReplyDeleteRumpole - 0
Suddenly, defense attorneys don't hate Scalia and Thomas ... at least not as much.
ReplyDeleteIf you think about it is ridiculous. Scalia's dissent shows that the trial in which the defendant was acquitted of conspiracy was a waste of time. Why have a trial if acquitted conduct can be used to sentence the defendant? When I tell civil lawyers about this sort of thing they look at me like I have two heads. I get the same response from non lawyers, who assume that trial verdicts mean something and that our federal courts' justice system, even if flawed and run by imperfect people, is fundamentally fair and consistent with their notions of constitutional rights. Yet, somehow a majority of the Justices of the Supreme Court think it is hunky dory to jack up a defendant's guidelines and sentence based on acquitted conduct because he or she believes that the trial evidence proved the conduct beyond a preponderance of the evidence. Hell, in our system, think of how much influence probation officers have with their PSI's and how prosecutors use them to back door hearsay and crap they could never prove to a jury or get the defendant to agree to. Do plea agreements really matter all that much?
ReplyDeleteI've always felt that, more the large part, Scalia has been pro-defense when it comes to criminal. Thoughts?
ReplyDeleteWow. . .
ReplyDeleteIt would be interesting to do a case study to learn if they consistently score & sentence in the same manner in white collar cases. (I'm just sayin')
Either way, its another discouraging evidence of "justice" moving in reverse.
The sentencing guidelines are a travesty.
ReplyDeleteYou should see how these people get treated in immigration court. Oh, your judge said it wasn't a conviction, eh. Too bad, so sad, DEPORTED.
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