We post news and comment on federal criminal justice issues, focused primarily on trial and post-conviction matters, legislative initiatives, and sentencing issues. 

IT’S DEJA VU ALL OVER AGAIN

It will seem like old times – James, Begay, Chambers, Sykes, Johnson, Mathis, and Beckles – as the Supreme Court has granted review to yet another pair of Armed Career Criminal Act cases last week. These companion cases focus on the question of whether burglary of a nonpermanent or mobile structure that is adapted or used for overnight accommodation can qualify as “burglary” under the ACCA. The cases will be decided together during the Supreme Court term beginning in October 2018.

At the same time, we’re watching a trio of cases that are awaiting a decision by SCOTUS on certiorari. The petitions for certiorari have been “relisted” eight times, an astounding number of deferrals by the Court. (A relist is when the Supreme Court schedules a case for a decision on certiorari at the weekly Friday justices’ conference, but then defers decision until the next conference, essentially “relisting” it on the next week’s conference list).

The three cases, Allen v. United States, Gates v. United States, and James v. United States, all ask whether under the Supreme Court’s opinions in United States v. Booker, Johnson v. United States and Beckles v. United States – all of which depended heavily upon the distinction between advisory and mandatory sentencing schemes – the residual clause of the mandatory sentencing guidelines is unconstitutionally vague.

Ohio State University law professor Doug Berman, writing in his Sentencing Law and Policy blog last week, noted that the Stitt and Sims cases are being heard “because the government was seeking cert on these cases after losing in big Circuit rulings and because there is a split in the circuits.” Still, he admitted to “growing somewhat annoyed that issues related to the application of the Armed Career Criminal Act continued to be the focal point of so much SCOTUS activity… Many other issues that are so very consequential to so many more cases – e.g., the functioning of reasonableness review or the proper application of Graham and Miller — have been unable to get the Justices’ attention while nearly a dozen ACCA cases have been taken up by SCOTUS in the last decade.”

United States v. Stitt, Case No. 17-765 (cert. granted Apr. 23, 2018)

United States v. Sims, Case No. 17-766 (cert. granted Apr. 23, 2018)

Allen v. United States, Case No. 17-5864 (certiorari decision pending)

Gates v. United States, Case No. 17-6262 (certiorari decision pending)

James v. United States, Case No. 17-6769 (certiorari decision pending)

Sentencing Law and Policy, SCOTUS grants cert on yet another set of ACCA cases, this time to explore when burglary qualifies as “burglary” (Apr. 23, 2018)

SCOTUSBlog.com, Relist Watch (Apr. 27, 2018)

– Thomas L. Root