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COURT DOESN’T LACK JURISDICTION JUST BECAUSE YOU MIGHT LOSE

Wolfgang Von Vader had some run-ins that resulted in a 2000 conviction in the Western District of Wisconsin for distributing methamphetamine (a Guidelines “career offender” 270-month sentence) and a 2012 federal conviction in Kansas for possessing heroin in prison (a 120-month consecutive sentence).

Wolf applied for 18 USC § 3582(c)(1)(A) compassionate release in both Kansas and Wisconsin. Both courts shot him down. The Kansas decision is currently on appeal in the 10th Circuit. In the Wisconsin case, the government argued that the court lacked jurisdiction to consider Wolf‘s compassionate release motion because he had already served all of his 2000 Wisconsin sentence, and is now on his consecutive 2012 Kansas sentence. Section 3582(c) does not authorize release from an expired sentence, the government contended, which makes Wolf’s Wisconsin compassionate release motion moot.

The district court agreed, and dismissed Wolf’s motion for lack of jurisdiction.

Last week, the 7th Circuit disagreed, reversing Wolf’s dismissal. Maybe a retroactive reduction is unauthorized by statute, the Circuit said, “but we do not see how this moots [Von Vader’s] request. If § 3582(c) does not supply authority for the relief Von Vader wants, then he loses on the merits, not for lack of jurisdiction.”

“The judge in Wisconsin could order the Bureau of Prisons to treat the Wisconsin sentence as if it had expired earlier and to reduce the time remaining on the Kansas sentence accordingly,” the 7th ruled. “Or the court in Wisconsin could make an adjustment in the length of supervised release, on the Wisconsin sentence, tht will follow the conclusion of the Kansas sentence. As long as relief is possible in principle, the fact that a given request may fail on statutory grounds does not defeat the existence of an Article III case or controversy.”

United States v. Von Vader, Case No 22-1798, 2023 U.S.App. LEXIS 1750 (7th Cir., January 24, 2023)

– Thomas L. Root