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

PACKAGE STORE

More than a few prisoners seeking sentence reductions under Section 404 of the First Step Act – the provision that made the 2010 Fair Sentencing Act apply retroactively to crack cocaine sentences – were denied reductions because they had other non-crack counts of conviction that weren’t covered by Section 404 and kept the sentences high.

In the case of Nathaniel Richardson, his sentence was life for crack distribution and a second life term for a 21 USC § 848 continuing criminal enterprise count. The district court found that the crack distribution count was a covered offense and reduced Nate’s life sentence to 360 months. But on the CCE count, the district court relied on 4th Circuit precedent, holding that CCEs were not covered offenses under Section 404 and left the life term intact. That life term was unchanged.

Last week, the 4th Circuit reversed, holding that the district court had the discretion to reduce both covered and noncovered offenses under Section 404 of the First Step Act “if they function as a package.”

The 4th said it has “upheld the use of the sentencing package doctrine in the habeas context, and resentencing under the First Step Act similarly provides district courts with broad discretion to fashion a remedy.” The Circuit ruled that “allowing judges to utilize the sentencing package doctrine is in line with how district judges practically sentence defendants and in accordance with the purpose of the First Step Act… The sentencing package doctrine is applicable here because where one count of a package is remanded, the district judge must be given the discretion to reconfigure the sentencing plan to ensure it remains adequate to satisfy the statutory sentencing factors.

District judges are entrusted with “enormous responsibility,” the 4th said, “and must be given adequate discretion in resentencing, especially in light of the changing landscape of new statutory schemes.”

United States v. Richardson, Case No. 22-6748, 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 6618 (4th Cir., March 20, 2024)

– Thomas L. Root