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APPEALS COURT TAKES GRANT OF COMPASSIONATE RELEASE MOTION INTO ITS OWN HANDS

Appellate courts are usually much more circumspect in reversing trial courts, vacating a decision but not explicitly directing the district judge how to decide things on remand.

Not that the savvy district judge doesn’t read between the lines. An appellate court vacatur with a suggestion – often implicit – that the district court needs to think about the case differently usually leads to a different ruling the second time around.

Not always. When Kelvin Brown was convicted of drug trafficking nine years ago, the jury also found him guilty of two 18 USC § 924(c) counts as well. Back then, the first § 924(c) carried a mandatory minimum sentence starting at five years. The second conviction – even if it resulted from events the next day – required an additional mandatory minimum of 25 years. The district court thus sentenced Kelvin to 30 years in prison for his two § 924(c) convictions and stacked another 27 years on him for the various drug offenses.

Six years later, during the height of the COVID crisis, Kelvin moved for compassionate release under 18 USC § 3582(c)(1)(A). The judge turned him down flat without even asking the government to respond. Kelvin appealed, and the 4th Circuit remanded, directing the district court to consider the fact that Kelvin got 20 more years for the gun than he would have had to get after the First Step Act passed in 2018 in light of the Circuit’s decision in United States v. McCoy.

The district court denied Kelvin a second time in December 2021, again neglecting to address the whopping § 924(c) sentences despite (as the 4th Circuit put it) “our express recognition in our previous remand order that McCoy – and its holding that disparate § 924(c) sentences can constitute “extraordinary and compelling reasons” for release – is relevant to this case.”

Two days ago, the 4th Circuit threw up its hands and told the district judge to watch how it’s done. The 4th cut Kelvin’s sentence by 20 years (which still leaves him with 37 years to do), both expressing its frustration and apologizing for its interference:

We hold that the district court abused its discretion by denying Brown’s motion because his disparate sentence creates an “extraordinary and compelling reason” for his early release, and the § 3553(a) sentencing factors overwhelmingly favor a sentence reduction. We therefore reverse and remand with instructions to rectify that disparity and reduce Brown’s prison sentence by twenty years.

Ordinarily, we understand that district courts wield broad discretion in deciding compassionate release motions… So, in a different case, we might remedy the district court’s error by remanding for the district court to consider Brown’s disparate sentence in the first instance. Yet the district court here has already had two opportunities to review Brown’s compassionate release motion: its initial denial of Brown’s motion in July 2020, and its second denial in December 2021 after we remanded Brown’s case for further consideration. Each time, the district court neglected to address Brown’s disparate sentence.

The Circuit also found that Kelvin’s disparate sentence strongly affects the 18 USC § 3553(a) sentencing factors: “The First Step Act‘s amendment to § 924(c) reflects Congress’s judgment that sentences like Brown’s are dramatically longer than necessary or fair,” the appeals court said, “and, in turn, are not necessary to serve the ends of § 3553(a)(2).”

Notable in the 4th’s analysis is its holding that the need for Kelvin’s longer sentence has been called into question because COVID-19 created hardship in prison life “not contemplated by the original sentencing court” and that those hardships have “undoubtedly increased his prison sentence’s punitive effect.” The Circuit observed that Kelvin’s facility was placed on lockdown in response to the pandemic, during which he was “confined to his cell for 22.5 hours a day,” and the recreation areas were closed.” The majority opinion said, “Even if those factors have been mitigated by the evolving circumstances of the pandemic, that they plagued Brown at any point has made his incarceration harsher and more punitive than would otherwise have been the case… Therefore, Brown’s drastic sentence, which might have been ‘sufficient but not greater than necessary’ before the coronavirus pandemic, may no longer be justified.”

The opinion also emphasizes that Kelvin’s “one disciplinary infraction throughout his incarceration—a fact the district court also failed to mention—casts further doubt on the court’s concern for the safety of the community. And while the court did briefly consider Brown’s rehabilitative efforts” – which included a stack of programming and mentoring work to his credit – “it failed to weigh how those efforts ameliorate any risk posed to Brown’s community upon his release.” Citing Pepper v. United States, the Circuit ruled that such “postsentencing rehabilitation minimizes the need for the sentence imposed to protect the public from further crimes of the defendant, and provides the most up-to-date picture of Brown’s history and characteristics, which also favors a sentence reduction.”

The 2-1 opinion is remarkable not only for the fact that an appellate court took the unusual step of granting a compassionate release motion itself but because of the reliance on the harshness of Bureau of Prisons conditions during the pandemic and the elevation of post-sentencing conduct as a factor in § 3553(a) analysis in reaching its decision.

United States v. Brown, Case No. 21-7752, 2023 U.S. App. LEXIS 21403, at *24-25 (4th Cir. Aug. 16, 2023)

United States v. McCoy, 981 F.3d 271 (4th Cir. 2020)

Pepper v. United States, 562 U.S. 476 (2011)

– Thomas L. Root