Author Archive | Steve Statsinger

Here are two recent summary orders of interest and one from March that we missed at the time:

In United States v. Pender, No. 08-5474-cr (2d Cir. May 6, 2010), there was a factual dispute as to whether the defendant was on parole when he committed the federal offense. Although the district court had concluded that he was, the court remanded the case for reconsideration. Notably, this issue was raised in the defendant’s pro se brief, not his counseled brief.

In United States v. Oruche, No. 09-0665-cr, (2d Cir. April 26, 2010), the court vacated one defendant’s sentence because he was erroneously classified as a career offender. One of his two prior drug convictions was for simple possession, not trafficking. The court also vacated a co-defendant’s sentence because the district court had used the erroneous career offender sentence as a point of reference.

Finally, in United States v. Harper, No. …

There hasn’t been much action in the circuit in the past couple of weeks. This smattering of noteworthy summary orders will have to keep us occupied for the time being.

In United States v. Givens, No. 09-0765-cr, and United States v. Blue, No. 09-0219-cr (2d Cir. April 26, 2010), related cases, the circuit vacated two defendants’ sentences because the district court misinterpreted an ambiguous Regalado remand order and did not conduct a full resentencing.

United States v. Young, No. 09-1853-cr (2d Cir. April 22, 2010), is surely the tersest and most cryptic summary order yet. It provides, in its entirety, “On the basis of the record before us, including what we have learned at oral argument, we discern no error and therefore AFFIRM the judgment of the District Court.”

In United States v. Lorenzo, No. 08-3626-cr (2d Cir. April 12, 2010), the court held that the defendant was not eligible …

The circuit seemingly never tires of issuing summary orders of interest. Here are three more:

In United States v. Grant, No. 09-1760-cr (2d Cir. April 8, 2010), the court ordered a Jacobson remand so that the district court could clarify an ambiguity in its decision on a motion to suppress that was material to the circuit’s consideration of whether police officers had the defendant’s implied consent to enter his apartment.

In United States v. Orozco, No. 08-4043-cr (2d Cir. April 1, 2010), the defendant appealed a condition of supervised release requiring him to notify the probation department of any “significant romantic relationship” to which he did not did not object at the time, but that was was rendered illegal under a later-decided case. The circuit ducked the plain error questions, and remanded instead under Rule 31.2(c) which gives district courts the “power to modify conditions of supervised release at any …