United States v. Feldman, No. 10-2275-CR (2d Cir. August 1, 2011) (McLaughlin, Pooler, Sack, CJJ) Defendant Feldman sought appellate review of four sentencing enhancements. The government argued that the court should not review them because the district court had indicated that it would impose “the same sentence” even without some of the errors. The circuit … Read more
United States v. Ferguson, No. 08-6211-cr (2d Cir. August 1, 2011) (Jacobs, Kearse, Straub, CJJ) For 3Q of 2000, the insurer AIG’s stock price dropped significantly, even though its earnings were satisfactory. The company concluded that the cause was a $59 million decline in its loss reserves – a measure of the company’s risk exposure. … Read more
United States v. Lee, No. 10-493-cr (2d Cir. July 26, 2011) (Parker, Chin, CJJ, Korman, DJ) For the many years, the third acceptance of responsibility point – although to be completely faithful to guideline lingo, it is a “level,” not a “point,” since “points” are for criminal history – was something of a given. As … Read more
United States v. Gonzalez, 10-2202-cr (2d Cir. July 22, 2011) (Kearse, Miner, Chin, CJJ) Former state senator Efrain Gonzalez, Jr., pled guilty to various fraud-related charges in connection with two sham charities that he set up while in office. This opinion contains an interesting discussion of the concept of “tracing” criminal proceeds. In it, the … Read more
United States v. Vilar, No. 10-521-cr (2d Cir. July 19, 2011) (Jacobs, CJ, Rakoff, DJ) Defendant Vilar and his co-defendant Tanaka were convicted of fraud-related charges after a jury trial. Both filed timely notices of appeal and the appeals were consolidated. Vilar, represented by new counsel, decided to develop a claim that his trial counsel … Read more
At last – more summary orders of interest. In United States v. White, No. 10-2631-cr (2d Cir. July 18, 2011) (summary order), the circuit vacated the district court’s decision denying resentencing under 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(2). The case has a long procedural history. White originally rejected a plea offer that included one § 924(c) count … Read more
United States v. Jennings, No. 10-1642-cr (2d Cir. July 22, 2011) (Kearse, Miner, Chin, CJJ) For defendant Russell Jennings, looking at child pornography was a hard habit to break. He served a twenty-one-month possession sentence in a 2006 case then, in 2009, while on supervised release, did it again. For the 2009 case, he received … Read more
United States v. Bailey, No. 07-3819-cr (2d Cir. July 6, 2011) (Cabranes, Pooler, Raggi, CJJ) In Michigan v Summers, 452 U.S. 602 (1981), the Supreme Court held that the Fourth Amendment permitted police officers to detain the occupant of a premises during the execution of a search warrant, without need for individualized suspicion of the … Read more
It has been a while, but here are three more summary orders of interest. In United States v. Mancuso, No. 10-2420-cr (2d Cir. June 30, 2011), the court identified several sentencing errors in connection with a prosecution for environmental crimes. First, the district court erred in applying the multi-object conspiracy guideline, U.S.S.G. § 1B1.2(d). When … Read more
United Sates v. Gravel, No. 10-1045-cr (2d Cir. June 20, 2011) (Pooler, Wesley, Chin, CJJ) (per curiam) The court’s latest per curiam looks at the firearm guideline’s six-level enhancement for “machineguns.” See U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(a)(5). The defendant’s gun was a Colt machinegun, initially designed to fire automatically, but had been retrofitted to fire only semi-automatically. … Read more