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Friday, January 29th, 2010

PC World

The court’s latest Per Curiam opinion, United States v. Rossi, No. 08-6108 (Kearse, Cabranes, Straub, CJJ) (2d Cir. January 28, 2010) (per curiam), holds that the district court had jurisdiction under the pre-1996 restitution statute, 18 U.S.C. § 3663, to amend a restitution order after the defendant had completed her sentence and her term of supervised release. The circuit had previously remanded the case for reconsideration of the restitution order, and this remand restored jurisdiction to the district court, which therefore had the power to impose restitution even though the statute only permits the imposition of restitution “when sentencing a defendant.”…

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Summary Summary

Here are two recent summary orders of interest:

In United States v. Prescott, No. 08-2886-cr (2d Cir. January 12, 2010), the government waived its objection to the defendant’s untimely notice of appeal, and the court considered the appeal as if the notice were timely.

In United States v. Oliveras, No. 08-4884-cr (2d Cir. January 8, 2010), the court vacated the sentence, finding that the district court made multiple errors in the defendant’s favor. Among other things, the trial court disregarded a mandatory minimum, made clearly erroneous fact findings in determining the guidelines, and might have erred in downwardly departing on criminal history grounds, although the record needed clarifying on this issue.…

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Thursday, January 7th, 2010

Moving Violations

United States v. Guzman; United States v. Hall, Nos. 08-5561-cr; 08-6004-cr (2d Cir. January 7, 2010) (Miner, Straub, Wesley, CJJ)

Defendants Guzman and Hall were both registered sex offenders in New York. Each moved to another state without updating his registration, and was charged with violating 18 U.S.C. § 2250(a), which makes it a crime for a person required to register as a sex offender to travel in interstate commerce and knowingly fail to keep his registration information current. Each defendant moved to dismiss his indictment on several grounds; the district court rejected all but the Commerce Clause challenges. Finding that the statutory scheme (“SORNA”) exceeded Congress’s authority to legislate pursuant to the Commerce Clause, the district court dismissed the indictment in both cases. On these consolidated government appeals, the circuit reversed.

The court first noted that § 2250(a) itself is a proper exercise of the power to regulate commerce, …


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Categories: Sex offender registration, Uncategorized

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Circuit to Probation: Three’s a Crowd

United States v. Reeves, No. 08-2966-cr (2d Cir. January 7, 2010) (Leval, Pooler, Parker, CJJ)

Lamont Reeves pled guilty to possessing child pornography. As a condition of his supervised release the district court required that he “notify the Probation Department when he establishes a significant romantic relationship and … inform the other party of his prior criminal history concerning his sex offenses.” It also required that Reeves provide his probation officer with his “significant other’s” contact information.

The court of appeals vacated the condition. First, it agreed that the condition was too vague to be enforceable. “What makes a relationship ‘romantic,’ let alone “significant” in its romantic depth, can be the subject of endless debate that varies across generations, regions and genders.” The condition had “no objective baseline” that would give anyone guidance as to what might constitute a “significant romantic relationship” and Reeves’ continued freedom during supervised release should …


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Monday, January 4th, 2010

PC World

We close out 2009 with two interesting per curiam opinions.

In United States v. MacPherson, No. 08-1829-cr (2d Cir. December 30, 2009) (Newman, Calabresi, Katzmann, CJJ) (per curiam), the defendant argued that the government violated a Pimentel-like non-binding plea agreement by advocating for a sentence higher than the estimate contained in the agreement. In the majority opinion, the court simply held that its precedents on this issue are in conflict, and that, given this, MacPherson, who did not argue in the district court that the government breached the plea agreement, could not establish plain error. Judge Newman concurred. In his view, not only was there no plain error, there was no error at all. He then made an inconclusive effort to harmonize the conflicting precedents, in the end noting that he would “uphold all plea agreements with Pimentel estimates, regardless of whether the Government at sentencing advocates a higher Guidelines …

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Summary Summary

United States v. Doe, No. 08-4064-cr (2d Cir. December 14, 2009), looks the First Amendment implications of a defendant’s request to seal his case. At sentencing, Doe had asked for the total and permanent sealing of his sentencing transcript. The court denied the request, and Doe appealed. After the government agreed that the decision should be reversed, the court appointed amicus counsel to defend the district court’s ruling. The appellate court noted that there were no serious First Amendment concerns, since the order concerned the denial of a sealing request. Moreover, the district court’s analysis of the issue correctly treated the public’s right of access to sentencing proceedings as qualified, and not absolute. The lower court also correctly recognized that the right of public access to criminal proceedings is presumptive, and that the party seeking to overcome the presumption bears a heavy burden, one that increases the more extensive the …

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Wednesday, December 16th, 2009

SORNA Doom

United States v. Hester, No. 08-4665-cr (2d Cir. December 16, 2009) (Winter, Cabranes, Hall CJJ) (per curiam)

After pleading guilty to two sex offenses in New York State, Hester was required to register as a sex offender. He completed his initial registration – which included explicit instructions that Hester update if he moved or changed jobs – and four change of address forms. Then, in April of 2007, he disappeared. Three months later, Hester was arrested on unrelated charges in Florida. He had neither registered as a sex offender there nor updated his New York registration.

Hester pled guilty to violating the Sex Offender Registration Act, “SORNA,” 18 U.S.C. § 2250(a), and was sentenced to 37 months’ imprisonment. On appeal, he raised three unsuccessful challenges to the statute: a due process claim that he had unsuccessfully litigated below and Commerce Clause and vagueness challenges that he had not.

The due …


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Categories: appeal waiver, due process, Sex offender registration, Uncategorized

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Role Away

United States v. Labbe, No. 08-0673-cr (2d Cir. December 4, 2009) (Newman, Pooler, Katzmann, CJJ)

About a week before Labbe’s sentencing, the district court issued a written Sentencing Opinion describing the sentence it was likely to impose. The Opinion included a 4-level role reduction for Labbe’s “minimal” participation and announced that “Labbe is hereby sentenced to … 57 months.” The Opinion noted, however, that this was “subject to modification at the sentencing hearing.”

Before sentencing, the government sent a letter to the court objecting to the role reduction, but at the sentencing hearing itself the defense focused its arguments primarily on the loss calculations, apparently assuming that the judge had decided to keep the role reduction. The judge asked the government a few questions about the relative participation levels of Labbe and his co-conspirators, then announced that the “government’s argument and its reading of the guidelines with respect to the …


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Summary Summary

It’s been a while but at last the court has issued enough summary orders of interest for another post. Here they are:

In United States v. Madarikan, No. 08-5589-cr (2d Cir. December 16, 2009), the court found a Confrontation Clause violation in the admission into evidence of a Certificate of Nonexistence of Record at an illegal reentry trial. Here, however, the error was harmless because there was other evidence that the defendant kacjed the requisite advance permission – her own testimony conceded the point.

In United States v. Venkataram, No. 08-3637-cr (2d Cir. December 16, 2009), the district court erroneously imposed five-year terms of supervised release on Class C and D felony convictions. The court modified the Judgment by reducing the terms to three years.

In United States v. Ramos-Soto, No. 08-2381-cr (2d Cir. December 1, 2009), the court remanded for clarification, where the sentencing record was ambiguous as to …

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Tuesday, December 15th, 2009

Money Disorder

United States v. Garcia, No. 08-1621-cr (2d Cir. December 1, 2009) (Jacobs, Sack, Lynch, CJJ)

In Cuellar v. United States, 128 S.Ct. 1994 (2008), the Court held that, for the crime of transportation money laundering under 18 U.S.C. § 1956(a)(2)(B)(i), the government most prove more than that the money was hidden during its transportation. Rather, it must prove that the “purpose,” not merely the effect, of the transportation was to conceal or disguise the nature, location, source, ownership or control of the money. Thus, the government must prove not just how the money was moved, but why it was moved. The Second Circuit has held that this holding applies equally to “transaction” money laundering under 18 U.S.C. § 956(a)(1)(B)(i), which makes it a crime to engage in certain financial transactions, including the transfer or delivery of cash, for those same purposes.

Here, the court held that, in light of these …


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Thursday, December 3rd, 2009

Fare is Foul

United States v. Rodriguez, No. 08-2805-cr (2d Cir. November 30, 2009) (Newman, Calabresi, Katzmann, CJJ)

This interesting opinion concludes that a dispute over a taxi fare did not violate the Hostage Taking Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1203.

Background

In 2005, Azucena Gonzalez Mendez was smuggled into the United States from Mexico. She was driven from Arizona to Las Vegas, then flew to Long Island, where her husband, Julio Perez, who lived in New Jersey, was to meet her and drive her home. When she arrived at the airport, however, Mendez, could not find her husband.

Defendant Rodriguez saw Mendez and told her that it was not safe for her to wait in the airport, because there were immigration officers present. Rodriguez pretended to call Mendez’ husband, telling her that there was no answer, then offered to give her a ride. He brought her to a van, which was driven by …


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