United States v. Sanchez, No. 05-3812-cr (2d Cir. February 29, 2008) (Kearse, Straub, Pooler, CJJ). In this long opinion, the court considered several challenges to recidivist sentences in a drug case. Two defendants, both “career offenders” under Guidelines section 4B1.1, got relief. A third, sentenced to an enhanced mandatory minimum, did not. Career Offender Title … Read more
It’s been a slow month for summary orders, but at last the court has eked out three of them worth noting. First, in United States v. Spencer, No. 06-2517-cr (2d Cir. February 26, 2008), the court reversed both defendants’ conviction of conspiracy to commit bankruptcy fraud because the judge erroneously charged the jury that the … Read more
United States v. Lynch, No. 05-6048-cr (2d Cir. February 27, 2008) (Calabresi, Raggi, Hall, CJJ) David Lynch received a 15-year sentence under the Armed Career Criminal Act (ACCA) and appealed. In an opinion that covered no new ground, the circuit affirmed. It held (again) that New York State convictions for attempted burglary in the third … Read more
United States v. Ramirez-Sucar, No. 06-2909-cr (2d Cir. February 20, 2008) (per curiam) Here is yet another case in which the circuit does not decide whether a district court can consider the lenient illegal-reentry sentences that are regularly imposed in “fast-track” districts as the basis for downward variance. Once again, all the court notes is … Read more
United States v. Dominguez, No. 05-7005-cr (2d Cir. February 15, 2008) (Miner, Sack, Hall, CJJ) Carol Dominguez faced 240-months in prison: a ten-year crack minimum that was doubled because of her prior conviction. The government moved for a downward departure under 5K1.1 and 18 U.S.C. § 3553(e), then asked the court to sentence her somewhere … Read more
United States v. Verkhoglyad, No. 05-4210-cr (2d Cir. February 14, 2008) (Cabranes, Raggi, CJJ, Berman, DJ) Oleg Verkhoglyad was a Russian mobster who repeatedly received lenient treatment. First, after cooperating in a 1998 extortion case, he received a 5K1.1 departure. Six months after getting out of jail, he violated his supervised release by committing a … Read more
United States v. Elfgeeh, No. 06-0638-cr (2d Cir. February 14, 2008) (Kearse, Sack, CJJ, Mills, DJ) Abad Elfgeeh, assisted by his nephew, Aref, ran a money-transfer business out of an ice cream parlor in Brooklyn that funneled money to Yemen and a host of other countries. Although the case had early on been linked to … Read more
United States v. Pepin, No. 06-1462-cr (2d Cir. February 6, 2008) (Walker, Calabresi, Sack, CJJ) Humberto Pepin is awaiting a capital trial in the Eastern District of New York, where he is charged, inter alia, with murdering two individuals who crossed him, in ways real or imagined, in the course of his drug dealing enterprise. … Read more
United States v. Brown, No. 05-5462-cr (2d Cir. January 30, 2008) (Kearse, Hall, CJJ, Rakoff, DJ) This opinion deals with a seemingly straightforward issue: whether a New York State conviction for burglary in the third degree is a “crime of violence” under Guidelines section 4B1.2(a). It turns out, however, that the issue has a complication. … Read more
United States v. Schlesinger, No. 05-03021-cr (2d Cir. January 30, 2008) (Jacobs, Parker, Wesley, CJJ) (per curiam) Schlesinger, convicted of mail and wire fraud, made a clever, but unfortunately not clever enough, argument challenging the forfeiture of the proceeds. The district court had relied on 28 U.S.C. § 2461(c) (2005), which provides that a criminal … Read more