United States v. Thavaraja, No. 12-4330-cr (2d Cir. Jan. 23, 2014) (Walker, Livingston, and Chin), available here
This summary was prepared by noted criminal defense attorney Francisco Celedonio, Esq., who is also a member of the Board of Directors of Federal Defenders of New York, Inc.:
abused its discretion in imposing a sentence substantially below the applicable
Guidelines range. The Circuit disagreed and affirmed the sentence in this published decision.
Pratheepan Thavaraja, a native of Sri Lanka, pled guilty to conspiracy to
provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization and conspiracy to
bribe public officials. Defendant was the principal procurement officer for the
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (“LTTE”), a militant separatist group in
northern Sri Lanka engaged in a civil war against the Sri Lankan government.
The State Department designated LTTE a “foreign terrorist organization” in
1997. Defendant purchased at least $20 million worth of military grade weapons
and materials used to make suicide bombs at the direction of the LTTE
leadership. Additionally, defendant played a role in a scheme to bribe
State Department officials to remove the LTTE from the foreign terrorist
organization list.
so-called “terrorism enhancement,” see U.S.S.G. § 3A1.4(a), placed him at offense level 37 and Criminal History Category VI. Thus, the Guidelines range was 360 months-to-life; the combined statutory maximum was
240 months (180 months for the material support conspiracy and 60 months for the
bribery conspiracy). The district court recognized the difficulties inherent in
deriving a “reasonable sentence,” including the prosecution of “people who
certainly pose no direct threat to the United States;” and that the defendant had been
incarcerated for a lengthy period of time (five years) during which he had been
separated from his family. The court also noted the inherent violence of the civil
war at issue. The district court sentenced defendant to 108 months and 60
months to run concurrently.
reasonableness, the Circuit rejected the government’s claim that the “more than 50%
reduction from the applicable guidelines” was substantively unreasonable. The
Court upheld the sentence, concluding that a prison term of 108 months was within the range of “permissible
decisions.”
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