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Parties Involved:
Don Temple
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

PUBLISH 

FILED 

United States Court of Appeals 

Tenth Circuit 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS NOV 7 1990 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff-Appellee, 

v. 

DON TEMPLE, 

Defendant-Appellant. 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

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ROBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

No. 89-2286 

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEW MEXICO 

(D.C. No. CR-87-0107-JB) 

Carlos K. Ogden, John F. Schaber, P.A., Deming, New Mexico, for 

the Defendant-Appellant. 

William L. Lutz, United States Attorney, and Robert J. Gorence, 

Assistant United States Attorney, Albuquerque, New Mexico, for the 

Plaintiff-Appellee. 

Before TACHA and BALDOCK, Circuit Judges, and CHRISTENSEN, 

District Judge.* 

TACHA, Circuit Judge. 

* The Honorable A. Sherman Christensen, District Judge of the 

United States.District Court for the District of Utah, sitting by 

designation. 

Appellate Case: 89-2286 Document: 01019946634 Date Filed: 11/07/1990 Page: 1 
Defendant-appellant, Don Temple, appeals a denial of credit 

toward his three-year probation term for time spent in confinement 

for a previous felony conviction that was reversed. 1 On July 13, 

1987, Temple was sentenced to five years imprisonment and three 

years probation for his felony conviction of conspiring to and 

unlawfully importing and transporting illegal aliens in violation 

of 18 u.s.c. § 371 and 8 u.s.c. §§ 1324(a)(l)(A) and 

1324(a)(l)(B). On February 2, 1989, this court reversed his 

conviction in United States Y.!.. Temple, 862 F.2d 821 (10th Cir. 

1988). 

On August 21, 1989, Temple pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor 

offense of aiding and abetting the illegal entry of an alien in 

violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1325.(a) and 18 u.s.c. § 2. On November 3, 

1989, the district court sentenced Temple to the custody of the 

Attorney General for a period of six months. The court suspended 

this sentence and placed Temple on probation for three years. On 

appeal, Temple contends the district court erred in not reducing 

this three year probation term with credit from the approximately 

twenty months of confinement for his felony conviction. We 

exercise jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 and affirm. 

We must determine whether 18 U.S.C. § 3568 allows credit for 

time spent in confinement to reduce a term of probation. We 

review this question of law de novo. See,~, United States Y.!.. 

1 After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel 

has determined unanimously that oral argument would not materially 

assist the determination of this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 

34(a); 10th Cir. R. 34.1.9. The case is therefore ordered 

submitted without oral argument. 

2 

Appellate Case: 89-2286 Document: 01019946634 Date Filed: 11/07/1990 Page: 2 
Woods, 888 F.2d 653, 654 (10th Cir. 1989), cert. denied, 110 S. 

Ct • 13 0 1 ( 19 9 0 ) • 

The statute governing credit for time served under a prior 

conviction states: 

The sentence of imprisonment of any person convicted of 

an offense shall commence to run from the date on which 

such person is received at the penitentiary, 

reformatory, or jail for service of such sentence. The 

Attorney General shall give any such person credit 

toward service of his sentence for any days spent in 

custody in connection with the offense or acts for which 

sentence was imposed •... 

18 u.s.c. § 3568 (emphasis added). 2 Temple contends he should 

receive credit from time spent in confinement for a prior felony 

conviction to reduce his probation term. We hold that Temple is 

not entitled to credit toward his probation term based on section 

3568. The statute requires the Attorney General to give credit 

toward a "sentence of imprisonment," not toward a term of 

probation. Congress' clarification that a sentence of 

imprisonment begins when a "person is received at the 

penitentiary, reformatory, or jail," forecloses the possibility a 

sentence of imprisonment might include a probation term. Congress 

specifically addressed time spent in a penitentiary, reformatory, 

and jail in defining a "sentence of imprisonment." Although 

Congress could have included probation time in section 3568, it 

did not. Based on the plain meaning of the statutory language, we 

2 This statute, which applies to offenses committed before 

November 1, 1987, has been superceded by a similar statute, 18 

u.s.c. section 3585. Because Temple committed the misdemeanor 

issue here during February and March 1987, however, the older 

version of the statute applies. · 

3 

at 

Appellate Case: 89-2286 Document: 01019946634 Date Filed: 11/07/1990 Page: 3 
conclude Congress did not intend criminal defendants to receive 

credit toward probation for time spent in custody. 3 

Here, the distict court imposed no sentence of imprisonment. 

Although the court originally sentenced Temple to the custody of 

the Attorney General for six months, the court suspended the 

sentence and put Temple on probation for three years. Temple 

never arrived at a penitentiary, reformatory, or jail to serve a 

prison sentence on his misdemeanor offense. Because Temple has no 

sentence of imprisonment toward which any possible credit may be 

applied, we find no legal basis in section 3568 to reduce his 

probation term. 

The defendant cites Berry~ United States, 435 F.2d 224 (7th 

Cir. 1970), as authority supporting his claim of credit from his 

previous conviction. The court allowed credit in Berry toward a 

3 Here, we limit our decision to the threshold issue whether a 

term of probation constitutes a sentence of imprisonment pursuant 

to section 3568. The record does not provide sufficient facts to 

determine whether the defendant actually was "in custody" during 

the approximately twenty months he spent in "confinement" prior to 

our reversal of his original felony conviction. In United States 

~ Woods, 888 F.2d 653, 656 (10th Cir. 1989), cert. denied, 110 S. 

Ct. 1301 (1990), we measured custody in terms of "the deprivation 

of liberty experienced by a person incarcerated in a jail 

facility" in deciding whether credit was due. See also Ramsey~ 

Brennan, 878 F.2d 995, 996 (7th Cir. 1989) (section 3568 custody 

based on whether the deprivation of liberty by confinement 

sufficiently similar to a prison in terms of degree of restraint); 

Anderberg~ Martin, 679 F. Supp. 1034, 1036 (W.D. Okla. 1987) 

( "Credited custody is equated • . . with . • . the punishment of 

incarceration." (emphasis added)). However, today we do not 

address whether Temple's previous confinement constituted 

"custody" according to the Woods test because we hold that no 

previous confinement may be applied toward probation. Nor do we 

address whether the misdemeanor covered the same "offense or acts 

for which the sentence was imposed" as section 3568 requires, see 

United States~ Baez, 732 F.2d 780, 782 (10th Cir. 1984), because 

we find no sentence of imprisonment was imposed for the 

misdemeanor. 

4 

Appellate Case: 89-2286 Document: 01019946634 Date Filed: 11/07/1990 Page: 4 
sentence of imprisonment based on the Supreme Court ruling in 

North Carolina Y..!.. Pearce, 395 U.S. 711, 719 (1969), that the 

double jeopardy clause "requires that punishment already exacted 

must be fully credited in imposing a sentence upon a new 

conviction for the same offense." However, the constitutional 

concern in Berr_y and Pearce is not implicated in this case because 

a probation term is not a sentence against which credit can be 

applied. Cf. Sims Y..!.. United States, 607 F.2d 757, 759 (1979) 

(rejecting double jeopardy claim when prison sentence follows 

probation because probation is not a sentence). The court in 

Berr_y allowed credit because the defendant faced a prison 

sentence. 435 F.2d at 227. Here, Temple is on probation and has 

no prison sentence to which we may credit time served under his 

previous conviction. The court's decision in Berry simply does 

not apply to this issue of whether credit applies toward a 

probation term. 

We hold that section 3568 does not apply to reduce a term of 

probation. We AFFIRM. 

5 

Appellate Case: 89-2286 Document: 01019946634 Date Filed: 11/07/1990 Page: 5