Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-95-03193/USCOURTS-caDC-95-03193-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
United States of America
Appellee
Michael A. Whren
Appellant

Document Text:

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued January 30, 1997 Decided May 6, 1997

No. 95-3193

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

APPELLEE

v.

MICHAEL A. WHREN,

APPELLANT

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the District of Columbia 

(No. 93cr00274-01)

Lisa B. Wright, Assistant Federal Public Defender, argued 

the cause for appellant, with whom A.J. Kramer, Federal 

Public Defender, was on the briefs.

Elizabeth H. Danello, Assistant U.S. Attorney, argued the 

cause for appellee, with whom Eric H. Holder, Jr., U.S. 

Attorney, John R. Fisher, Elizabeth Trosman, and Nancy R. 

Page, Assistant U.S. Attorneys, were on the brief.

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Before: GINSBURG, HENDERSON, and TATEL, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge GINSBURG.

Concurring opinion filed by Circuit Judge HENDERSON.

GINSBURG, Circuit Judge: In this appeal we are asked to 

decide whether a criminal defendant whose case we have 

remanded to the district court for resentencing may there 

raise for the first time a challenge to his sentence that is 

unrelated to the reason for the remand. We hold that he 

may not do so unless his newly-raised objection to the sentence is based upon an error so plain that the district court or 

the court of appeals should have raised it for him.

I. Background

Michael Whren was convicted on four counts: One, possession with the intent to distribute 50 grams or more of cocaine 

base (the distribution count); Two, possession with the intent 

to distribute 50 grams or more of cocaine base within 1,000 

feet of a school (the schoolyard count); Three, possession of 

marijuana; and Four, possession of phencyclidine, a/k/a PCP. 

Pursuant to the United States Sentencing Guidelines, Whren 

was sentenced to serve 168 months in prison and to pay a 

special assessment of $150.

The base offense level for the distribution count, determined by the quantity of drugs involved, was 32 which, 

considering Whren's Category II criminal history, produced a 

sentencing range of 135-168 months. The base offense level 

for the schoolyard count was 34, being the same 32 for the 

quantity of drugs involved plus a two-level enhancement 

because the drugs "directly involved a protected location." 

U.S.S.G. ¶ 2D1.2(a)(1). An offense level of 34 for an offender 

with a criminal history in Category II produces a sentencing 

range of 168-210 months. Whren did not dispute the district 

court's determination that 34 was the correct base offense 

level for his violation of the schoolyard statute. The district 

court then sentenced Whren to the maximum of 168 months 

on the distribution count and to the minimum of 168 months 

on the schoolyard count, the sentences to be served concurrently.

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Whren appealed to this court arguing, among other things, 

that the distribution count should be vacated because it is a 

lesser included offense of the schoolyard count. Whren acknowledged that, because he did not appeal the sentence for 

the schoolyard conviction, vacatur of the distribution count 

would have no effect upon his overall sentence other than to 

reduce his special assessment by $50.

This court affirmed Whren's convictions on Counts Two, 

Three, and Four, as did the Supreme Court; 116 S. Ct. 1769 

(1996). We reversed Whren's conviction on Count One, however, holding that possession with the intent to distribute is a 

lesser-included offense of possession with the intent to distribute within 1,000 feet of a school. "Consequently ... we 

remand[ed the case] to the District Court for entry of an 

amended judgment and resentencing on Counts One and 

Two." United States v. Whren, 53 F.3d 371, 376 (1995). We 

did not say why vacatur of the distribution count necessitated 

a remand for resentencing upon the schoolyard count, but 

Whren concedes that the remand was consistent with this 

court's general rule that when "we cannot ascertain whether 

the District Court's sentence on a valid conviction was influenced by a conviction on a separate count that is later 

overturned on appeal, the proper course is to remand so that 

the District Court may reconsider the sentence imposed." 

United States v. Lyons, 706 F.2d 321, 335 n.25 (1983).

At his resentencing hearing Whren sought to raise four 

issues that he had not raised either at the original sentencing 

or upon appeal. None of the four issues was in any way 

related to this court's vacatur of the distribution count. 

Whren argued first that the district court should grant a 

downward departure pursuant to § 5k2.0 of the Sentencing 

Guidelines, in view of the Special Report to the Congress: 

Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy (February 1995), in 

which the Sentencing Commission asserts that there is no 

justification for the large disparity between the prescribed 

sentence for a crack cocaine offense and that for a similar 

offense involving powder cocaine. Whren also urged the 

court to grant a downward departure in light of his educationUSCA Case #95-3193 Document #270251 Filed: 05/06/1997 Page 3 of 9
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al efforts in prison. Whren next argued that he should not 

receive the two-level sentence enhancement normally meted 

out for a conviction under the schoolyard statute, see U.S.S.G. 

§ 2D1.2(a)(1), because his presence near a school was fortuitous. (He was driving by when he was stopped and arrested.) 

Finally, Whren argued that if the district court did not have 

discretion to give him a pass on the schoolyard enhancement, 

then it should grant him an offsetting downward departure 

because his offense did not run afoul of the purpose of the 

schoolyard statute.

The district court ruled that it lacks authority to consider 

Whren's request for a downward departure based upon the 

Special Report of the Sentencing Commission. Whren does 

not challenge that ruling. The district court received testimony about Whren's educational progress in prison but ultimately concluded that such post-sentencing conduct is not a 

proper ground for a departure either. Whren does challenge 

this ruling but his challenge is both obliquenot to say 

crypticand belated, coming as it does in a footnote to his 

reply brief; absent extraordinary circumstances (not present 

here) we do not entertain an argument raised for the first 

time in a reply brief, Forman v. Korean Air Lines Co., Ltd.,

84 F.3d 446, 448 (D.C. Cir. 1996), or for that matter, in a 

footnote. Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless v. 

Barry, 107 F.3d 32, 39 (D.C. Cir. 1997). Finally, the district 

court expressly declined to consider Whren's arguments 

against penalizing him for proximity to a school because it 

concluded that our mandate implicitly prohibited it from 

doing so. It is that decision only that we now review.

II. Analysis

Whren argues that when the court of appeals remands a 

case for resentencing, the district court is presumptively 

authorized to sentence the defendant de novo; only some 

limitation in the order of the appellate courtand he sees 

none in this casecould limit the district court's role after the 

remand. The Government, on the other hand, argues that 

the mandate in this case implicitly precluded the district court 

from considering anything other than our vacatur of the 

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distribution count in resentencing the defendant on the 

schoolyard count.

Several circuits have held that when the court of appeals 

vacates a sentence the district court may, upon remand, take 

any evidence and hear any argument that it could have 

considered in the original sentencing proceeding. See United 

States v. Atehortva, 69 F.3d 679, 685 (2d Cir. 1995); United 

States v. Jennings, 83 F.3d 145, 151 (6th Cir. 1996); United 

States v. Cornelius, 968 F.2d 703, 705 (8th Cir. 1992); United 

States v. Ponce, 51 F.3d 820, 826 (9th Cir. 1995); United 

States v. Moore, 83 F.3d 1231, 1235 (10th Cir. 1996). Two 

rationales have been given for this practice of de novo resentencing. In Moore, the Tenth Circuit reasoned that when a 

sentence has been vacated and the count remanded for resentencing the defendant is in the same position he was in before 

being sentenced for the first time. 83 F.3d at 1235. This is a 

rather formalistic approach. Although upon Whren's first 

appeal we remanded the case for resentencing without vacating his sentence, we do not want to rely now upon the 

technical distinction between vacatur and remandto which 

we attached no apparent significance at the timewhen 

substantial rights are involved.

In Jennings the Sixth Circuit offered a functional rationale 

for de novo resentencing upon remand: otherwise the parties 

would be forced to litigate every conceivable sentencing issue 

at the initial hearing, regardless of its relevance, lest they be 

precluded from later raising an issue that becomes relevant 

only because of subsequent events. The defendant in Jennings had not objected at his first sentencing hearing to 

certain findings in his pre-sentence report. The court of 

appeals then remanded for resentencing because the district 

court had overstated the quantity of drugs to be used in 

computing the defendant's base offense level. Upon resentencing it turned out that the findings in the PSR, immaterial 

when the larger quantity of drugs was being considered, 

would affect a sentence based upon the smaller quantity of 

drugs.

The Seventh Circuit has rejected the de novo approach, 

holding that "only an issue arising out of the correction of the 

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sentence ordered by [the court of appeals] could be raised in 

a subsequent appeal." United States v. Parker, 101 F.3d 527, 

528 (7th Cir. 1996). The defendant in that case tried to raise 

in his second appeal issues that he had not previously raised 

(and that neither the district court nor the court of appeals 

had therefore ever ruled upon) and that were not affected by 

the remand for resentencing. By failing to raise the issues 

upon the first appeal, the court of appeals held, the defendant 

had waived them. Id.

This circuit has not previously adopted either approach to 

the scope of resentencing on remand. We did hold in United 

States v. Leonzo, 50 F.3d 1086, 1088 (1995), that upon remand 

the Government could not offer new evidence in support of 

the sentencing level for which it had unsuccessfully argued at 

the original sentencing hearing. Absent special circumstances justifying the Government's initial failure to carry its 

burdens of production and of persuasion, we saw "no reason 

why it should get a second bite at the apple." Although 

Whren argues that Leonzo should be limited to cases in which 

a party tries upon remand to offer new evidence, rather than 

to make a new legal argument, he suggests (and we can think 

of) no reason for this distinction.

We think the waiver approach of the Seventh Circuit is 

both preferable to the de novo approach followed in other 

circuits and more consistent with our own reasoning in Leonzo. De novo resentencing is in essence a license for the 

parties to introduce issues, arguments, and evidence that they 

should have introduced at the original sentencing hearing. 

The alternative of requiring the parties to raise all relevant 

issues at the original sentencing hearing serves both equity 

and efficiency: Each party gets early notice of the other's 

position, and the district court can resolve all material issues 

early onwhen the record is fresh in mindand in a single 

proceeding, thereby minimizing the scope of any second proceeding, i.e., should the first result in a remand. We note 

also that, had Whren raised his sentencing argument for the 

first time not before the district court on remand but in his 

original appeal, this court would have reversed his sentence 

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only if Whren could have shown that it was a plain error. 

United States v. Myles, 96 F.3d 491, 495 (D.C. Cir. 1996). In 

this second appeal it would be both anomalous and inefficient 

to place Whren in a better position for having neglected to 

raise a relevant argument in either the district court or in his 

first trip to the court of appeals than he would be in if he had 

neglected to raise it only in the district court.

We hold, therefore, that upon a resentencing occasioned by 

a remand, unless the court of appeals expressly directs otherwise, the district court may consider only such new arguments or new facts as are made newly relevant by the court 

of appeals' decisionwhether by the reasoning or by the 

result. While we think the Jennings court was rightly concerned that a defendant might not have raised an issue at his 

original sentencing because it was not then materialonly to 

find at resentencing that the issue had become materialthe 

solution tailored to that problem is for the district court not 

to resentence the defendant de novo but to consider the newly 

relevant issue. A defendant should not be held to have 

waived an issue if he did not have a reason to raise it at his 

original sentencing; but neither should a defendant be able to 

raise an issue for the first time upon resentencing if he did 

have reason but failed nonetheless to raise it in the earlier 

proceeding. Under our approach a defendant may argue at 

resentencing that the court of appeals' decision has breathed 

life into a previously dormant issue, but he may not revive in 

the second round an issue he allowed to die in the first. That 

is just what Whren tried to do when he belatedly raised his 

sentencing arguments in an effort to lower his sentencing 

range from 168-210 months to 135-168 months. He had just 

as much reason, and no less ability, to make the same 

arguments at his original sentencing hearing.

Of course, under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 52(b) 

the resentencing court may consider even an issue raised 

belatedly if it is both obvious and prejudicial and therefore 

arguably rises to the level of "plain error." United States v. 

Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 734 (1993); see United States v. Saro, 24 

F.3d 283, 286 (D.C. Cir. 1994) (error must be "so plain the 

trial judge and prosecutor were derelict in countenancing it, 

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even absent the defendant's timely assistance in detecting 

it"). Relief is available for plain error, however, only in those 

relatively rare "circumstances in which a miscarriage of justice would otherwise result." United States v. Frady, 456 

U.S. 152, 163 n.14 (1982).

In this case the district court did not plainly err in failing 

to notice on its own the argument that the schoolyard enhancement should not apply to Whren's offense because his 

presence near the school at the time of his arrest was 

fortuitous. We had already rejected that argument in United 

States v. McDonald, 991 F.2d 866, 868-70 (D.C. Cir. 1993). 

Nor did the district court plainly err in not sua sponte

departing downward on the ground that the purpose of the 

schoolyard enhancement would not be served in this case. If 

there is no clear legal rulewhether expressed in a prior 

decision or elsewheregoverning an issue, then the district 

court's decision cannot be a plain error. United States v. 

Merlos, 8 F.3d 48, 51 (D.C. Cir. 1993) (jury instruction 

equating "strong belief" with belief "beyond a reasonable 

doubt" not plain error because at time of trial no appellate 

court had held instruction erroneous). Here the point was 

far from clearly established. The only appellate authorities 

that Whren could muster in support of his position were dicta 

in McDonald, 991 F.2d at 870 (passenger carrying drugs on 

train or subway speeding by school "might warrant a departure"), and in United States v. Rodriguez, 961 F.2d 1089, 1095 

n.8 (3d Cir. 1992) (downward departure would be permissible 

in hypothetical involving "defendant who speeds by a school 

in a train or other vehicle on the way to a narcotics sale"). 

But it is not a plain error for a trial court not to follow a mere 

dictum of the court of appeals. See United States v. Warren,

42 F.3d 647, 657-58 (D.C. Cir. 1994). Accordingly, the trial 

court did not plainly err in failing sua sponte to notice this 

argument.

III. Conclusion

For the reasons given above, the judgment of the district 

court is

Affirmed.

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The first panel's resentencing discussion in its entirety takes 

one sentence of one paragraph, to wit:

Appellants contend that their convictions for violation of 21 

U.S.C. § 841(a)(1), which proscribes possession with intent to 

distribute controlled substances, including cocaine base, should 

be vacated because that section describes a lesser-included 

offense of 21 U.S.C. § 860(a), which proscribes possession with 

intent to distribute a controlled substance within one thousand 

feet of a school. Appellants rely on United States v. Williams,

782 F. Supp. 7, 8-9 (D.D.C. 1992), aff'd without opinion, 6 F.3d 

829 (D.C. Cir. 1993), in which the District Court concluded that 

section 841 offenses were, in fact, lesser included offenses of 

section 860(a) offenses. The government agrees with appellants' argument. Consequently, pursuant to the agreement of 

the parties, we will remand to the District Court for entry of 

an amended judgment and resentencing on Counts One and 

Two.

United States v. Whren, 53 F.3d 371, 376 (1995) (emphasis added). 

The remanding panel could have, more directly and more succinctly 

than it did, simply instructed the district court to vacate the 

conviction and sentence on count one and reimpose the sentence on 

count two. The fact that its language is less precise does not affect 

its plain meaning in my view. 

KAREN LECRAFT HENDERSON, Circuit Judge, concurring:

I concur in the affirmance but see no need for any extended 

analysis or announcement of a new rule for resentencing on 

remand. The first appellate panel remanded for the ministerial resentencing on count two resulting from vacatur of the 

count one conviction.* This was clear to the district court, it 

is clear to me and it should have been clear to defense 

counsel, whose failure to raise the meritorious merger argument at the first sentencing necessitated the remand. The 

scope of the mandate aside, defense counsel knew that the 

time for raising the fortuitous proximity issue was long past. 

She failed to argue the point at sentencing and on the first 

appeal. She could not reasonably request a third bite at that 

particular apple, however tantalizing, after declining it twice.

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