United States Court of Appeals

For the Seventh Circuit

Chicago, Illinois 60604

Submitted May 9, 2013*

Decided May 13, 2013

Before

RICHARD A. POSNER, Circuit Judge

DANIEL A. MANION, Circuit Judge                                 

DIANE P. WOOD, Circuit Judge

   

No. 12‐3422

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Plaintiff‐Appellee,

v.

HELEN L. FORT,

Defendant‐Appellant.                 

Appeal from the United States District

Court for the Northern District of Illinois,

Western Division.

No. 93 CR 20024‐2

Philip G. Reinhard,

Judge.

O R D E R

Helen Fort appeals the denial of her second motion under 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(2) to

reduce her sentence based on retroactive amendments to the sentencing guidelines for crack

cocaine offenses. The district court denied the motion on the ground that the amendments

did not lower Fort’s guidelines range. We affirm the judgment.

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

To be cited only in accordance with

Fed. R. App. P. 32.1

*

After examining the briefs and the record, we have concluded that oral argument is

unnecessary. Thus, the appeal is submitted on the briefs and the record. See FED. R. APP.

P. 34(a)(2)(C).
No. 12‐3422 Page 2

Fort was a member of a 19‐person drug ring operating in Rockford, Illinois in the

early 1990s. She and six others composed the group’s core (the “Mob,” as they called

themselves), and they purchased kilogram quantities of cocaine for sale in crack houses

operated by the group. For her role in the Mob’s operations, Fort was charged with

conspiring to distribute and conspiring to possess with intent to distribute cocaine base, 21

U.S.C. § 846, and distributing cocaine base, 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1). The district court found her

accountable for 5 kilograms of powder cocaine and 41 grams of crack, which resulted in a

base offense level of 32. The court applied upward adjustments based on her possession of a

dangerous weapon, see U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1(b)(1), and her leadership role in the drug ring, see

id. § 3B1.1(a); with her category‐II criminal history, the sentencing guidelines yielded a

range of 262 to 327 months. The district court sentenced her to 312 months, and we upheld

that sentence on appeal. See United States v. Evans, 92 F.3d 540 (7th Cir. 1996).

Fort then filed an unsuccessful motion under § 2255 in the district court, and we

denied her requests for a certificate of appealability and for leave to file a second collateral

attack. She later moved for relief from the judgment and for review of her sentence,

claiming that the district court’s drug‐quantity determination was flawed, but the court

denied both motions as impermissible collateral attacks on her sentence.

In 2008 Fort filed a motion under 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(2), seeking to reduce her

sentence based on Sentencing Guidelines Amendment 706, which retroactively reduced

offense levels in most crack cocaine cases by two levels. See U.S.S.G. app. C, amend. 706.

Fort acknowledged that her guidelines range would remain the same if the court relied on

its original drug‐quantity findings, but she maintained that the court should revisit these

findings in light of our decision in United States v. Henderson, 58 F.3d 1145 (7th Cir. 1995), in

which we held that a district court could not base its drug‐quantity findings on testimony it

deemed incredible. Although the court’s purported error in calculating the powder cocaine

attributable to Fort did not make a difference at sentencing, she maintained that the

amended guidelines would yield a lower sentence if the error were corrected given the

reduced impact of the crack attributed to her. The court denied the motion on the ground

that Amendment 706 did not affect her guidelines range and noted that her drug‐quantity

argument was inappropriate in a motion under § 3582(c)(2). She did not appeal that

decision.

Three years later Fort again moved under § 3582 for a sentence reduction “[i]n light

of the recent amendment to the sentencing guidelines.” The district court construed her

motion as requesting a reduced sentence under Amendment 750, which revised the drug‐

quantity tables based on the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010. The court denied the motion after

determining that Amendment 750 also does not affect Fort’s guidelines range. See U.S.S.G.

app. C, amend. 750. The court explained that the 5 kilograms of powder cocaine and 41
No. 12‐3422 Page 3

grams of crack attributed to Fort equated with 1,146 kilograms of marijuana, yielding a base

offense level of 32 even under the revised guidelines. See U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1(c)(4).

Fort appeals the denial of that motion, arguing only that the district court improperly

relied on its original drug‐quantity calculations in determining that the amended guidelines

would not yield a more favorable sentence. Fort maintains that in light of our decision in

Henderson the district court was obligated to recalculate the powder cocaine attributed to

her before deciding her motion. But § 3582 authorizes a court only to substitute an amended

guidelines range for the range originally calculated at sentencing; it does not permit the

court to resentence the defendant based on other intervening legal changes. See U.S.S.G.

§ 1B1.10(b)(1); Dillon v. United States, 130 S. Ct. 2683, 2694 (2010); United States v. Foster, 706

F.3d 887, 888 (7th Cir. 2013). Further, courts ruling on § 3582(c)(2) motions may not make

factual findings that are inconsistent with those made at sentencing, and the district court

here was therefore bound by its original drug‐quantity findings. See United States v. Neal,

611 F.3d 399, 401 (7th Cir. 2010); United States v. Hall, 600 F.3d 872, 876 (7th Cir. 2010); United

States v. Woods, 581 F.3d 531, 538 (7th Cir. 2009). Because these findings did not support a

lower sentence under the amended guidelines, the district court properly denied Fort’s

motion.

AFFIRMED