Source: http://openjurist.org/262/f3d/31
Timestamp: 2015-11-25 14:46:12
Document Index: 469668750

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 841', '§ 841', '§3', '§5', '§ 841', '§ 841', '§ 841']

262 F3d 31 United States of America v. Kenneth J Eirby | OpenJurist
262 F. 3d 31 - United States of America v. Kenneth J Eirby HomeFederal Reporter, Third Series262 F.3d
262 F3d 31 United States of America v. Kenneth J Eirby 262 F.3d 31 (1st Cir. 2001)
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Appellee,v.KENNETH J. EIRBY, Defendant, Appellant.
No. 00-1945
The facts are virtually undisputed. In late 1999, law enforcement officers caught the appellant red-handed as he endeavored to peddle cocaine base. A federal grand jury sitting in the District of Maine thereafter returned a two-count indictment against him. The appellant eventually agreed to plead guilty to the first count of the indictment (which charged him with conspiracy to distribute cocaine base) and the government agreed to dismiss the second count (which charged a specific distribution offense). Like the indictment itself, a non-binding plea agreement (the Agreement), entered into between the appellant and the government under the aegis of Fed. R. Crim. P. 11(e)(1)(B), mentioned 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(B) and described the "penalty which may be imposed upon conviction" as "a term of imprisonment of not less than five years or more than forty years" (the precise parameters limned in section 841(b)(1)(B)).
Based on the presentence investigation report, the district court, over objection, found the appellant responsible for 147 grams of crack cocaine (enough to subject him to a different penalty provision -- that contained in 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A)).1 Because the indictment and the Agreement each referenced section 841(b)(1)(B) rather than section 841(b)(1)(A), the district court recessed the disposition hearing and offered the appellant an opportunity to withdraw his plea.
When the district court reconvened the disposition hearing, it rejected the appellant's constitutional challenge to the disparity between cocaine base and cocaine powder. Moving from the general to the specific, the court found that the appellant's relevant criminal conduct consisted of distributing 147 grams of crack cocaine (cocaine base). After applying an appropriate three-level reduction for acceptance of responsibility, see USSG §3E1.1, the court arrived at an adjusted offense level of 29. In conjunction with the appellant's criminal history category (II), the adjusted offense level yielded a guideline sentencing range (GSR) of 97-121 months. The court's drug-quantity determination and its invocation of section 841(b)(1)(A) brought into play a mandatory minimum sentence of 120 months (which, coincidentally, was within the GSR). Starting from that baseline, the court departed downward for substantial assistance, USSG §5K1.1, and sentenced the appellant to serve a 66-month incarcerative term. This appeal followed.2
The appellant's best argument is that the district court usurped the grand jury's province by impermissibly substituting 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A) for 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(B). While this argument obliquely involves Apprendi, he places his next three arguments squarely under the Apprendi umbrella. He asserts that, post-Apprendi, drug quantity no longer can be treated as a sentencing factor, but, rather, must be treated as an element of the offense--and therefore must be charged in the indictment and proven beyond a reasonable doubt; that the lower court's drug-quantity determination, made pursuant to a preponderance-of-the-evidence standard, exposed him to a higher mandatory minimum sentence (and, thus, offended Apprendi); and that Apprendi requires a distinction, not drawn by the court below, between the quantity of drugs "involved" in an offense (for the purpose of ascertaining the applicable statutory mandatory minimum sentence) and the quantity of drugs for which a defendant is "responsible" (for the purpose of determining the applicable GSR). The appellant's last argument assails, on constitutional grounds, what he deems the draconian nature of the criminal penalties that Congress has attached to crack cocaine.
We pause at the onset to delineate the standard of review. The appellant squarely challenged the district court's invocation of section 841(b)(1)(A) and argued below that he should have been sentenced under section 841(b)(1)(B). Since that argument presents an abstract legal question, our review is plenary. United States v. Conley, 156 F.3d 78, 82 (1st Cir. 1998). The same holds true for the appellant's cocaine base/cocaine powder "disparity" argument. See United States v. Gifford, 17 F.3d 462, 471-72 (1st Cir. 1994) (holding that questions involving the constitutionality of statutes engender plenary review). In contrast, the appellant's three Apprendi-based claims are raised for the first time on appeal. As such, our review of those claims is for plain error. This entails a quadripartite showing: "(1) that there was error; (2) that it was plain; (3) that the error affect[ed] substantial rights; and (4) that the error affected the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings." United States v. Gomez, 255 F.3d 31, 42 (1st Cir. 2001).
Before grappling with the appellant's contentions, we offer some background. Pre-Apprendi, this court had held that the drug-quantity delineations contained in 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1) were not element