Opinion ID: 615992
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Scope of Remand and the Impact of Pepper v. United States

Text: We first address whether the district court improperly determined the scope of remand when it refused to entertain Barnes and Taylor's new arguments at re-sentencing. In particular, we consider whether Pepper v. United States, 131 S.Ct. at 1229, abolishes waiver in the context of re-sentencing or whether de novo re-sentencing retains a more limited meaning. We conclude that, upon a general remand for re-sentencing, a district court may permit new arguments and evidence as it deems necessary to re-fashion its sentence. General remand does not, however, entitle the defendants to present new arguments and evidence beyond that pertinent to the issues raised on appeal. [2] We review a district court's determination of the scope of remand de novo. United States v. Husband, 312 F.3d 247, 251 (7th Cir.2002) (citing United States v. Watson, 189 F.3d 496, 500 (7th Cir.1999)).
This Court's decision to remand and our corresponding opinion dictate the scope of that remand. United States v. Avila, 634 F.3d 958, 961 (7th Cir.2011). If this Court remands to correct a discrete, particular error that can be corrected . . . without . . . a redetermination of other issues, the district court is limited to correcting that error. United States v. Parker, 101 F.3d 527, 528 (7th Cir.1996). The Court's silence on an issue raised on appeal means it is not available for consideration on remand. See Husband, 312 F.3d at 251 (citing Barrow v. Falck, 11 F.3d 729, 730 (7th Cir.1993)). Moreover, any issue that could have been raised on appeal but was not is waived and, therefore, not remanded. See Husband, 312 F.3d at 250-51; see also Parker, 101 F.3d at 528 (A party cannot use the accident of a remand to raise in a second appeal an issue that he could just as well have raised in the first appeal because the remand did not affect it.).
Barnes and Taylor contend that they were entitled to the district court's consideration of any and all arguments they raised upon re-sentencing. They refer this Court to the Supreme Court's recent decision in Pepper v. United States, 131 S.Ct. at 1229, which they read as holding that an order for general remand by the Court of Appeals erases the original sentencing proceeding and, with it, any issues of waiver. In Pepper, the Supreme Court denied the appellant's claim that the law of the case doctrine prevented a new judge, upon re-sentencing, from disturbing the prior sentencing judge's downward departure from the defendant's recommended Guideline sentence. Pepper, 131 S.Ct. at 1251. The Court equated general remands for re-sentencing to an order for de novo re-sentencing, noting that such orders effectively wiped the slate clean. Id. at 1250-51. As such, it concluded, an appellate court when reversing one part of a defendant's sentence `may vacate the entire sentence . . . so that, on remand, the trial court can reconfigure the sentencing plan . . . to satisfy the sentencing factors in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a).' Id. at 1251 (quoting Greenlaw v. United States, 554 U.S. 237, 253, 128 S.Ct. 2559, 171 L.Ed.2d 399 (2008)). At issue, then, is what the Pepper Court intended by the term de novo in the re-sentencing context. Barnes and Taylor interpret the Court's dicta that general remand orders wipe the slate clean as entitling them to present any and all new arguments at re-sentencingregardless of their relevance to the error giving rise to the remand. Although few courts have yet to apply Pepper, and the Supreme Court has not yet defined the scope of this case, no court has concluded that Pepper operates to abolish waiver in the context of re-sentencing. [3] As it discusses de novo re-sentencing, the Court emphasizes a district court's ability to effectuate its sentencing intent, id. at 1251, underscoring its concern that re-sentencing courts should not be bound by their predecessors or rotely input the Court of Appeal's changes into their original sentencing calculations. Its holding thus stands for the proposition that general remands render a district court unconstrained by any element of the prior sentence. Id. Allowing a district court to freely balance already and properly raised arguments to preserve or revise its sentencing objectives does not equate to carte blanche for defendants to raise new arguments unrelated to the issues raised on appeal. To the contrary, the only new evidence that the Supreme Court considered and approved of is that of a defendant's postsentencing rehabilitation. Id. at 1236 (We hold that when a defendant's sentence has been set aside on appeal, a district court at resentencing may consider evidence of the defendant's postsentencing rehabilitation. . . .). Barnes and Taylor attempt to expand the Pepper Court's holdings so that, upon general remand, a defendant enjoys a manifest right to raise new issues. We decline the invitation to do so. See, e.g., United States v. White, 406 F.3d 827, 831-32 (7th Cir.2005) (Our case law has characterized the scope of the remand issue using two analogies: (1) that upon remand the district court is presented with a `clean slate' or (2) the district court may `unbundle the sentencing package.' There is no meaningful distinction in this phraseology.). We, therefore, hold that when a case is generally remanded to the district court for re-sentencing, the district court may entertain new arguments as necessary to effectuate its sentencing intent, but it is not obligated to consider any new evidence or arguments beyond that relevant to the issues raised on appeal. Accordingly, the district court did not err by refusing to consider Barnes and Taylor's new arguments as beyond the scope of remand.
Assuming arguendo that the district court should have considered Barnes and Taylor's new arguments within the scope of remand, its error is harmless. See, e.g., United States v. Anderson, 517 F.3d 953, 965 (7th Cir.2008) (applying harmless error analysis to sentencing). An error is harmless if it did not affect the district court's selection of the sentence imposed. Williams v. United States, 503 U.S. 193, 203, 112 S.Ct. 1112, 117 L.Ed.2d 341 (1992). The district court in this case examined both defendants' waived arguments and explained why they would not prevail even if it had formally reached their merits. See discussion supra Part I.B.2b, d. Since it expressly stated that these arguments would not have altered the sentences it pronounced, any error is harmless.