Opinion ID: 72320
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: standard of review

Text: In Koon v. United States, ___ U.S. ___, ___, 116 S. Ct. 2035, 2043 (1996), the Supreme Court held that an appellate court reviewing a district court's departure from the sentencing guidelines should ask “whether the sentencing court abused its discretion.” The Court explained that while an abuse of discretion review standard preserves the sentencing court's “traditional discretion,” it does not render appellate review an empty exercise. Id. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2046. A sentencing court's factual findings continue to be afforded substantial deference, but a mistake of law is, by definition, an abuse of discretion. Id. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2047. 6 Whether to depart from the sentencing guidelines is a decision which requires a district court to make both factual and legal findings. Under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(b), a district court may depart from the applicable guideline range if “the court finds that there exists an aggravating or mitigating circumstance of a kind, or to a degree, not adequately taken into consideration by the Sentencing Commission in formulating the guidelines that should result in a sentence different from that described.” Thus, to depart from the sentencing guidelines, a district court must make two fundamental determinations: (1) what, if any, factor makes the case “atypical” (i.e., unlike the typical case found under the applicable sentencing guideline), and (2) should that factor result in a different sentence. The first of these determinations is factual in nature, see Koon, ___ U.S. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2046-47, while the second involves both legal and factual considerations, see id. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2047. Cases implicating a factor not adequately taken into consideration by the Sentencing Commission are said to fall outside the “heartland” of typical cases embodying the conduct described in the applicable guideline. See U.S.S.G. ch.1, pt. A, intro. comment. 4(b). A district court determines whether a case falls outside the heartland by making a refined assessment of the facts of the case, comparing those facts to the facts of other cases falling within the guideline's heartland. See Koon, ___ U.S. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2046-47. To determine whether a factor which takes a case outside the 7 heartland should result in a different sentence, a district court must first decide whether the factor is forbidden, encouraged, discouraged, or unaddressed by the guidelines as a potential basis for departure. See id. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2045. If a factor is forbidden, see, e.g., U.S.S.G. § 5H1.10 (race, sex, national origin, creed, religion and socio-economic status), a district court cannot use it to depart from the applicable guideline; to do so would be a per se abuse of discretion. See Koon, ___ U.S. at ___, ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2045, 2047. If a factor is encouraged, see, e.g., § 5K2.1 (causing death), a court is authorized to depart from the applicable guideline if the guideline does not already take that factor into account. See Koon, ___ U.S. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2045. If a factor is discouraged, see, e.g., § 5H1.2 (education and vocational skills), or is an encouraged factor already taken into account by the applicable guideline, a district court may depart only if the factor is present to an exceptional degree or in some other way makes the case distinguishable from an ordinary case where the factor is present.2 See Koon, ___ U.S. at 2 The guidelines provide the following examples to illustrate the use of encouraged and discouraged factors in the departure decision: [D]isruption of a governmental function, § 5K2.7, [an encouraged factor], would have to be quite serious to warrant departure from the guidelines when the applicable offense guideline is bribery or obstruction of justice. When the theft offense guideline is applicable, however, and the theft caused disruption of a governmental function, departure from the applicable guideline range more readily would be appropriate. Similarly, physical injury would not warrant departure from the guidelines when the robbery offense guideline is applicable because the robbery guideline includes a specific adjustment 8 ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2045. Finally, a district court may depart on the basis of a factor not addressed by the Sentencing Commission if it finds, “after considering the 'structure and theory of both the relevant individual guidelines and the Guidelines taken as a whole,'” that the factor takes the case out of the applicable guideline's heartland. Id. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2045 (quoting United States v. Rivera, 994 F.2d 942, 949 (1st Cir. 1993)). However, a district court departing on the basis of an unenumerated factor should bear in mind the Commission's expectation that such departures will be “highly infrequent.” Id. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2045 (citing U.S.S.G. ch. 1, pt. A, intro. comment. 4(b)). We note that a district court is required to perform the foregoing analysis only when its decision to depart is not based on specific guidance contained within the guidelines. If the district court's departure is based upon a suggestion within the applicable guideline(s), this analysis is unnecessary. See U.S.S.G. ch. 1, pt. A., intro. comment. 4(b). On appeal, our review of a district court's decision to depart from the sentencing guidelines is a three-step process. First, we deferentially review the district court's determination of whether the facts of a case take it outside the heartland of the applicable based on the extent of any injury. However, because the robbery guideline does not deal with injury to more than one victim, departure would be warranted if several persons were injured. U.S.S.G. § 5K2.0. 9 guideline. See Koon, ___ U.S. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2047 (“District Courts have an institutional advantage over appellate courts in making these sorts of determinations, especially as they see so many more Guidelines cases than appellate courts do.”). Second, we independently determine whether the departure factor relied upon by the district court has been categorically proscribed, is encouraged, encouraged but taken into consideration within the applicable guideline, discouraged, or not addressed by the Commission. See id. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2047 (stating that an appellate court need not defer to the district court on questions of law). If the district court has relied upon a forbidden factor, it necessarily has abused its discretion. If the factor relied upon is not forbidden, we reach the third step of our review process. We review with deference the remaining factually sensitive findings of the district court, e.g., whether a discouraged factor is present to such an extraordinary degree that departure is warranted. See id. at ___, ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2047, 2050.3 3 In United States v. Taylor, 88 F.3d 938 (11th Cir. 1996), our first post-Koon review of a district court's decision to depart from the sentencing guidelines, we recognized that Koon had changed the standard of review and the analysis that applies when reviewing departure decisions. See id. at 945-46. We consistently applied the Koon standard of review and analysis in the next three guideline departure cases that followed. See United States v. Bernal, 90 F.3d 465, 467-68 (11th Cir. 1996); United States v. Santos, 93 F.3d 761, 763 (11th Cir. 1996), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___; 117 S. Ct. 1437 (1997); United States v. Bristow , 110 F.3d 754, 757-59 (11th Cir. 1997). However, in United States v. Gunby, 112 F.3d 1493 (11th Cir. 1997), we stated that when reviewing a district court's decision to depart upward from the sentencing guidelines we should ask the 10 following three questions: (1) Was the aggravating circumstance cited by the district court adequately taken into consideration by the Sentencing Commission in formulating the guidelines? (2) If adequate consideration was not given to the circumstance, was consideration of the circumstance consistent with the goals of the sentencing guidelines? (3) If the circumstance was properly taken into account, was the extent of the departure from the guideline range reasonable? 112 F.3d at 1499 (citing United States v. Shuman , 902 F.2d 873, 875-76 (11th Cir. 1990)). We stated that this three-part inquiry from pre-Koon case law was consistent with Koon. Id. at 1499 n.8. A close examination of the second Gunby question reveals that it may well be inconsistent with the Supreme Court's decision in Koon and with our pre-Gunby decisions utilizing the Koon analysis to review departure decisions. In none of our pre- Gunby, post-Koon decisions did we inquire whether the factor relied upon by the district court as a basis for departure was consistent with the goals of the Guidelines. See Taylor, 88 F.3d at 945-46; Bernal, 90 F.3d at 467-68; Santos, 93 F.3d at 763; Bristow, 110 F.3d at 75759. Nor have we done so in any of our post- Gunby guideline departure decisions. See United States v. Lewis, 115 F.3d 1531, 1538-39 (11th Cir. 1997); United States v. White, 118 F.3d 739, 741-42 (11th Cir. 1997); United States v. Phillips, 120 F.3d 227, 230-32 (11th Cir. 1997). Moreover, in Koon itself, the Supreme Court expressly rejected the government's suggestion that courts should test potential departure factors against broad sentencing goals and reject those factors that are inconsistent with these goals. ___ U.S. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2051. The Court stated: “We conclude, then, that a federal court's examination of whether a factor can ever be an appropriate basis for departure is limited to determining whether the Commission has proscribed, as a categorical matter, consideration of the factor.” Id. at ___, 116 S. Ct. at 2051. Because the second Gunby question appears to be inconsistent with Koon and our pre-Gunby decisions applying the Koon analysis, we do not utilize the Gunby analysis. Instead, we adhere to the analysis set forth in Koon, which was adopted by this Court in Taylor, and which we have expounded upon in the text previously. In United States v. Hogan, 986 F.2d 1364, 1369 (11th Cir. 1993), we held that “it is the firmly established rule of this Circuit that each succeeding panel is bound by the holding of the first panel to address an issue of law, unless and until that holding is overruled 11 Having set forth the standard by which we review a sentencing court's decision to depart from the guidelines, we turn now to the merits in this case.