Opinion ID: 2999538
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The 100:1 Ratio and Booker

Text: The Government presents two issues in its appeal to this court: (1) whether the district court committed legal error by sentencing Mr. Jointer under a 20:1 ratio rather than a 100:1 6 No. 05-4632 ratio;1 and (2) whether Mr. Jointer’s sentence is unreasonable. We turn now to the first issue. In this post-Booker world, the basic methodology that must be employed by a district court in sentencing a defendant is now well-settled. As a threshold matter, the district court first must calculate the appropriate sentence under the applicable version of the United States Sentencing Guidelines. See, e.g., United States v. Walker, 447 F.3d 999, 1007 (7th Cir. 2006). Although the Guidelines are now advisory, not mandatory, they serve as a necessary starting point in the court’s deliberations. In making this initial calculation, the court must acknowledge, and abide by, the policy choices made by Congress and by the Sentencing Commission. At this stage of the process, a district court, and indeed this court on review, must respectfully adhere to the 100:1 ratio that Congress has decided to implement; the court cannot substitute a different ratio for the one that Congress has selected. “[A]fter Booker district judges are obliged to implement the 100-to-1 ratio as long as it remains part of the statute and the Guidelines.” United States v. Miller, 450 F.3d 1 The so-called “100:1” ratio originated in the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 (the “Act”), Pub. L. No. 99-570, 100 Stat. 3207 (1986) (codified in pertinent part at 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)). The Act prescribes a minimum sentence of 10 years for possession of 5,000 grams of cocaine or 50 grams of cocaine base (“crack”) and a minimum sentence of 5 years for 500 grams of cocaine or 5 grams of crack. See 21 U.S.C. §§ 841(b)(1)(A)(ii), (iii); id. §§ 841(b)(1)(B)(ii), (iii). The Sentencing Commission then set the Guidelines accordingly, adjusting the sentencing ranges for crack and powder to reflect Congress’ decision. For a more detailed discussion of the history of the 100:1 ratio, see United States v. Eura, 440 F.3d 625, 635-36 (4th Cir. 2006) (Michael, J., concurring). No. 05-4632 7 270, 275 (7th Cir. 2006);2 see also United States v. Lister, 432 F.3d 754, 762 (7th Cir. 2005) (noting that the 100:1 ratio has been upheld consistently by our circuit and that “Booker do[es] nothing to overturn this decision”). After the court has ascertained the appropriate advisory guideline sentence, it then must determine, by an examination of all of the facts and circumstances of the case in light of the criteria set forth in 18 U.S.C. § 3553, an appropriate sentence for the individual defendant. Notably, only after calculating the correct range may a court make reference to the factors specified in § 3553(a) and select a sentence for a defendant that is either within or outside of the advisory guidelines range. See Walker, 447 F.3d at 1007. In this case, the district court did not make a statement categorically rejecting the 100:1 ratio in sentencing all crack defendants in front of the court. Such a statement would have been a quintessential appropriation of legislative authority. On the other hand, a fair reading of the sentencing transcript does not permit us to characterize the district court’s action as entirely judicial in nature. The court simply did not tie the 20:1 ratio specifically to Mr. Jointer. Although the court said that it was applying the 20:1 ratio “in this case,” it did not articulate a rationale for why 20:1 was more appropriate than any other ratio for Mr. Jointer. Sent. Tr. at 14. It simply disagreed with the legislative facts upon which Congress had based its judgment and substituted other legislative facts for the congressional judgment. Although the court did discuss characteristics specific to Mr. Jointer, such as Mr. Jointer’s relatively low-level involve- 2 The district court did not have the benefit of our decision in United States v. Miller, 450 F.3d 270 (7th Cir. 2006), at the time that it ruled. 8 No. 05-4632 ment in the drug distribution business, the court did not make any defendant-specific findings or statements when discussing the crack-to-cocaine ratio. In sum, although the district court did, at first, correctly calculate the applicable offense level and sentencing range, the court abandoned that correct calculation and inserted its own ratio, 20:1, and then recalculated the applicable offense level and sentencing range. See Sent. Tr. at 24 (“I’m not abandoning the Guidelines. I will reconfigure the Guidelines . . . on the conclusions I have drawn by applying the 3553(a) factors, and that would, in fact, leave the total offense level at a 25.”). This recalculation was erroneous; it followed neither the statutory language set out by Congress nor the applicable guidelines sections. A district court “err[s] as a matter of law when it construct[s] a new sentencing range” based on a crack-topowder range other than 100:1. United States v. Pho, 433 F.3d 53, 64 (1st Cir. 2006); see also United States v. Robinson, 435 F.3d 699, 701 (7th Cir. 2006) (“Guideline ranges must be determined correctly as a matter of law.”). A district court simply cannot substitute its own ratio for the 100:1 ratio. See United States v. Williams, No. 05-13205, ___ F.3d ___, 2006 WL 2039993, at  (11th Cir. July 21, 2006) (“Congress concluded the 100-to-1 ratio is justified, and the courts have no authority to change that.”); United States v. Eura, 440 F.3d 625 (4th Cir. 2006); Pho, 433 F.3d 53. Because the district court did not follow the appropriate methodology in sentencing Mr. Jointer, and because that error certainly can not be characterized as harmless error, we must remand the case for resentencing. We have stated that, although the Guidelines are no longer mandatory, “errors in their application remain relevant,” United States v. Skoczen, 405 F.3d 537, 549 (7th Cir. 2005), and such No. 05-4632 9 errors may require us to remand for resentencing, see United States v. Chamness, 435 F.3d 724, 726 (7th Cir. 2006). The Mandatory Sentencing Act, 18 U.S.C. § 3742(f)(1), requires resentencing when a sentence was imposed “as a result of an incorrect application of the sentencing guidelines.” This provision of the Mandatory Sentencing Act survives Booker, and thus errors in the Guidelines application must be remanded for resentencing even post-Booker. See United States v. Scott, 405 F.3d 615, 617 (7th Cir. 2005). To ensure that our holding is received in the proper context, we emphasize that, once a correct guideline sentence has been calculated, the district court must fashion an individual sentence for the defendant before it by evaluating all the facts and circumstances of the case in light of the criteria set forth by Congress in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a). See Pho, 433 F.3d at 65 (“[W]e do not intend to diminish the discretion that, after Booker, the district courts enjoy in sentencing matters or to suggest that, in a drug trafficking case, the nature of the contraband and/or the severity of a projected guideline sentence may not be taken into account on a caseby-case basis.”); see also Williams, 2006 WL 2039993, at  (holding that “a sentence below the Guidelines range in a crack cocaine case” may be permissible “so long as it reflects the individualized, case-specific factors in § 3553(a)”). At this later stage of the sentencing proceedings, the Sentencing Commission’s detailed reports on crack and cocaine sentencing3 may have “practical utility” to a district 3 The Sentencing Commission has issued reports to Congress in 1995, 1997 and 2002, recommending that Congress narrow the sentencing disparity between crack and cocaine offenders. The 2002 report was extensive and drew on a variety of different (continued...) 10 No. 05-4632 court’s evaluation of the facts and circumstances of the individual case in light of the § 3553(a) factors. Eura, 440 F.3d at 634 (Michael, J., concurring). However, as Judge Michael cautioned, the analysis and data contained in the reports cannot alone justify a below-guidelines sentence; they can be considered only “insofar as they are refracted through an individual defendant’s case.” Id. at 637 (emphasis in original). This is not to say, of course, that a district court must consult the Sentencing Commission reports in any given sentencing. See United States v. Gipson, 425 F.3d 335, 337 (7th Cir. 2005) (per curiam) (holding that there is no requirement that a district court take into account the discrepancy between crack and cocaine sentencing to give a below-guidelines sentence). Nor will reliance on the Sentencing Commission reports shield a district court from a reasonableness review on appeal because, at the core, the district court must still tie the § 3553(a) factors to the individual characteristics of the defendant and the offense committed. See Eura, 440 F.3d at 634 (stating that, in order to deviate from the applicable range when sentencing a crack defendant, “a sentencing court must identify the individual aspects of the defendant’s case that fit within the factors listed in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a)” (emphasis in original)). 3 (...continued) sources, including recent literature on the effects and use of cocaine, an empirical study of federal cocaine offenders, public comments, and public hearing testimony from physicians, law enforcement officials, civil rights leaders and academics. See United States Sentencing Comm’n, Report to Congress: Cocaine and Federal Sentencing Policy (2002); see also Eura, 440 F.3d at 635-36 (Michael, J., concurring) (discussing the various Sentencing Commission reports). No. 05-4632 11