Opinion ID: 199507
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Cross-Reference.

Text: 47 When sentences are imposed under the federal sentencing guidelines, the process encompasses certain mechanical aspects. First, the district court must determine the section of the guidelines that applies to the offense(s) of conviction. The court then must look to that guideline section to determine the BOL. This is not as simple as it sounds because some guideline provisions are not self-contained; they require (or, at least, suggest) cross-referencing to other guideline sections to help determine the BOL. 48 In this case, the sentencing court determined that the appellant's conduct fell, in pertinent part, within the purview of USSG §§2A6.2 (Stalking or Domestic Violence). This determination was fully consistent with the plea agreement, and the appellant does not contest it. Moving forward, the court noted that section 2A6.2(c) contains a cross-reference provision which reads as follows: If the offense involved conduct covered by another offense guideline from Chapter Two, Part A (Offenses Against the Person), apply that offense guideline, if the resulting offense level is greater than that determined above. The court found that the pertinent offenses of conviction fell within the scope of this language and cross-referenced to the first-degree murder guideline (USSG §§2A1.1). Because that guideline yielded a higher BOL (43), the court applied it. 49 The appellant concedes that, in the plea agreement, she stipulated both to this very cross-reference and to the resultant BOL (43). She nonetheless asseverates that the sentencing court erred in embracing this stipulation. Here, however, the appellant stipulated to the facts underlying the cross-reference, and those facts render the sentencing court's use of the cross-reference plausible. No more is exigible to warrant rejection of the appellant's asseveration. 50 We have analogized plea agreements to contracts, binding upon the prosecution and the defense alike. E.g., United States v. Ortiz-Santiago, 211 F.3d 146, 151 (1st Cir. 2000). We have been scrupulous in holding the government to the due performance of its obligations thereunder, e.g., United States v. Clark, 55 F.3d 9, 12-13 (1st Cir. 1995), and defendants cannot expect to be treated less fastidiously. Consequently, defendants ordinarily should be held to plea-agreement terms that they knowingly and voluntarily accept. See United States v. Alegria, 192 F.3d 179, 185-86 (1st Cir. 1999). But there are caveats. Stipulations about legal issues, for example, are problematic. There is language in a number of cases indicating (correctly, we think) that such stipulations normally are not binding on a court. E.g., Estate of Sanford v. Commissioner, 308 U.S. 39, 51 (1939); Weston v. Wash. Metro. Area Transit Auth., 78 F.3d 682, 685 (D.C. Cir. 1996); Gunn v. United States, 283 F.2d 358, 364 (8th Cir. 1960). Even when stipulations concern facts rather than law, courts traditionally retain the power to relieve parties from them on terms that are just. E.g., TI Fed. Credit Union v. DelBonis, 72 F.3d 921, 928 (1st Cir. 1995). 51 Of course, except where the parties have entered into a binding plea agreement under the aegis of Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(e)(1)(C), the stipulations contained in the agreement, even if factual in nature, do not tie the district court's hands. See United States v. Saxena, 229 F.3d 1, 4-8 (1st Cir. 2000); Ortiz-Santiago, 211 F.3d at 149 n.2. That the court has the power to deviate from such stipulations, however, does not obligate the court to do so. Should the court decide to accept and act upon factual stipulations for sentencing purposes, the parties usually will be firmly bound. 12 This general rule will apply when, for example, a defendant stipulates to a matter of fact or to the applicability of a sentencing guideline (the legal meaning of which is pellucid) to the unique facts of her case. After all, the defendant knows what she has done, and has little cause for complaint if the district court takes her at her word. 52 It is much more difficult to justify binding effect for a stipulation that purports to resolve a general issue of law (or one that turns out to do so without acknowledgment). To cite an extreme example, it is difficult to see why a district court that misreads the effective date of a statute bearing on a sentencing determination should automatically be insulated from appellate review because the parties stipulated to the (wrong) effective date. That leaves stipulations as to mixed questions of fact and law. As to such stipulations, generalizations are risky business. The answer, in a particular case, may depend on the extent to which the mixed question is fact-dominated, cf. In re Extradition of Howard, 996 F.2d 1320, 1328 (1st Cir. 1993), or the extent to which the known facts (whether found by the court or stipulated by the parties) make a given answer to the mixed question plausible. 53 This case involves a combination of these principles. The appellant stipulated to the BOL - 43 - and to the propriety of using the cross-reference to USSG §§2A1.1 found in USSG §§2A6.2 to reach that BOL. To that extent, her challenge to the stipulation is based in law, and thus arguably subject to plenary review. But there is more: in the course of the proceedings below, the appellant pled guilty to counts five, six, seven, and ten (among others). These counts charged her with aiding and abetting interstate domestic violence, interstate stalking, and interstate violation of a protection order. 18 U.S.C. §§§§ 2, 2261(a)(1)-(2), 2261A, 2262(a)(1). She admitted to certain facts through her plea agreement, the change-of-plea colloquy, and at sentencing. Those factual admissions are not now open to challenge -and they suffice to justify the sentencing court's use of the stipulated cross-reference. We explain briefly. 54 The applicable sentencing guideline in this case is USSG §§2A6.2 (Stalking or Domestic Violence). As said, this section contains a cross-reference to the first-degree murder guideline, USSG §§2A1.1. This cross-reference arises by virtue of USSG §§1B1.3(a)(1)(B) (Relevant Conduct), which pertinently provides that a defendant's BOL shall be determined in the case of jointly undertaken criminal activity [on the basis of] all reasonably foreseeable acts and omissions of others in furtherance of the jointly undertaken criminal activity, that occurred during the commission of the offense of conviction. In the district court, the appellant admitted to crossing state lines to commit illegal acts against Deborah Brown, a stipulation of fact unchallenged on appeal. Additionally, she admitted to seeing and hearing Brown's vicious attack on Wood, yet nonetheless luring the next victim, Brouillard, into a place of maximum danger. Given these conceded facts, the murder of the second victim, at the very least, was a reasonably foreseeable act in furtherance of the offenses of conviction. Consequently, the district court had a plausible factual basis for cross-referencing to the first-degree murder guideline (as agreed by the parties) and employing a BOL of 43. 55 On this point, we find United States v. Robinson, 14 F.3d 1200 (7th Cir. 1994), instructive. There, the defendant entered into a plea agreement in which he admitted to distributing specific quantities of drugs. The district court sentenced him in line with the stipulation. The defendant nonetheless appealed, claiming that the court erred by failing to make an independent drug-quantity determination. Id. at 1206. The Seventh Circuit quickly shut down this appeal: 56 Robinson pled guilty, and was sentenced based on what he admitted in the plea agreement, at the guideline level agreed upon in the plea agreement. . . . Robinson got what he bargained for, he waived any right to challenge the contents of the plea agreement when he signed it, and he has no basis to challenge it now. 57 Id. The same can be said for Teeter. Having admitted the underlying facts that supported the sentencing court's resort to the stipulated cross-reference, she is unable to challenge that decision on appeal. 58