Opinion ID: 665566
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Downward Departure--Thigpen

Text: 80 Thigpen appeals the district court's failure to depart downward on the grounds that his classification as a career offender significantly overstates his criminal history. A district court's discretionary decision not to depart downward is not reviewable. United States v. Reyes-Alvarado, 963 F.2d 1184, 1189 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 113 S.Ct. 258 (1992). If, however, the district court was under the impression that it was as a matter of law without authority to depart downward, and if it expressed a desire to depart downward in the case before it, we will review de novo its determination that it had no authority to depart. United States v. Brown, 985 F.2d 478, 480 (9th Cir.1993). 81 Thigpen argues that the district court was under the impression that it had no authority to depart downward if it thought his career offender status overstated his criminal history. See U.S.S.G. Sec. 4A1.3 (departure appropriate where defendant's criminal history category significantly over-represents the seriousness of a defendant's criminal history or the likelihood that the defendant will commit future crimes). A review of the record, however, shows this is not true. 82 Thigpen's codefendant Falconer thoroughly briefed the Sec. 4A1.3 departure for the district court, and Thigpen made a corresponding oral argument at sentencing. In summarizing its decision not to depart, the court said, 83 I have read the cases that [Falconer's brief] presented to me and I can't say that those cases are helpful to the defendants. The facts in those cases are clearly distinguishable. The cases speak of the proximity in time of the offenses, the sentence imposed ... the fact that there was no antisocial quality to the defendant or the offenses, and in one instance some prognostication by a psychiatrist that recidivism was unlikely. Hardly a prognostication that could be being taken seriously here. 84 Transcript of Sentencing Hearing, January 11, 1993, at 27-28. The court concluded, 85 I wish it were otherwise, but the fact is that [defendants] do legitimately come within the category of career offenders and the cases don't, the facts here don't justify a departure. 86 Id. at 29. 87 Thigpen cites one statement of the district court in support of his contention that the court thought it had no authority to depart downward: 88 Furthermore, in this offense there was evidence of some arsenal of weaponry and it doesn't seem to me that I have discretion. In a way I wish I had, but I think I would be violating the law if I downwardly departed on these facts. It distresses me, but that is the unfortunate conclusion. 89 Id. at 28. Read in context, however, this statement expresses the district court conviction that prior caselaw would not justify a departure on these facts. The statement immediately follows a paragraph in which the district court distinguishes the other cases on downward departure where a criminal history category over-represents a defendant's real criminal history. We read the district court's statement that it doesn't seem to me that I have discretion to mean, it would be an abuse of discretion for me to depart downward on these facts. 90 In sum, the district court understood that downward departure was available where a defendant's prior convictions were close in time (thus indicating no criminal career is involved), where defendant was young at the time of the priors, where the crime was not antisocial, or where there was a low risk of recidivism. The district court also decided these mitigating factors did not appear in Thigpen's case. Because the district court's decision not to depart downward was therefore an unreviewable exercise of discretion, we affirm Thigpen's sentence.