Opinion ID: 780186
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Apprendi Claim (Stines and Ford)

Text: 20 Ford argues that because the jury was not required to find either the type or quantity of drugs involved in the offense or that he used a weapon during and in furtherance of the conspiracy, under Apprendi, his sentence is a violation of his Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights and must be vacated and remanded for resentencing. Stines makes the same argument, adding that the issue concerning his leadership role should have been submitted to the jury and proved beyond a reasonable doubt. 21 Ford received a sentence based on the district court's finding of drug quantity, approximately 25 kilograms of cocaine base, that implicated the enhancement penalties of 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A), which prescribe a term of imprisonment up to life. He also received a two-level enhancement for possession of a weapon in furtherance of the conspiracy. His sentence of 292 months was well beyond the statutory maximum of twenty years for an unspecified quantity of any form of cocaine pursuant to § 841(b)(1)(C). The district court found that Stines was accountable for 25 kilograms to 100 kilograms of cocaine base, implicating the enhancement penalties under § 841(b)(1)(A). He also received a four-level enhancement for his leadership role in the conspiracy. Stines's sentence, 400 months, was also well beyond the statutory maximum of twenty years. 22 Ford argues that the indictment was defective because it failed to allege an element of the offense, i.e., drug quantity. Although he did not move to dismiss the indictment on this ground, Ford claims that this is a jurisdictional objection that may be raised at any time. In United States v. Cotton, 535 U.S. 625, 122 S.Ct. 1781, 1785, 152 L.Ed.2d 860 (2002), the Supreme Court explained that it had some time ago abandoned the view that indictment defects are jurisdictional. Thus, Ford's claim that a defective indictment deprives a court of jurisdiction requiring dismissal must be rejected. 23 Next, we must determine the appropriate standard of review to apply in evaluating defendants' Apprendi challenge. Although Ford and Stines did not raise the issue of quantity at trial, it is clear that they made written objections to the drug quantity determination in response to their presentence reports. In order to preserve an Apprendi challenge, the defendants need not utter the words `due process' as long as it is well known that they dispute the district court's factual findings as to drug quantity. United States v. Strayhorn, 250 F.3d at 462, 467 (6th Cir.2001) (Contrary to the government's assertions that [the defendant's] constitutional challenge was waived, we believe the record makes plain that [the defendant] preserved his challenge by repeatedly objecting to the drug quantity determination at his plea hearing and at his sentencing hearing, as well as in a written objection to the calculation of his base offense level in his presentence report.). 24 At sentencing, however, Stines withdrew his objection and Ford stipulated to a base offense level of 38. The subsequent withdrawal by Stines and stipulation by Ford could lead one to believe that defendants waived their claims challenging the drug quantity determination. Waiver is different from forfeiture. Whereas forfeiture is the failure to make the timely assertion of a right, waiver is the intentional relinquishment or abandonment of a known right. United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 733, 113 S.Ct. 1770, 123 L.Ed.2d 508 (1993) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). The significance of this difference is that plain error does not apply to cases of waiver, but may be invoked in the court's discretion to review rights that were forfeited below. See id. at 733-34, 113 S.Ct. 1770. It would have been impossible for the defendants to have intentionally relinquished or abandoned their Apprendi based claims considering Apprendi was decided after they were sentenced. Thus, we find that Stines's withdrawal and Ford's stipulation resulted in a forfeiture of their right to challenge the drug quantity determination on appeal, requiring us to review their Apprendi claims under a plain error analysis. See United States v. Wade, 266 F.3d 574, 585 (6th Cir.2001) (Generally, a failure to object at sentencing forfeits any challenge to the sentence on appeal. We may overlook such a forfeiture to correct a plain error.). 25 Under the plain error test of Fed. R.Crim.P. 52(b), there must be (1) error, (2) that is plain, and (3) that affects defendants' substantial rights. See Cotton, 122 S.Ct. at 1785. If all three conditions are met, an appellate court may then exercise its discretion to notice a forfeited error, but only if ... the error seriously affect[s] the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings. Id. (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). 26 In Cotton, the Supreme Court applied the plain error analysis to facts almost identical to those in this case. The indictment in Cotton charged a conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute a detectable amount of cocaine and cocaine base. Id. at 1783. The district court imposed sentences well beyond the twenty-year statutory maximum for drug offenses involving a detectable quantity of cocaine or cocaine base. Consistent with the practice in federal courts at that time, at sentencing the district court made a finding of drug quantity that implicated the enhanced penalties of § 841(b)(1)(A). See id. Based on the subsequent ruling in Apprendi, the government conceded that the indictment's failure to allege a fact, drug quantity, that increased the statutory maximum sentence rendered the sentences erroneous. The government also conceded that the error was plain. See id. at 1785. The only issue left for the Court to decide was whether the plain error affected the defendants' substantial rights. The Court concluded it did not need to determine whether this element of the plain error inquiry was satisfied because even assuming defendants' substantial rights were affected, the error did not seriously affect the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings. See id. It found the evidence that the conspiracy involved at least 50 grams of cocaine base overwhelming and essentially uncontroverted and, thus, there was no basis for concluding that the error would seriously affect the fairness of the judicial proceeding. See id. The Court explained: 27 In providing for graduated penalties in 21 U.S.C. §§ 841(b), Congress intended that defendants, like respondents, involved in large-scale drug operations receive more severe punishment than those committing drug offenses involving lesser quantities. Indeed, the fairness and integrity of the criminal justice system depends on meting out to those inflicting the greatest harm on society the most severe punishments. The real threat then to the fairness, integrity, and public reputation of judicial proceedings would be if respondents, despite the overwhelming and uncontroverted evidence that they were involved in a vast drug conspiracy, were to receive a sentence prescribed for those committing less substantial drug offenses because of an error that was never objected to at trial. 28 Id. at 1787. 29 Following the opinion in Cotton, we find that the defendants' forfeiture of their Apprendi objections below precludes a finding of plain error by this court. There was an overwhelming amount of evidence to justify the district court's drug quantity determinations. Trial testimony established that Stines was buying two to five kilograms of crack a week from his source in Detroit as early as 1993. There was also testimony that Ford was Stines's right hand man at least from 1996 on. Each of the cooperating conspirators had personally purchased more than a kilogram of crack from Stines and other members of the gang. Thus, the district court's determination as to drug quantities attributable to Stines and Ford, based on this overwhelming amount of evidence, after the decision in Cotton, does not constitute plain error. Accordingly, we affirm Stines's and Ford's sentences. 30 AFFIRMED.