Opinion ID: 596393
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Conspiracy as a lesser included offense

Text: 34 The Supreme Court has indicated and the Eleventh Circuit has held that drug conspiracy, as defined by 21 U.S.C. § 846 or § 963, is a lesser included offense of CCE, and that it is a violation of double jeopardy to prosecute a defendant for the greater offense of CCE following a conviction of the lesser included offense of conspiracy. In Jeffers, the Supreme Court was confronted with the question of whether or not conspiracy is a lesser included offense of CCE and if so, whether this relationship between the two offenses prohibited separate prosecutions for each offense. 3 The Jeffers Court did not directly answer this question although it indicated that a section 846 offense is most likely a lesser included offense of 848. 4 Since Jeffers was decided, the former Fifth Circuit as well as the Eleventh Circuit have held that a section 846 offense is indeed a lesser included offense of section 848 offense: 35 Although the facts in Jeffers made it unnecessary to settle definitively the issue of whether § 846 is a lesser included offense of § 848, [cite omitted] the Court's discussion of the issue indicates that the question would be answered affirmatively because § 848 requires proof of an agreement among the persons involved in the continuing criminal enterprise and thus requires proof of every fact necessary to show a violation under § 848 [sic] as well as proof of several additional elements. 36 United States v. Stricklin, 591 F.2d 1112, 1123 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 444 U.S. 963, 100 S.Ct. 449, 62 L.Ed.2d 375 (1979). 5 A conspiracy is a lesser included offense of section 848 because the in concert requirement of § 848 has been interpreted to encompass the agreement required to prove a [section 846] conspiracy. United States v. Michel, 588 F.2d 986, 999 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 444 U.S. 825, 100 S.Ct. 47, 62 L.Ed.2d 32 (1979); United States v. Bollinger, 796 F.2d 1394, 1403 n. 4 (1986), opinion substituted in part on other grounds, 837 F.2d 436 (11th Cir.), cert. denied, 486 U.S. 1009, 108 S.Ct. 1737, 100 L.Ed.2d 200 (1988); United States v. Brantley, 733 F.2d 1429, 1436 (11th Cir.1984), cert. denied, 470 U.S. 1006, 105 S.Ct. 1362, 84 L.Ed.2d 383 (1985). 37 Moreover, the double jeopardy clause bars a prosecution under section 848 where the predicate felony violation was a [ ] conspiracy and the section 848 prosecution is based on the 'same criminal agreement.'  United States v. Boldin, 772 F.2d 719, 730 (11th Cir.1985), cert. denied, 475 U.S. 1048, 106 S.Ct. 1269, 89 L.Ed.2d 577 (1986) (decided after Garrett ) (emphasis added); Stricklin, 591 F.2d at 1123. In other words, [a]ny section 846 conspiracy for which [defendant] was subject to prior jeopardy cannot be used by the government in [a later] prosecution to satisfy the collaboration requirement of section 848. Boldin, 772 F.2d at 731. If the conspiracy serves as the predicate act for the CCE conviction and both crimes are based upon the same criminal agreement, the conspiracy merges into the CCE conviction. United States v. Jones, 918 F.2d 909, 910 (11th Cir.1990) (citing Jeffers and Boldin); see also Brantley, 733 F.2d at 1436. Consequently, in a situation where a defendant is simultaneously tried and convicted of CCE and conspiracy to import, the conspiracy conviction and sentence must be vacated. Jones, 918 F.2d at 911; Brantley, 733 F.2d at 1436. 38