Opinion ID: 531018
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The effect of quantity

Text: 48 Robles claims he was convicted of distributing one kilogram of cocaine, and that prior to the enactment of the 1986 amendments, section 841(a) offenses involving a kilogram or more of cocaine were not punishable by the imposition of a special parole term. Since he committed his offense prior to the effective date of the new supervised release term requirement, he argues, this pre-October 1986 law should have governed the penalty in his case. Therefore, he concludes, the decision of the district court to impose special parole upon him was error. For support, Robles relies on our decision in United States v. De Los Reyes, supra. 49 The defendant in De Los Reyes had pleaded guilty to possessing less than fifty kilograms of marihuana, a crime punishable by section 841(b)(1)(C) at the time of the offense (October 18, 1986), which expressly provided for special parole terms, 8 and thus that case refrained from deciding the issue for which Robles cites it. The Court did, however, discuss the ambiguity as to the law that would be applicable to offenses punishable pursuant to the pre-October 27, 1986 section 841(b)(1)(A), but that had occurred during the gap period. It suggested two ways this statutory ambiguity might be resolved: (1) by simply substituting the phrase special parole term for term of supervised release in the new section 841(b) for these October 1986-November 1987 gap cases, or (2) by applying the law in effect just prior to the enactment of the 1986 amendments on the parole issue--in other words, by allowing special parole for all cases except those that would have fallen within the ambit of pre-October 17, 1986 section 841(b)(1)(A), which had omitted the special parole requirement. The De Los Reyes Court expressly refrained from deciding which approach should be applied until presented with a case in which the issue was properly before it. United States v. De Los Reyes, 842 F.2d at 758 n. 3. 50 Robles argues that because his crime falls within the gap period and would have fallen within the ambit of pre-October 1986 section 841(b)(1)(A), we must now decide the issue left open in De Los Reyes, that is, whether to apply prior (viz., pre-October 1986) law respecting special parole or to simply read special parole term for term of supervised release in section 841(b) for offenses committed during the October 1986-November 1987 gap. He urges the court to apply prior law, which he asserts will deny the district court authority to impose a special parole term on him. 51 Robles incorrectly assumes, however, that pre-October 1986 law did not authorize a special parole term for his distribution count. He erroneously asserts that he was convicted of distribution of one kilogram of cocaine. Count two of the indictment alleged distribution of approximately one kilogram of cocaine, but the undisputed evidence at trial establishes that the quantity of cocaine actually delivered to Agent Gonzalez amounted only to 996 grams, some four grams short of a kilogram. 9 Thus, the penalty provision of section 841(b) applicable to Robles' case was section 841(b)(1)(B), which prescribes penalties for distributing greater than five hundred grams. Prior to the 1986 amendments, the applicable penalty provision would have been the old section 841(b)(1)(B), which prescribed penalties for, inter alia, distributing less than a kilogram of cocaine. See Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, Pub.L. 91-513, Sec. 401(b)(1)(A), 84 Stat. 1236, 1260, as amended by Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, Pub.L. No. 98-473, Sec. 502, 98 Stat. 1837, 2068. As noted above, that section did require the imposition of a special parole term of not less than three years in addition to the term of imprisonment. Id. Thus, whichever of the approaches suggested by the De Los Reyes Court were applied, the district court would have been required to impose a special parole term for Robles' second count. 52