Opinion ID: 36097
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Bass I Unbundled Bass’s Sentencing Package

Text: In denying Bass’s request for a new sentencing hearing, the district court dutifully followed our instruction “to reduce his total assessment to $600 for the remaining 14 counts for which Bass’s convictions stand.”8 Given our express statement in Bass I that “Bass’s total time of incarceration will not be shortened as a result of our decision today to vacate his CCE conviction,”9 the district court understandably concluded that it was without authority to reconsider any other aspect of Bass’s punishment. 6 See infra note 15 and accompanying text. 7 See United States v. Phipps, 368 F.3d 505, 510 (5th Cir. 2004). 8 310 F.3d at 330. 9 Id. 4 Nevertheless, Bass is correct that, in calculating the applicable guideline range, the probation officer had grouped all 15 counts and applied the offense level for the most serious count, which was the CCE charge. Pursuant to U.S.S.G. § 2D1.5 (the CCE guideline), four levels were added to the offense level governing the underlying drug offenses under U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1, resulting in a total offense level of 42. This score, combined with Bass’s criminal history category of I, resulted in a guideline sentencing range of 360 months to life imprisonment. In light of our vacature of the CCE conviction, though, § 2D1.5 was no longer applicable. Thus, Bass’s total offense level under § 2D1.1 would only have been a 38 which, when combined with his criminal history category, would have yielded a guideline sentencing range of 235 to 293 months’ imprisonment.10 We failed to recognize this in rendering our decision in Bass I. The mandate rule requires a lower court to “implement both the letter and the spirit of the appellate court’s mandate and ... not disregard the explicit directives of that court.”11 We cannot fault the district court for its post-remand ruling, but the mandate rule is a corollary to the law of the case doctrine and is therefore not 10 See U.S.S.G., Chap. 5, Sentencing Table. 11 United States v. Lee, 358 F.3d 315, 321 (5th Cir. 2004) (quoting United States v. Matthews, 312 F.3d 652, 657 (5th Cir. 2002)). 5 “inviolate.”12 If our ruling from a prior appeal in the same case is “clearly erroneous and would work a manifest injustice,” the district court on remand may exceed our mandate.13 The punishment imposed by the district court was part of an integrated “sentencing package,”14 a consideration overlooked in Bass I: When a defendant is convicted of more than one count of a multicount indictment, the district court is likely to fashion a sentencing package in which sentences on individual counts are interdependent. When, on appeal, one or more counts of a multicount conviction are reversed and one or more counts are affirmed, the result is an “unbundled” sentencing package. Because the sentences are interdependent, the reversal of convictions underlying some, but not all, of the sentences renders the sentencing package ineffective in carrying out the district court’s sentencing intent as to any one of the sentences on the affirmed convictions.15 We, therefore, “said too much” in our Bass I opinion about the net effect of our vacature of Bass’s CCE conviction on his sentence. 12 See id. at 320. 13 Matthews, 312 F.3d at 657. 14 United States v. Campbell, 106 F.3d 64, 68 (5th Cir. 1997). See U.S.S.G. § 5G1.2 (directing the court to sentence multiple counts of conviction as a single interdependent package, and to use consecutive as well as concurrent sentencing to construct a combined sentence equal to the total punishment). 15 United States v. Shue, 825 F.2d 1111, 1114 (7th Cir. 1987). Although our circuit has not expressly used the term “unbundled,” it is a metaphor widely used among the circuit courts. See, e.g., United States v. Smith, 115 F.3d 241, 245 n.4 (4th Cir. 1997); United States v. Evans, 314 F.3d 329, 332 (8th Cir. 2002); United States v. Ruiz-Alvarez, 211 F.3d 1181, 1184 (9th Cir. 2000); United States v. Hicks, 146 F.3d 1198, 1202 (10th Cir. 1998); United States v. Watkins, 147 F.3d 1294, 1297 (11th Cir. 1998). 6 Our failure to acknowledge this principle was error, and because our vacature of Bass’s CCE conviction could result in a reduced total sentence for Bass, it would be unjust for Bass not to be resentenced. At resentencing, the district court may consider de novo any sentencing-related issues that arise out of our vacature of Bass’s CCE conviction.16 For example, the court may consider whether a “role in the offense” adjustment is warranted under U.S.S.G. § 3B1.1.17