Opinion ID: 200045
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Apprendi Error.

Text: 27 The government concedes that the petitioner's case suffers from a strain of Apprendi error. In hindsight, the trial court should have asked the jury to determine, beyond a reasonable doubt, whether the underlying conspiracy involved a drug quantity sufficient to trigger a sentence higher than the five-year default statutory maximum. See United States v. Barnes, 244 F.3d 172, 177-78 (1st Cir.) (explaining the genesis of the default statutory maximum in an analogous context), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 122 S.Ct. 379, 151 L.Ed.2d 289 (2001); see also 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(D) (setting five-year maximum for a conspiracy involving fewer than fifty marijuana plants). Absent such a determination, the sentence imposed by the district court — ten years and one month — is open to question. 28 The petitioner tries to define the district court's error more broadly. He asserts that the court transgressed Apprendi by determining the drug quantity that was reasonably foreseeable to him rather than tendering that question to the jury. In other words, he claims that the court should have submitted to the jurors not only the question of drug quantity vis-à-vis the conspiracy but also the individualized question of what drug quantity was attributable to him as a coconspirator. We do not agree: the Apprendi error is far narrower in scope than the petitioner suggests. 29 In Edwards v. United States, 523 U.S. 511, 118 S.Ct. 1475, 140 L.Ed.2d 703 (1998), the Supreme Court held that, as long as (1) the jury finds beyond a reasonable doubt that a defendant participated in a conspiracy, and (2) the Court sentences him within the statutory maximum applicable to that conspiracy, the court may determine both the amount and the kind of `controlled substances' for which [the] defendant should be held accountable — and then ... impose a sentence that varies depending upon amount and kind. Id. at 513-14, 118 S.Ct. 1475. Apprendi, decided two years later, did not purport to overrule Edwards, and the two decisions are easily harmonized: in a drug conspiracy case, the jury should determine the existence vel non of the conspiracy as well as any facts about the conspiracy that will increase the possible penalty for the crime of conviction beyond the default statutory maximum; 4 and the judge should determine, at sentencing, the particulars regarding the involvement of each participant in the conspiracy. See Edwards, 523 U.S. at 514, 118 S.Ct. 1475. This means that once the jury has determined that the conspiracy involved a type and quantity of drugs sufficient to justify a sentence above the default statutory maximum and has found a particular defendant guilty of participation in the conspiracy, the judge lawfully may determine the drug quantity attributable to that defendant and sentence him accordingly (so long as the sentence falls within the statutory maximum made applicable by the jury's conspiracy-wide drug quantity determination). Cf. United States v. Eirby, 262 F.3d 31, 37 (1st Cir. 2001) (holding, post- Apprendi, that when a sentence falls within the statutory maximum, judicial determination of drug quantity under a preponderance-of-the-evidence standard remains a viable option). The rule, then, is that the government need only allege and prove to the jury the bare facts necessary to increase the statutory sentencing maximum for the conspiracy as a whole (e.g., that the conspiracy involved at least 1,000 marijuana plants). See United States v. Patterson, 292 F.3d 615, 623 (9th Cir.2002) (upholding conviction based on jury finding that the defendant was guilty of manufacturing 100 or more plants, although the jury was not instructed to determine the exact amount). 30 The decisions cited by the petitioner in support of a contrary rule do not withstand scrutiny. He relies chiefly on United States v. Nordby, 225 F.3d 1053 (9th Cir.2000), but no extended discussion of that decision is warranted. It suffices to say that the Ninth Circuit severely limited Nordby 's reach in United States v. Buckland, 289 F.3d 558, 567-68 (9th Cir.2002) (en banc), and then issued a decision in Patterson that coheres with the decision we reach today. See Patterson, 292 F.3d at 623. 31 Our recent opinion in United States v. Bailey, 270 F.3d 83 (1st Cir.2001), does not advance the petitioner's position. There, the defendant argued that the jury — and not the judge — should have decided the quantity of drugs attributed to him at sentencing. Id. at 85-86. We agreed that, because the defendant had been sentenced to a term above the default statutory maximum, an Apprendi error had occurred. Id. at 89. We then considered whether the error was harmless and concluded that it was not; the evidence needed to boost the statutory maximum to the next level was sketchy and permitted a reasonable factfinder to decide the drug quantity issue either way. Id. at 89-90. Consequently, we vacated the sentence and remanded for resentencing. Id. at 90. The decisive factor in Bailey, however, was the government's inability to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the conspiracy involved the requisite drug quantity necessary to elevate the applicable statutory maximum to the next level. That weakness is not present here. See infra Part III(B). 32 To summarize, we conclude that an Apprendi error occurred, but that the trial court's determination that the petitioner reasonably could have foreseen that the conspiracy would encompass at least 26,400 marijuana plants should not be regarded as part and parcel of that error. See Edwards, 523 U.S. at 513-14, 118 S.Ct. 1475. Instead, the Apprendi error relates to the failure to have the jury determine the number of plants involved in the conspiracy. It is to the effect of that error that we now turn.