Court Opinion

ID: 9439910
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 06:53:24.738592+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:26:42.168682
License: Public Domain

STAHL, Circuit Judge
(concurring in part and dissenting in part).
With all due respect, I disagree with my colleagues that the phrase “maximum term authorized” in 28 U.S.C. § 994(h) supports more than one plausible interpretation. In endeavoring to set forth an analytically sound basis for their decision, my colleagues find ambiguity where none exists. After careful review, I believe that, when applied to defendants subject to special enhanced penalty provisions, the only plausible interpretation of the phrase “maximum term authorized” is the enhanced maximum punishment. Furthermore, once the phrase “maximum term authorized” is correctly read as referring in these instances to the enhanced statutory maximum, I think it clear that the sentencing scheme propounded by Amendment 506 does not satisfy Congress’s clear command to sentence career offenders at or near that maximum. Accordingly, I dissent with respect to parts I-IV.
I.
In reaching their conclusion, my colleagues engage a full-blown Chevron inquiry twice, carefully analyzing the phrases “maximum term authorized,” “categories of defendants” and “at or near.”16 On the first pass, they find, depending on the meaning ascribed to the term “categories,” that the phrase “maximum term authorized” is susceptible to two different plausible interpretations. If the term “categories” is defined so that it recognizes the distinctions between defendants subject to special enhanced penalties and those who are not, then the phrase “maximum term authorized” must mean the enhanced statutory maximum when referring to the former and the unenhanced statutory maximum when referring to the latter. They define this as the enhanced statutory maximum (“ESM”) interpretation. On the other hand, my colleagues contend, that if the term “categories” is read more broadly such that it *1415fails to recognize these distinctions, then the phrase “maximum term authorized” must mean in all cases the unenhanced statutory maximum because that is the highest possible sentence applicable to all defendants in the category. They define this as the unen-hanced statutory maximum (“USM”) interpretation. My colleagues then conclude that, because both interpretations are plausible, Congress has not spoken clearly or without ambiguity on the issue and, therefore, we should defer to the Commission’s choice between the two. I disagree with this analysis because I do not believe that the USM interpretation is a plausible reading of the phrase “maximum term authorized.”
Principally, I find the USM interpretation inherently implausible because it effectively nullifies the criminal history enhancements carefully enacted in statutes like 21 U.S.C. § 841. These statutes, to which Congress expressly referred in the text of § 994(h), provide an intricate web of enhanced penalties applicable to defendants who are repeat offenders or whose offenses resulted in death or serious bodily injury. The USM interpretation, however, completely disregards these enhanced penalties because, under that interpretation, all defendants must be sentenced at or near the unenhanced maximum whether or not the enhanced penalties apply. Recognizing that Congress specifically referred to these statutes in the text of § 994(h), it seems absurd to suppose that Congress did not intend to preclude this result. A plausible reading of a statute would not render meaningless complete sections of other statutes to which it refers.17
The reasoning of the District of Columbia Circuit in United States v. Garrett, 959 F.2d 1005, 1010-11 (D.C.Cir.1992), firmly supports this analysis. In Garrett, the court rejected the argument that the guideline phrase “Offense Statutory Maximum” should be read to refer to the unenhanced statutory maximum. Id. The court explained that such an interpretation (which I note necessarily requires interpreting the phrase “maximum term authorized” in § 994(h) to mean the unen-hanced maximum) would “thwart congressional intent.” Id. at 1011. The court reasoned that to conclude that “Congress ... intended to erase the statutory distinctions among offenders based either on their past actions or on the circumstances of the offense, distinctions carefully set forth in subsection 841(b)(1)(B) would be senseless.” Id. (emphasis added). While it is true that Garrett involved only the interpretation of “Offense Statutory Maximum” and did not directly consider the statutory language, I think its analysis is informative and applies with equal force to the question at hand. Indeed, prior to the promulgation of Amendment 506, the Commission defined the guideline phrase “Offense Statutory Maximum” as equivalent to the statutory phrase “maximum term authorized.” See U.S.S.G. § 4B1.1, comment, (n. 2) (Nov. 1993).18
Furthermore, I believe the legislative history strongly suggests that Congress intended “maximum term authorized” to refer, in appropriate circumstances, to the enhanced maximum penalty. The Senate Judiciary Committee noted that § 994(h) was enacted to replace the sentencing provisions for “dangerous special offenders” and “dangerous special drug offenders” provided respectively by 18 U.S.C. § 3575 (repealed 1984) and 21 U.S.C. § 849 (repealed 1984). See S.Rep. 225, 98th Cong.2d Sess. 120 (1984), reprinted in 1984 U.S.C.C.A.N. 3182, 3303. These two provisions enabled courts to sentence “dangerous” defendants to terms “of imprisonment longer than that which would ordinarily be provided.” S.Rep. 225 at 117, reprinted in 1984 U.S.C.C.A.N. at 3300; see United *1416States v. Thornley, 733 F.2d 970, 972 (1st Cir.1984) (affirming “dangerous special offender” sentence that exceeded the maximum prescribed sentence for the underlying offense). A defendant was subject to sentencing under these provisions upon, inter alia, a finding of dangerousness. Specifically, a defendant was considered dangerous if a term of imprisonment “longer than the maximum provided in the statute defining the [underlying] felony ‘[was] required for the protection of the public.’ ” S.Rep. 225 at 117, reprinted in 1984 U.S.C.C.A.N. at 3300 (quoting 18 U.S.C. § 3575(f) and 21 U.S.C. § 849(f)) (emphasis added). As this definition makes clear, the purpose of these special offender statutes was to provide, in appropriate circumstances, enhanced punishment beyond that otherwise provided in the underlying statute. See, e.g., United States v. Sutton, 415 F.Supp. 1323, 1324 (D.D.C.1976). This is exactly the same rationale underlying the enhanced penalty provisions found in statutes like 21 U.S.C. § 841. Because Congress intended § 994(h) to address these “same considerations,” see S.Rep. 225 at 120, reprinted in 1984 U.S.C.C.A.N. at 3303, it seems reasonable to conclude that Congress intended “maximum term authorized” to mean the enhanced statutory maximum.19
In sum, because the USM interpretation would render ineffective the enhanced penalties provided in statutes like 21 U.S.C. § 841 and because the legislative history strongly suggests that Congress intended the phrase “maximum term authorized” to mean the enhanced statutory maximum, I believe deferring to the Commission’s interpretation of the phrase “maximum term authorized” in § 994(h) is inappropriate.
In passing, I further note that, in large part, my colleagues’ argument turns on their analysis of the term “categories” found in § 994(h). Indeed, they can only import ambiguity into the narrow phrase “maximum term authorized,” by first deeming the expression “categories of defendants” fatally imprecise. Moreover, they justify the USM interpretation by reasoning that any other interpretation would write off “the word ‘categories’ as some sort of linguistic accident or awkward locution.”
With all due respect, I find the phrase “categories of defendants” much less troubling. First, I note that “categories” is inherently a general, imprecise term, whereas I believe “maximum” is naturally a specific, precise one. Hence, I find it eminently more plausible, in this context, to read the phrase “categories of defendants” narrowly — as referring to classes of defendants subject to specific enhanced penalties — than it is to read the phrase “maximum term authorized” broadly — as referring to, with respect to certain defendants, something less than the maximum (i.e., under the USM interpretation, some defendants who are subject to enhanced penalties will be sentenced at or near the unenhanced maximum, which, with respect to those defendants, is not the authorized statutory maximum).
Second, I do indeed believe that the phrase “categories of defendants” is perhaps better understood, to use my colleagues’ phraseology, as a “linguistic accident or an awkward locution.” As I note infra, at 1418-19, Congress added § 994(h) to the enabling legislation late in the drafting process. The subsection derives from a sentencing provision attached to other legislation that directed judges to sentence career criminals to the maximum possible penalty. In attaching it to the enabling legislation, Congress rewrote the provision borrowing the phrase “categories of defendants” and other language from the already-existing § 994(i).20
*1417In contrast with § 994(h), § 994(i)’s usage of the phrase “categories of defendants” is sensible in light of that subsection’s structure. First, § 994(i) broadly instructs the Commission to assure that various “categories of defendants” shall receive “substantial” sentences, and then it proceeds to list five different “categories” of defendants to which the instruction applies. In contrast, § 994(h)’s usage of the term “categories” is peculiar. See, supra, note 16. First, § 994(h)’s sentencing command (ie., “at or near the maximum term authorized”) is more precise than § 994(i)’s broad command (ie., “substantial”), and, second, its structure is different: it does not sequentially enumerate separate categories of defendants to which the command applies. Hence, I believe the parallel language in the two subsections is best understood as principally revealing Congress’s intent that the two subsections should be read together. In other words, by using the parallel language, Congress awkwardly expressed its intent that § 994(h) should be read as carving out a narrow subset of criminals, otherwise subject to the broader § 994(i), that should be sentenced, not just substantially, but at or near the maximum penalty possible.
In any event, because I believe that the phrase “maximum term authorized” cannot plausibly be interpreted to mean the unen-hanced maximum, I likewise believe that “categories of defendants” must be read narrowly.
II.
Deciding that the phrase “maximum term authorized” means, in the appropriate circumstances, the enhanced statutory maximum does not end the analysis. It is still necessary to consider whether the sentencing scheme propounded by Amendment 506 nonetheless satisfies Congress’s directive to sentence career offenders “at or near” the maximum.21
The defendants contend that, when read in context, § 994(h)’s “at or near” directive is unclear and ambiguous, see United States v. Fountain, 885 F.Supp. 185, 188 (N.D.Iowa 1995), and, accordingly, this court should defer to the Commission’s reasonable interpretation. Moreover, the defendants argue that § 994(h) is only one of many congressional directives which the Commission had the responsibility and duty to harmonize in promulgating the sentencing guidelines. Specifically, the defendants note that one of the main purposes of the Sentencing Commission is to reduce “unwarranted disparities” in sentencing and, thus, assure that individuals who have committed similar acts receive similar sentences. See 28 U.S.C. 991(b)(1)(B). They maintain that Amendment 506 achieves this goal because it eliminates “unwarranted” disparity resulting from exercise of unchecked prosecutorial discretion in deciding whether or not to seek the enhanced penalties provided in statutes like § 841.
In response, the government contends that Amendment 506 is invalid because it is inconsistent with the plain language of 28 U.S.C. § 994(h). The government argues that the sentencing ranges resulting from application of the amendment do not satisfy § 994(h)’s clear command that career offenders should *1418be sentenced “at or near” the maximum term authorized. I agree with the government.
First, in analyzing 28 U.S.C. § 994(h), I disagree with the defendants that its command that career offenders should receive sentences “at or near” the statutory maximum is unclear and ambiguous. Though Congress undoubtedly could have been more precise in limiting the Commission’s discretion in this context, the phrase “at or near” has a fairly unambiguous and narrow ordinary meaning. Common definitions of the term “near” specify that an object (or limit) is “near” another if it is “not a far distance] from” or “close to” the other object (or limit). Webster’s Third New International Dictionary (1986); accord The American Heritage Dictionary (2d College Ed.1985) (defining “near” as “To, at, or within a short distance or interval in space or time.”). The Commission’s attempt to implement the “at or near” directive (as ultimately expressed in Amendment 506), however, does not satisfy this standard. For example, under Amendment 506, a defendant who qualifies as a Career Offender and whose punishment has been enhanced pursuant to 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(C) to a maximum possible penalty of thirty years is assigned a base sentencing range of only 210 to 262 months. Such a range is but 58.3 to 72.78 percent of the maximum possible term of thirty years (360 months). Notwithstanding a certain amount of ambiguity in the term “near” at the margins, I think it plainly obvious that a guideline interpretation that, even before any adjustment for acceptance of responsibility, prescribes such a sentencing range does not assure that defendants will be sentenced “at or near” the maximum term authorized.
Moreover, a comparison of § 994(h) with § 994(i) makes clear beyond doubt that Congress intended the language “at or near” to limit narrowly the Commission’s discretion to prescribe sentencing ranges for career offenders. Subsection 994(i), which was added to the enabling legislation in the Senate prior to the addition of § 994(h),22 provides that the “Commission shall assure that the guidelines specify a sentence to a substantial term of imprisonment” for habitual offenders, racketeers, defendants who commit crimes while released on bail, and felony drug offenders. 28 U.S.C. § 994(i) (emphasis added).23 Subsection 994(i) applies to a broad class of defendants including all defendants subject to § 994(h). Id. § 994(i)(l) (subsection applies, inter alia, to all defendants who have “a history of two or more prior Federal, State, or local felony convictions for offenses committed on different occasions”). Subsection 994(h), on the other hand, applies to a narrower subset of defendants that Congress felt must be punished even more stringently. In offering the original version of § 994(h), Senator Kennedy argued that the amendment was needed because “Career criminals must be put on notice that their chronic violence will be punished by maximum prison sentences for their offenses, without parole.” 24 128 Cong.Rec. 26,518 (1982) (emphasis added). By adding § 994(h), Congress sought to indicate that certain career offenders, with serious criminal histories, should receive not simply a “substantial term of imprisonment” as prescribed by 994(i), but instead a term of imprisonment that was at *1419or near the statutory maximum. Indeed, if § 994(h) is only, as the defendants argue, a general admonishment — which the Commission has broad discretion to implement — to punish career offenders more harshly than it otherwise would, the subsection adds little direction not already provided by § 994(i).25
Second, the basic structure of the enabling legislation undercuts the defendants’ argument that this court should defer to the Commission’s attempt to harmonize § 994(h) with other purportedly conflicting congressional directives. The goal of avoiding unwarranted sentencing disparities is, indeed, one of the broad underlying purposes that motivated Congress’s creation of the Sentencing Commission. See 28 U.S.C. § 991(b)(1)(B). Though Congress restated the goal as one of the directives to which the Commission should “pay particular attention” in promulgating the guidelines, see 28 U.S.C. § 994(f), it is nonetheless a general objective not specific to any particular guideline. The directive expressed by § 994(h), on the other hand, is a specific command aimed at a narrow class of defendants who are established as career criminals. In essence, § 994(h) is a specific exception, dealing with a narrow class of criminal offenders, that limits the discretion otherwise granted to the Commission to create sentencing guidelines. Therefore, while the Commission should strive to harmonize the implementation of § 994(h) with other, more general, congressional directives, to the extent that § 994(h) is in tension with them, I believe that the more general directives must bend to accommodate the more specific § 994(h), rather than the other way around.
Third, I find the defendants’ and the Commission’s disparity arguments to be largely irrelevant in this context. One of the principal justifications cited by the Commission in promulgating Amendment 506 was the perceived need to eliminate the disparity resulting from the exercise of prosecutorial discretion in deciding whether or not to seek maximum penalty enhancements. See U.S.S.G.App. C, Amendment 506, at 409 (November 1994). A review of the legislative history, however, strongly suggests that the sentencing disparity that Congress hoped to eliminate did not stem from prosecutorial discretion, but, instead, from two other sources: (1) unchecked judicial discretion in formulating sentences, and (2) the imposition of indefinite sentences subject to parole board review. See S.Rep. 225 at 38, reprinted in 1984 U.S.C.C.A.N. 3182, 3221. More specifically, it is apparent that Congress was particularly concerned by the fact that different judges — due to differing views on the purposes and goals of punishment — tended to mete out substantially different sentences to similarly situated individuals convicted of the same crimes. S.Rep. 225 at 41-46, reprinted in 1984 U.S.C.C.A.N. at 3224-29.26 It is not apparent, however, that Congress was overly (or even marginally) concerned with disparities resulting from prosecutorial discretion over charging decisions. Indeed, one of the principal criticisms expressed against adopting the enabling legislation was that sentencing guidelines would simply shift the unchecked discretion in sentencing from judges to prosecutors. See S.Rep. 225 at 63, reprinted in 1984 U.S.C.C.A.N. at 3246. Congress could hardly have been seeking to reduce sentencing disparities arising from exercise of prosecutorial discretion when the legislation under consideration would, if anything, enhance that discretion. Hence, the unwarranted disparities that Congress intended the Commission to correct were those primarily arising from judicial, not prosecuto-rial, discretion.
*1420Finally, as I have noted, § 994(h) specifically refers to the enhanced penalty statutes (e.g. 21 U.S.C. § 841) to which it applies. These statutes, in turn, expressly vest discretion in the prosecutor to seek application of the criminal history enhancements. See 21 U.S.C. § 851. Thus, it is reasonable to conclude that Congress understood that its command to sentence at or near the maximum term authorized could result in disparate sentences for similarly situated individuals depending on whether or not the prosecutor had chosen to seek the enhanced penalties provided by the underlying statutes. Thus, I think the disparities that result from an implementation of § 994(h)’s clear directive to sentence “at or near” the maximum are not the “unwarranted disparities” that Congress charged the Commission to avoid.
While I am sympathetic to the concerns noted by the Commission in promulgating Amendment 506, I nonetheless find it contrary to Congress’s clear command. In sum, I believe the amendment is inconsistent with Congress’s clearly expressed intent to limit narrowly the Commission’s discretion to establish sentencing ranges for career offenders. Accordingly, I dissent with respect to parts I-IY.

. 28 U.S.C. § 994(h) provides:
The Commission shall assure that the guidelines specify a sentence to a term of imprisonment at or near the maximum term authorized for categories of defendants in which the defendant is eighteen years old or older and (1) has been convicted of a felony that is
(A) a crime of violence; or
(B) an offense described in section 401 of the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. [§] 841), sections 1002(a), 1005, and 1009 of the Controlled Substances Import and Export Act (21 U.S.C. [§§] 952(a), 955, and 959), and the Maritime Drug Law Enforcement Act (46 U.S.C.App. [§] 1901 et seq.) and
(2) has previously been convicted of two or more prior felonies, each of which is
(A) a crime of violence; or
(B) an offense described in section 401 of the Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. [§] 841), sections 1002(a), 1005, and 1009 of the Controlled Substances Import and Export Act (21 U.S.C. [§§] 952(a), 955, and 959), and the Maritime Drug Law Enforcement Act (46 U.S.C.App. [§] 1901 et seq.)
(Emphasis added.)

. The majority contends that this argument is of little moment because a Career Offender guideline using the USM interpretation as espoused by Amendment 506 does not technically conflict with 21 U.S.C. § 841 or the other enhanced penalty statutes. While I agree that there may be no technical "conflict,” I hardly take that as evidence that Congress intended to permit the Commission in interpreting § 994(h) to nullify many of the special enhanced penalties.

. Other circuits have interpreted “Offense Statutory Maximum" similarly. United States v. Smith, 984 F.2d 1084, 1086-87 (10th Cir.) (similarly interpreting "Offense Statutory Maximum”), cert. denied, — U.S. -, 114 S.Ct. 204, 126 L.Ed.2d 161 (1993); United States v. Amis, 926 F.2d 328, 330 (3d Cir.1991) (same); United States v. Sanchez-Lopez, 879 F.2d 541, 558-560 (9th Cir.1989) (same).

. In concluding that the legislative history fails to disprove the plausibility of the unenhanced interpretation, the majority quotes the Judiciary Committee’s opinion that §§ 994(h) and 994(i) would "assure the consistent and rational implementation of the Committee’s view that substantial prison terms should be imposed on repeat violent and repeat drug offenders." S.Rep. No. 225 at 175, reprinted, in 1984 U.S.C.C.A.N. at 3358. While this statement clearly suggests that the Committee trusted the Commission more than individual judges to see that recidivist defendants were sentenced at or near the maximum term authorized, it in no way suggests that Congress intended to grant the Commission the authority to disregard the sentencing enhancements provided in 21 U.S.C. § 841 and other similar statutes.

. 28 U.S.C. 9940) provides:
*1417The Commission shall assure that the guidelines specify a sentence to a substantial term of imprisonment for categories of defendants in which the defendant—
(1) has a history of two or more prior Federal, State, or local felony convictions for offenses committed on different occasions;
(2) committed the offense as part of a pattern of criminal conduct from which the defendant derived a substantial portion of the defendant’s income;
(3) committed the offense in furtherance of a conspiracy with three or more persons engaging in a pattern of racketeering activity in which the defendant participated in a managerial or supervisory capacity;
(4) committed a crime of violence that constitutes a felony while on release pending trial, sentence or appeal from a Federal, State, or local felony for which he was ultimately convicted; or
(5) committed a felony that is set forth in section 401 or 1010 of the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970 (21 U.S.C. [§§] 841 and 960), and that involved trafficking in a substantial quantity of a controlled substance.

. I do not restate the facts or describe how the Career Offender guideline operates. For a thorough discussion of these matters see Majority Opinion at 1400-03.

.The guidelines enabling legislation, ultimately enacted in 1984, has a long and complex legislative histoiy. See generally Kate Stith & Steve Y. Koh, A Decade of Sentencing Guidelines: Revisiting the Role of the Legislature, 28 Wake Forest L.Rev. 223 (1993). Indeed, the legislation enacted in 1984 traces its roots to a sentencing reform measure originally introduced by Senator Kennedy in 1975. Id. at 225. Subsection 994(i) first appeared in a Senate version of the legislation in 1978. See S. 1437, 95th Cong., 2d Sess. § 124 (1978) (proposed tit. 28, § 994(h)); 124 Cong. Rec. 1463 (1978). The Senate subsequently added § 994(h) to a later version of the legislation in 1983. See S. 668, 98th Cong., 1st Sess. § 7 (1983 (proposed tit. 28, 994(h))); 129 cong. Rec. 22,883 (1983). Both provisions were part of the guidelines enabling legislation ultimately enacted in 1984. Pub.L. No. 98-473, § 217, 98 Stat. 2021-22 (codified as amended 28 U.S.C. §§ 994(h), (i)).

. See, supra, note 20.

. Section 994(h) derives from an amendment originally offered in 1982 by Senator Kennedy to S. 2572. See S.Rep. 225 at 175, reprinted in 1984 U.S.C.C.A.N. 3182, 3358. The 1982 amendment provided in relevant part that “A career criminal shall receive the maximum or approximately the maximum penalty for the current offense.” 128 Cong.Rec. 26, 511-12 (1982).

. The point made here, that a comparison of § 994(h) with § 994(i) clearly evinces Congress’s intent in enacting § 994(h) to narrow the Commission's discretion in sentencing career criminals, provides further support for my analysis in part I. In other words, it strikes me as quite odd to note, on the one hand, that Congress clearly directed the Commission to sentence career criminals at or near the maximum, while noting, on the other, that it gave the Commission complete discretion to define what that maximum is.

. Senator Kennedy argued that sentencing guidelines were necessary because “[fjederal criminal sentencing is a national disgrace. Under current sentencing procedures, judges mete out an unjustifiably wide range of sentences to offenders convicted of similar crimes.” 129 Cong.Rec. 1644 (1984).