Court Opinion

ID: 993238
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2013-07-04 00:04:34.051432+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:10:22.043463
License: Public Domain

UNPUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.                                                                    No. 96-4597

ROCKY WOOD,
Defendant-Appellant.

Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Virginia, at Newport News.
J. Calvitt Clarke, Jr., Senior District Judge.
(CR-91-59)

Submitted: September 29, 1997

Decided: October 7, 1997

Before HALL and MOTZ, Circuit Judges, and
MICHAEL, Senior United States District Judge for the
Western District of Virginia, sitting by designation.

_________________________________________________________________

Vacated by unpublished per curiam opinion.

_________________________________________________________________

COUNSEL

Hunt L. Charach, Federal Public Defender, Charleston, West Vir-
ginia, for Appellant. Helen F. Fahey, United States Attorney, Kevin
M. Comstock, Assistant United States Attorney, Norfolk, Virginia,
for Appellee.

_________________________________________________________________
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit. See
Local Rule 36(c).

_________________________________________________________________

OPINION

PER CURIAM:

Rocky Wood appeals the district court's revocation of supervised
release and the imposition of a twenty-four month term of imprison-
ment. We vacate the sentence.

The government concedes that the district court was without
authority to impose the 1991 and 1994 revocation sentences. See
United States v. Alli, 929 F.2d 995, 998 (4th Cir. 1991) ("[F]ollowing
revocation of probation, the court is limited to a sentence within the
guidelines available at the time of the original sentence"), and United
States v. Cooper, 962 F.2d 339, 340 (4th Cir. 1992) ("[U]pon revok-
ing a previously imposed term of supervised release,[a court] has no
authority to impose another term of supervised release but may only
order reincarceration"). The government's only argument is that
Wood has waived or forfeited his right to raise the illegality of the
earlier sentences for the first time in the appeal of the 1996 sentence.
We reject the argument for a number of reasons.

The errors in the 1991 and 1994 revocation sentences are clear, and
the government as much as concedes that the cumulative effect of the
three erroneous sentences amounts to error in the current sentence that
is "plain." See United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 732-33 (1993).
Moreover, it is clear that Wood could have attacked the legality of all
of the sentences in a habeas corpus proceeding at any time he
remained under supervision as a result of the 1990 conviction. See
United States v. Robinson, 106 F.3d 610 (4th Cir. 1997) (granting a
writ of habeas corpus in a case in which special parole had been reim-
posed after each of four revocations, although no direct appeal had
been taken from any of these sentences). The closer questions are
whether the error is prejudicial and, if so, whether we should exercise
our discretionary authority to correct it. See id. at 735-36. We answer
both in the affirmative.

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When Wood was initially sentenced in 1990, his Guidelines range
was 8-14 months. Now, in 1997, the sentence on appeal extends the
period of supervision over Wood to a point almost two years beyond
the date at which he would have been free of any supervision had the
district court proceeded correctly from the beginning, operated under
no misapprehension as to the sentencing options available at each
juncture, and imposed the maximum available sentences in 1991 and
1994. Thus, we readily find prejudicial error that "seriously affect[s]
the fairness" of the sentencing process. Id. at 736. Accordingly, the
sentence is vacated.

VACATED

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