Court Opinion

ID: 9498007
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 17:05:30.214745+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:58:33.139260
License: Public Domain

EMILIO M. GARZA, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
I concur in the judgment and the excellent opinion of Judge Benavides except for footnote 2. Although, I agree with footnote 2 that Booker did not invalidate the Guidelines in their entirety and that district courts must still “consider” the Guidelines when sentencing defendants, I cannot agree that this “indicates that Booker did not alter the standard of review we must employ when reviewing a court’s interpretation and application of the Guidelines.” For this proposition the majority cites dicta from United States v. Villegas, 404 F.3d 355 (5th Cir.2005) (a plain error case that did not apply proffered standard of review). See also Cacho-Bonilla, 404 F.3d at 91-92 (citing pre-Booker case law and stating, without discussion, that it reviews questions of law under the Guidelines de novo); Doe, 398 F.3d at 1257 (same); Hazelwood, 398 F.3d at 801 (same); and Hughes, 401 F.3d at 557 (same).1 I believe footnote 2 and Villegas’s dicta contravene the clear language in Booker.
. Nothing in Booker suggests a de novo review. Rather, Booker instructs courts of appeals to “review sentencing decisions for unreasonableness.” Booker, 125 S.Ct. at 767 (emphasis added). Significantly, Booker severed and excised § 3742(e), “the provision ... [requiring] de novo review of departures from the applicable Guidelines range.” Id. at 763. Thus, I believe we review sentencing decisions for unreasonableness regardless of whether the district court applies the Guidelines and, in cases where the, district court does apply the Guidelines, regardless of whether it does so correctly.
Villegas and thus the majority draw support for continued de novo/clearly erroneous review in part from 18 U.S.C. § 3742(f)(1). This reliance is misplaced. Section 3742(f)(1), while not expressly excised, must now be read in light of the excised § 3742(e), the provision that sets forth standards of review on appeal, including de novo review of departures from the applicable Guideline range. Having excised § 3742(e), we no longer review sentences for “violation of law” and “incorrect application,” 18 U.S.C. § 3742(e)(1), (2), but rather for unreasonableness. Booker, 125 S.Ct. at 767. As Justice Scalia correctly wrote, “[i]t is incomprehensible how or why [§ 3742(f)(1)] can be combined with an obligation upon the appellate court to conduct its own independent evaluation of the ‘reasonableness’ of a sentence.” Booker, 125 S.Ct. at 791, n. 6 (Scalia, J., dissenting). In his majority opinion, Justice Breyer responds to Justice Scalia’s *275mystification by acknowledging that “some provisions [of the Guidelines] will apply differently from the way Congress had originally expected.” Id. at 767. The continuing validity of § 3742(f)(1) is in serious doubt. I cannot agree, therefore, that § 3742(f)(1) lends force to a de novo standard of review.
By replacing Booker's unreasonableness standard of review with a de novo review, the court is essentially reimposing 18 U.S.C. § 3553(b)(1), the severed provision that made the Guidelines mandatory. Booker recognizes that de novo review is used in conjunction with mandatory systems. Booker states, “[i]n 2003, Congress modified the pre-existing text, adding a de novo standard of review for departures and inserting cross-references to § 3553(b)(1). In light of today’s holding, the reasons for these revisions to make Guidelines sentencing even more mandatory than it had been have ceased to be relevant.” Booker, 125 S.Ct. at 765 (citation omitted). Following Booker’s admonition, de novo review is inconsistent with an advisory system.
Here, the district court properly interpreted and applied the Guidelines, resulting in a reasonable sentence. United States v. Mares, 402 F.3d at 519-20 (5th Cir.2005) (“Given the deference due the sentencing judge’s discretion under the Booker/Fanfan regime, it will be rare for a reviewing court to say ... a sentence [in which the district court properly applied the Guidelines] is ‘unreasonable.’ ”). This statement from Mares is significant, for it explicitly recognizes the proper standard of review. Footnote 2 and the dicta in Villegas, however, suggest that the improper application makes the sentence unreasonable per se. I agree that to ascertain whether the Guidelines have been applied properly, a preliminary step in our review, requires de novo review of legal issues and clearly erroneous review of factual issues. However, any determination that either or both determinations are error does not end the inquiry as it did pre-Booker. The court must take the additional step to determine whether the sentence decision is unreasonable in light of the factors listed in § 3553(a). Booker, 125 S.Ct. at 766 (“Section 3553(a) remains in effect, and sets forth numerous factors that guide sentencing. Those factors in turn will guide appellate courts, as they have in the past, in determining whether a sentence is unreasonable.”). In reviewing for reasonableness, we must remember that “the most important point is that an unreasonable application of federal law is different from an incorrect application of federal law.” Williams v. Taylor, 529 U.S. 362, 410, 120 S.Ct. 1495, 146 L.Ed.2d 389 (2000) (discussing unreasonable applications under AEDPA) (emphasis in original). Here, the district court’s sentence was a correct application of the advisory Guidelines, and I agree that we should hold Creech’s sentence reasonable. Thus, I concur in the judgment and in most of the opinion except for this most important, but erroneous, footnote.

. These cases, like the majority, seem to find it more comfortable to return to the default position of appellate review; namely, de novo review for legal issues and clearly erroneous review for factual issues. See, e.g., Hazelwood, 398 F.3d at 801 ("district courts are required by statute to consult [the Guidelines], and since a district court's misinterpretation of the Guidelines effectively means that it has not properly consulted the Guidelines, we hold that it was error for the district court to apply the threat of death enhancement in this case") (emphasis in original). Clearly, this position makes perfect sense in a mandatory scheme. It is, however, contrary to an advisory one. The majority, like the court in Hazelwood, equates "misinterpretation of the guidelines” with “not properly consulted the guidelines,” a total misreading of Booker.