Court Opinion

ID: 9473711
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 04:37:42.157829+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:43:41.902121
License: Public Domain

BAILEY ALDRICH, Senior Circuit Judge
(concurring).
Because of our minimal appellate jurisdiction over sentencing, I do not dissent in this case, but I disassociate myself vigorously from the final sentence of the court’s opinion. In the first place, it is not apposite. Defendants were local police officers, not professional thieves who could be thought to have come to Puerto Rico to commit crimes because of its supposed easy-going sentencing practices. But far more important, while there may be a superficial appeal in the thought, “go take your business elsewhere,” it is entirely contrary to the concept of federalism. Sentencing is to reduce crime, not to transfer it to your neighbors. That federal judges, countrywide, should try to outbid each other in high sentencing is [not only] not a pretty picture. Moreover, it is contrary to all principles of criminal sentencing, whether addressed to the crime, or to the individual.
Disparate sentencing is one of our great problems. To quote just a smattering from the American Bar Association, Standards of Criminal Justice, Chapter III,
One of the “targets of recent critiscism” of sentencing is “the pervasiveness of sentencing disparities among the similarly situated.” (P. 5)
“[EJ quality among the similarly situated is basic to the appearance of justice, and compelling reasons should therefore exist before disparate treatment of the equally blameworthy is tolerated. (P. 8)
“Empirical evidence also suggests that sentencing disparities are among the leading perceived grievances of prisoners and succeed in deepening their alienation from society.” (P. 224).
I hope no future district court judge will think this decision speaks for the court as a whole.