Court Opinion

ID: 9559953
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 17:39:17.05396+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:11:55.011405
License: Public Domain

BOGGS, Chief Judge,
dissenting.
This case represents essentially a judgr ment call under the rather unclear standard of “reasonableness” that we have been given by the Supreme Court in the wake of Rita, Kimbrough, and Gall. Although I recognize that it is a close question, I am persuaded by the emphasis on the discretion of district courts in the recent Supreme Court cases that the sentence here should be affirmed. See United States v. Vonner, 516 F.3d 382, 392 (6th Cir.2008) (en banc) (affirming sentence and noting that “the central lesson [of] these decisions [is] that district courts ... de*531serve the benefit of the doubt when we review their sentences and the reasons given for them.”)- I therefore respectfully dissent.
I do not read the district court’s statement here as saying that the “career offender” guidelines should never be applied to result in a sentence that is in fact within those guidelines. Although the district judge was somewhat cursory in stating, as our court summarizes at page 5, that the chosen sentence of 150 months of imprisonment would “provide[] a just punishment .... appropriately fit[ ] this defendant and his offense ... [and] provide[ ] an adequate public deterrence,” I believe enough was said to indicate that the court exercised, and did not abuse, its discretion.
In logic, I find it difficult to express a way in which a judge can adequately say that a sentence is “too much” or “too little” in any form of words. As I read the trial transcript, the district judge obviously knew the characteristics of the defendant before him, considered the advice of the guidelines, and decided to reject it, invoking the language of § 3553(a) as to the factors that he considered.
While a more extensive, fact-laden, or lyrical exegesis might have been possible or preferable, what I take from the record is that the judge did consider thoughtfully the facts of this case and did enough that he did not abuse his discretion.