Court Opinion

ID: 9575581
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:15:04.153932+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:48:34.115132
License: Public Domain

*311RENDELL, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
I agree with the majority that our narrow holding in United States v. Kikumura, 918 F.2d 1084, 1102 (3d Cir.1990), that 18 U.S.C. § 3553(b) requires a court to find sentencing facts that result in a massive upward departure by clear and convincing evidence, has no relevance in the post-Booker world given that 18 U.S.C. § 3553(b) has been excised from the Sentencing Reform Act. See United States v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220, 245, 125 S.Ct. 738, 160 L.Ed.2d 621 (2005). However, our decision in Kikumura to require a heightened standard of proof at sentencing in certain circumstances addressed a due process concern that I submit still exists. A defendant’s due process rights are implicated when facts found by a judge under a preponderance standard concerning a separate, uncharged crime result in a dramatic increase in the sentence actually imposed on the defendant for the crime of conviction, so as to suggest that the defendant is really being sentenced for the uncharged crime rather than the crime of conviction. See United States v. Grier, 475 F.3d 556, 573 (3d Cir.2007) (Rendell, J., concurring). Writing for the court in Kikumura, Judge Becker noted the increase in Kikumura’s sentence from about 30 months to 30 years, resulting from the judge’s finding that Kikumura intended to commit multiple, uncharged murders, and observed: “In this extreme context, we believe, a court cannot reflexively apply the truncated procedures that are perfectly adequate for all of the more mundane, familiar sentencing determinations.” Kikumura, 918 F.2d at 1101. This statement rings true today, wherever such an “extreme context” repeats itself. Thus, it is still possible even under the current advisory Guidelines regime for a defendant’s due process rights to be violated at sentencing when findings concerning collateral conduct become the “tail which wags the dog of the substantive offense.” Kikumura, 918 F.2d at 1100-01 (quoting McMillan v. Pennsylvania, 477 U.S. 79, 88, 106 S.Ct. 2411, 91 L.Ed.2d 67 (1986)).
Judge Rosenn, in his concurrence in United States v. Kikumura, described a set of circumstances that would raise such due process concerns:
Suppose the police apprehend a man who is driving recklessly with the intention to meet others in a robbery conspiracy. State officials only charge and convict the man with violating traffic ordinances, but at the man’s sentencing hearing argue that the underlying motive for the man’s speeding was participation in a robbery at another end of town. The sentencing judge finds the state’s evidence convincing and sentences the defendant as if he had been convicted of conspiracy to commit a robbery.
Id. at 1121 (Rosenn, J., concurring).
The transition from the mandatory Guidelines regime in place at the time that Kikumura was sentenced to the current advisory one alters, but does not eliminate, the potential for due process concerns to arise at sentencing. While, admittedly, the sentencing landscape has changed since Kikumura was decided, I do not agree that the advent of the advisory Guidelines regime is all that relevant to the due process issue before the court in Kikumura or before us here. The absence of a legally mandated relationship between a judge’s finding that the defendant committed a separate, uncharged crime and the imposition of a substantially longer term of imprisonment does not eliminate the need for a court to safeguard a defendant’s due process rights at sentencing. As Justice Stevens pointed out in his concurrence in Rita v. United States, — U.S. -, 127 S.Ct. 2456, 168 L.Ed.2d *312203 (2007), an otherwise-permissible sentence may be unreasonable if it is imposed for an impermissible reason. See 127 S.Ct. at 2473 (Stevens, J., concurring) (“After all, a district judge who gives harsh sentences to Yankees fans and lenient sentences to Red Sox fans would not be acting reasonably even if her procedural rulings were impeccable.”). Even though judges are no longer bound to impose a sentence within the Guidelines sentencing range, they must not violate a defendant’s constitutional rights by sentencing based on unconstitutional considerations.
At sentencing, a court may take into consideration facts about the offender and the offense of conviction, even if such facts also constitute elements of a separate offense. See McMillan, 477 U.S. at 90, 106 S.Ct. 2411. However, the defendant’s right to due process is implicated when it appears that a defendant is being sentenced primarily for a crime other than the crime of conviction, such as when the defendant’s sentence is based predominantly on criminal conduct collateral to the crime of conviction. See McMillan, 477 U.S. at 88, 106 S.Ct. 2411; Kikumura, 918 F.2d at 1120 (Rosenn, J., concurring) (“[Bjecause of the extreme departure involved here for the separate offense of attempted murder, it seems evident that the Government and the sentencing judge did not consider Ki-kumura’s attempt to kill as collateral but primary.”); Grier, 475 F.3d at 573 (Rendell, J., concurring) (“The spectre of another “crime” impacting [a defendant’s] sentence would be troublesome from a due process standpoint only if we were concerned that [the] sentence was in fact based predominantly on conduct wholly collateral to his convicted crime.”).
The difficulty comes in determining when a court is impermissibly sentencing a defendant 'primarily for uncharged, unproven criminal conduct, rather than merely considering uncharged conduct in imposing sentence for the offense of conviction. Here, the dramatic difference between Fisher’s unenhanced Guidelines sentencing range for the possession crime alone, and the sentence actually imposed, raises the possibility that the assault was given primary consideration at sentencing.
However, I concur in the judgment affirming Fisher’s sentence because, based on the record before us, I do not find reason to believe that Fisher’s sentence was based predominantly on the collateral criminal conduct. The District Court clearly gave consideration to all of the § 3553(a) factors at sentencing and did not place undue reliance on the uncharged assault or on the Guidelines sentencing range that factored in the uncharged assault in arriving at the sentence actually imposed. The Court stated: “Mr. Fisher, after having considered the provisions of the United States Sentencing Guidelines, the advisory guideline range, the Supreme Court’s ruling in United States versus Booker, the sentencing factors outlined in Title 18 United States Code, Section 3553, and the underlying goals of sentencing, which are many, but include punishment, deterrence, rehabilitation, respect for the law, I am sentencing you to 108 months of imprisonment.” App. 160. The Court made no mention of the assault on Detective Silvers when imposing sentence. In fact, early in the sentencing hearing, the District Court noted that “this isn’t purely guideline analysis anymore, counsel,” in response to defense counsel’s argument that omitting the stolen firearm enhancement would lower the Guidelines sentencing range. App. 151. The Court added: “I am going to look as I am permitted to, under the current state of the law, under the current standard, that the Supreme Court has said is the standard, I am going *313to look at all of the factors to which I am entitled to look.” Id.
In addition, the District Court clearly understood that possession was the crime of conviction and, unlike in Kikumura, the enhancements to Fisher’s base offense level were made pursuant to particular guidelines, rather than arrived at as part of the court’s exercise of discretion to depart from the Guidelines range once the range was calculated. There is nothing in the District Court’s written decision or in its remarks at sentencing that would suggest that the Court was covertly sentencing Fisher for assault rather than gun possession. Accordingly, although I do not agree with the majority’s view that Kikumura’s concern for the “tail wagging the dog” scenario no longer has relevance post-Booker, I concur in the judgment affirming Fisher’s sentence.