Court Opinion

ID: 9494574
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 15:40:38.13549+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:56:28.308694
License: Public Domain

DIANA GRIBBON MOTZ, Circuit Judge,
concurring in the judgment:
I concur in the judgment and in the majority’s emphasis on the critical revisions in the language of § 924(c)(1)(B), but I write separately because I do not agree entirely with the remainder of the majority’s rationale or its characterization of Castillo v. United States, 530 U.S. 120, 120 S.Ct. 2090, 147 L.Ed.2d 94 (2000).
In Castillo, the Supreme Court did closely examine the language and structure of § 924(c), as the majority suggests, but it did not rest there. The Court also considered the statute’s “context, history, and such other factors as typically help courts determine a statute’s objectives.” Id. at 124, 120 S.Ct. 2090. In particular the Court noted that “statutory drafting occurs against a backdrop ... of traditional treatment of certain categories of important facts.” Id. (quoting Jones v. United States, 526 U.S. 227, 234, 119 S.Ct. 1215, 143 L.Ed.2d 311 (1999)).
It therefore mattered to the Court in Castillo that there is a “great” difference between using a machine gun and using a pistol, “both in degree and kind.” Id. at 126, 120 S.Ct. 2090. As the Court recounted, this difference had been recognized by “substantive distinctions” in “numerous [federal] gun crimes” that punish the transport, sale, or manufacture of machine guns and semiautomatic assault weapons while placing no restrictions on pistols. Id. The Castillo Court also noted that state legislatures, judges, and the Manual of Model Criminal Jury Instructions have all commonly made this distinction, and that courts have not traditionally used firearm type as a sentencing factor “in respect to an underlying ‘use or carry’ crime.” Id. These historic distinctions were of special importance to the Court in understanding § 924(c), because they “concern[ed] the nature of the element lying closest to the heart of the crime at issue” — using or carrying a firearm. As such, they provided strong support for the Court’s conclusion that Congress meant to make use of a machine gun a separate crime in old § 924(c). Id.
This part of Castillo’s analysis applies equally to revised § 924(c), which requires a significantly higher minimum penalty for use of a machine gun than for use of other firearms — thirty years instead of five. Recently, we had occasion to examine another statute with similar features — a “steeply higher penaltfy]” that depended on facts “that the states and federal government traditionally have considered elements of an offense rather than sentencing factors” — and determined that the statute described a separate offense rather than a sentencing factor. United States v. Campbell, 259 F.3d 293, 299 (4th Cir.2001) (also noting that Castillo, 530 U.S. at 125, 120 S.Ct. 2090, and Jones, 526 U.S. at 233, 119 S.Ct. 1215, teach that a statute’s “look” is not dispositive “[w]here other factors persuasively indicate that Congress’ intent was to create separate offense elements”).
Nevertheless, the goal of our analysis is to ascertain Congress’ intent, and Congress can make firearm type a sentencing factor if it writes language that is clear enough to do so, even in light of the strong contrary tradition. In the case of § 924(c)(1)(B) I think it did, by failing to provide for determinate sentences. As the majority notes, if this were “a provision marking out a separate offense” it would *228be “incomplete.” Ante at 225. Section 924(c)(1)(B) “sets forth no determinate sentence or even any upper limit on sentencing.” Id. The statute therefore “makes sense only as a sentencing factor that cabins a judge’s discretion when imposing a sentence for the base offense in § 924(c)(1).” Id. If § 924(c)(1)(B) provided for a determinate sentence, but was otherwise written and structured exactly as it is now, I would hold that it created a separate offense.