Court Opinion

ID: 9497069
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:42:39.793993+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:57:59.183841
License: Public Domain

RYAN, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
While I agree that the defendant’s sentence should be vacated, I do not join in the majority’s holding that the government waived its objection to the defendant’s sentence. In my view, the sentence should be vacated and the case remanded for resen-tencing because the prosecutor was not given a reasonable opportunity to be heard .at the sentencing hearing in order to articulate his objection to the radical downward departure the defendant was seeking and ultimately received.
At the very outáet of the sentencing hearing, the prosecutor acknowledged that the defendant had filed a motion for a downward departure and asked that he be allowed to address the court regarding the government’s position on sentencing. He was never given that opportunity. Following the government’s request to be heard, the district court engaged in a colloquy with the defendant and his attorney. In the midst of that colloquy, and without affording the Assistant U.S. Attorney an opportunity to speak, the district judge granted the motion for a downward departure, imposed the sentence, and abruptly left the bench.
My sister has characterized the prosecutor’s request to be heard as being limited to an evidentiary matter concerning the defendant’s offense conduct and that the *878government’s request gave no indication that it objected to the defendant’s motion for a downward departure. Respectfully, she is mistaken. After the government introduced its evidence concerning the defendant’s offense conduct, the prosecutor informed the court that he wanted to be heard on yet another matter, stating as follows: “I would just like to address the Court on the government’s view on sentencing after we hear from [defense counsel], Your Honor.”
Our precedent is clear, that in cases such as this, “where the district court fails to provide an opportunity for objections after the pronouncement of a sentence, waiver should not be found.” United States v. Breeding, 109 F.3d 308, 310 (6th Cir.1997). Moreover, where there is an explicit grant of authority for challenging a sentence and where the government does not have an opportunity to object following the pronouncement of sentence, there is no waiver. United States v. Hickey, 917 F.2d 901, 906 (6th Cir.1990). In the case before us, the explicit grant of authority for challenging the defendant’s sentence is found in 18 U.S.C. § 3742(b)(3), which states the following:
The Government may file a notice of appeal in the district court for review of an otherwise final sentence if the sen- . tence—
(3) is less than the sentence specified in the applicable guideline range to the extent that the sentence includes a lesser ... term of imprisonment, probation, or supervised release than the minimum established in the guideline range....
18 U.S.C. § 3742(b)(3). There is no dispute that the sentence imposed is below “the minimum established in the guideline range.” Id. Because there is an explicit grant of authority for challenging the defendant’s sentence and because the prosecutor was not given a reasonable opportunity to object to the downward departure, the government did not waive its right to appeal this issue. The prosecutor made it very clear that he wished an opportunity to address the court in opposition to defense counsel’s request for leniency. He was not obligated to reassert his request by repeating himself, by interrupting the trial judge in the midst of pronouncing sentence, or by attempting to call the judge back to the bench as he was leaving. There is no rule of law or practice, of which I am aware, that requires the prosecutor to repeat his request to be heard, or face, as in this case, an appellate adjudication that the issue is waived.
With all due respect to my colleagues who see it differently, the record of this case does not call for the preparation of a lengthy published opinion, creating a new, rigid rule of sentencing law that further narrows and restricts the relatively limited discretion left to trial judges under the Sentencing Guidelines. The Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure and our existing case precedent sufficiently set forth the duties of the district court- at sentencing and I strongly object to the adoption under our “supervisory power” of still another uncodified “procedural rule” telling district judges what to incant after sentencing a person.
This case appears to be nothing more than an uncharacteristic and inadvertent mistake by a highly respected district judge, who has conducted more rule-conforming sentencing proceedings in an exemplary fashion than he or we can count. Very likely, he simply forgot to do what he regularly does: ask both counsel if they had anything further to say. In my view, the prosecutor adequately put the district court on notice that the government objected to the motion for a downward departure. Accordingly, the proper standard of review is abuse of discretion. United *879States v. Tocco, 200 F.3d 401, 432 (6th Cir.2000). I conclude that the district court abused its discretion by imposing a sentence without first giving the prosecutor an opportunity to address the court, after being earlier advised by the prosecutor that he “would just like to address the Court on the government’s view on sentencing. ...”
The only appropriate remedy is to vacate the sentence and remand for resen-tencing.