Court Opinion

ID: 9497882
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 17:02:26.153444+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:58:28.585302
License: Public Domain

CARD AMONE, Circuit Judge,
Concurring:
I agree with the result and reasoning in this case, with one possible exception stated below. I write separately because I believe it important to highlight the fact that our decision to vacate the sentence in this case should not be taken as precedent automatically to vacate all incorrectly calculated Guidelines sentences in the future.
In the wake of United States v. Booker, -U.S. -, 125 S.Ct. 738, 160 L.Ed.2d 621 (2005), we remand sentences imposed under the prior mandatory Guidelines regime to allow the district court to consider whether, in light of its newly minted discretion to impose a non-Guidelines sentence, it wishes to resentence, thus curing the Sixth Amendment violation identified in Booker. See United States v. Crosby, 397 F.3d 103, 117-18 (2d Cir.2005). As we state in our opinion, we exercise discretion in these transitional cases to consider the propriety of the district court’s original Guidelines calculation before remanding, and, in circumstances such as those here, to vacate an erroneous Guidelines sentence. Of course, since Booker requires all sentences from this point forward to be reviewed for “reasonableness,” 125 S.Ct. at 765, our decision to vacate an erroneous Guidelines sentence does not mean that if the district court, on remand, imposes a correct Guidelines sentence, we would necessarily find that sentence reasonable upon subsequent review. Correct application of the Guidelines is but one factor to be considered under 18 U.S.C. § 3553 in reviewing reasonableness, see Booker, 125 S.Ct. at 766 (stating that the factors in 18 U.S.C. § 3553 “will guide appellate courts ... in determining whether a sentence is *102unreasonable”), and it is entirely possible that a correctly calculated Guidelines sentence might nonetheless be found unreasonable upon consideration of other factors.
By the same token, an incorrectly calculated Guidelines sentence might nonetheless be reasonable. I thus think it necessary to clarify our statement that “because the Guidelines error non-trivially affected the Guidelines sentence imposed as a mandate, vacatur of the sentence is necessary without reference to Blakely[ v. Washington, — U.S. -, 124 S.Ct. 2531, 159 L.Ed.2d 403 (2004)] or Booker or the principles of re-sentencing set out in Crosby.” Majority op. supra (emphasis added). I do not agree with the majority that vacatur is “necessary” rather than discretionary, and I likewise do not agree that our decision to vacate is unrelated to our obligations under Booker and Crosby; indeed, we go on (correctly) to state that we vacate “because we think [the error is] so pronounced that it could cause a resen-tencing after remand to be unreasonable.” Majority op. supra (emphasis added).
In any event, we confine our statement regarding vacatur to pre-Booker sentences imposed as a mandate. We will soon be faced with a growing number of post-Booker sentences, including those that return to us after a Crosby remand. Those sentences will be reviewed for reasonableness, and because an incorrectly calculated Guidelines sentence might nonetheless be reasonable, vacatur of a sentence based on Guidelines errors would not automatically be warranted.