Court Opinion

ID: 9492406
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 14:40:36.919001+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:55:17.606187
License: Public Domain

ALAN E. NORRIS, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
Although the majority opinion omits the most objectionable portion of the original *364panel’s opinion' — the portion which occasioned my dissent and led to en banc review of this case — I remain of the view that the majority does not fairly assess the district judge’s understanding of her authority and discretion to depart.
The majority concludes that the district court did not properly consider Coleman’s request for a downward departure based upon the “investigative techniques:” employed by the ATF because it looked at the issue from a procedural, rather than a substantive, perspective. A review of the record leads me to a different conclusion. The district court initially observed that it thought the argument regarding the ATF’s investigative techniques was “not a downward departure issue” but more properly a selective prosecution issue that should have been raised in a motion to dismiss. Coleman’s attorney then reminded the court that he was not arguing selective prosecution but was instead asking for a downward departure:
[T]his is not a claim of selective prosecution, and the reason it was not brought by motion to dismiss indictment is we are not claiming this as a case of selective prosecution.... It’s more of a case of selective law enforcement....
... The reason this is a grounds for departure is simply because this takes this case out of the heartland of your typical drug case. That is where perhaps there’s someone who is actively involved in dealing narcotics and the government then investigates and catches him in the act. This is a case where Mr. Secretti was out soliciting for drug cases and firearm cases and, frankly, Your Honor, the departure section in the guidelines is not meant to be an all-inclusive section, and I think the courts that have been inclined to look at the various factors that have been listed by the Sentencing Commission in the original guidelines, but the [Guidelines also allow] that if there is a circumstance, mitigating circumstances of a kind that is not included in your normal case, your general case, that the Court can consider that for departure, and it’s strictly a matter for discretion.
The district court then proceeded to consider the merits of that argument, which I note essentially tracks the reasoning set forth in the majority’s opinion, before it concluded:
I understand that the guidelines make exceptions for exceptional circumstances but I think there, I think you need more to bring this into that realm than your assertion that Mr. Coleman was being solicited by Agent Secretti. In fact, you know the government’s position is exactly the opposite, and there isn’t enough to warrant having a hearing on it. I mean, all you’ve given me as an exhibit here is the business card, no affidavit, no- — -nothing in terms of hard evidence of this, and even if you did, I still don’t — I still don’t see it as an issue which would entitle this defendant to a departure, so motion denied.
It is apparent that the district court considered whether Coleman’s assertion amounted to a proper basis for a downward departure but concluded that his claim was so lacking in merit that it deserved summary rejection. The court did not, as asserted by the majority, believe it “lacked the authority and discretion to depart downward.” I fail to see how the district court’s conclusion can be said to be the product of an abuse of discretion when one considers the Supreme Court’s admonition that sentencing courts must “bear in mind the Commission’s expectation that departures based upon grounds not mentioned in the Guidelines will be highly infrequent.” Koon, 518 U.S. at 96, 116 S.Ct. 2035 (punctuation omitted).
Because I believe that the record reveals that the district court properly considered all of the permissible grounds for departure raised by defendant at sentencing, I respectfully dissent.