Court Opinion

ID: 9472970
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 04:16:03.315557+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:43:15.330893
License: Public Domain

KEARSE, Circuit Judge, concurring:
I concur in most of the Court’s opinion. It is not clear to me, however, what the precise effect is of “joinpng]” or “com-bin[ing]” the convictions on Counts 2 and 6 “with the conviction on Count 1.” See Majority opinion, ante, at 130, 135.
Viewing Counts 2 and 6, which charged conspiracies in violation of 21 U.S.C. §§ 846 and 963 (1982), respectively, as lesser-included offenses within Count 1, which charged a continuing criminal enterprise in
violation of 21 U.S.C. § 848 (1982), I believe it would have been appropriate to vacate the convictions on the two lesser-included offenses, on the condition that the convictions on those offenses would be reinstated in the event that the conviction on the greater offense, Count 1, were ever overturned for reasons not affecting the validity of the convictions on Counts 2 and 6. The convictions on lesser-included offenses were vacated in United States v. Slutsky, 487 F.2d 832 (2d Cir.1973), cert. denied, 416 U.S. 937, 94 S.Ct. 1937, 40 L.Ed.2d 287 (1974), and United States v. Rosenthal, 454 F.2d 1252, 1255 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 406 U.S. 931, 92 S.Ct. 1801, 32 L.Ed.2d 134 (1972); and this was the course prescribed in United States v. Mourad, 729 F.2d 195, 202 n. 8 (2d Cir.), petition for cert. filed, 52 U.S.L.W. 3922 (U.S. June 26, 1984) (No. 83-2067), though not followed, see id. at 202 (vacating only the lesser count sentences, not the convictions).
The majority, however, elects to “join” or “combine” the convictions on the lesser offenses with the conviction on Count 1, stating that the convictions on the lesser counts “would not be merged out of existence,” but “would not exist as separate convictions” as long as the conviction on Count 1 was not disturbed. Majority opinion, ante, at 135 (emphasis in original). I do not know what this means ontologieally, but I concur in the judgment in the hope that its import is that the convictions on the lesser-included offenses have ceased, in light of the conviction on the greater offense, to be a basis upon which collateral consequences, such as more severe parole treatment, may follow.