Court Opinion

ID: 9493618
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 15:13:17.875419+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:55:56.027909
License: Public Domain

GILMAN, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
I concur in the judgment and the reasoning of the court, but write separately because I would reverse the district court’s use of methamphetamine to calculate Munoz’s sentence for an additional reason not *417expressed in Part IV.A. of the court’s opinion. The court relies on Application Note 12 to hold that methamphetamine should not have been used to calculate Munoz’s sentence because “the defendant was incapable of delivering methamphetamine.” I would hold that methamphetamine should not have been used to calculate Munoz’s sentence even if he was capable of delivering that drug, because it is undisputed that the drug actually delivered was amphetamine, not methamphetamine.
I base my reasoning in part on the portion of Application Note 12 that reads as follows:
In an offense involving an agreement to sell a controlled substance, the agreed-upon quantity of the controlled substance shall be used to determine the offense level unless the sale is completed and the amount delivered more accurately reflects the scale of the offense. For example, a defendant agrees to sell 500 grams of cocaine, the transaction is completed by the delivery of the controlled substance — actually 480 grams of cocaine, and no further delivery is scheduled. In this example, the amount delivered more accurately reflects the scale of the offense.
U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1 Application Note 12 (emphasis added). Because the commentary to the guideline provides that “the amount delivered more accurately reflects the scale of the offense” than the amount intended to be delivered, parallel logic would seem to require that the type of drug actually delivered “more accurately reflects the scale of the offense” than the type of drug intended to be delivered. In other words, no matter how clear Munoz’s intent was to deliver methamphetamine, the principle upon which Application Note 12 is based dictates that the amphetamine actually delivered should control his sentencing.
This conclusion is supported by the law as generally applied to sentencing for “attempt crimes.” See 21A Am.Jur.Crim. L. § 941 (2d ed.1998) (referring to state statutes that provide “that one convicted of an attempt may be sentenced to a term of imprisonment not exceeding half the length of the longest term to which he could have been sentenced had he succeeded in his attempt”). Thus, despite the fact that a defendant’s “moral turpitude” is just as bad whether his intended criminal act succeeds or not, the law does not generally punish him as severely if his attempt fails. I therefore disagree with the reasoning in United States v. Lopez, 125 F.3d 597 (8th Cir.1997), that resulted in Lopez receiving a stiffer sentence on the basis that it “was merely fortuitous” that amphetamine rather than methamphetamine was actually delivered. Id. at 600. The law has long since made a major distinction between completed crimes versus attempted crimes based on what Lopez dismissively characterizes as “merely fortuitous.”
For the above reasons, in addition to those set forth by the court, I agree that the district court erred in using methamphetamine to calculate Munoz’s sentence. I therefore concur in the remand to determine a new sentence based on the actual delivery of amphetamine.