Court Opinion

ID: 9483282
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:15:56.86851+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:49:31.811769
License: Public Domain

FAGG, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I cannot join the court’s decision bestowing a windfall sentence on an undeserving felon. By choosing to ignore an illegal sentence, the court has disregarded its obligation to carry out the sentencing guidelines as written. I thus dissent.
Steven A. Filker, a felon with earlier convictions for attempted murder, distribution of marijuana, and distribution of cocaine, threatened a man with a sawed-off shotgun. The Government charged Filker on several counts, and Filker pleaded guilty to possession of an altered and unregistered firearm in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 5861.
Filker did not object to the presentence report, which recommended a guidelines sentence between thirty-three and forty-one months imprisonment. Instead, at sentencing, Filker argued for a downward departure. The district court expressly found no factual basis supporting a downward departure and nothing indicating the recommended sentencing range “is bad [or] that some specific lower range is more appropriate to dispense.” Given this finding, the district court could not “mak[e] a downward departure from the guidelines for proper reasons” as this court suggests. Ante at 242. Recognizing it had no basis to depart from the guidelines, the district court nevertheless proceeded to state, “The [cjourt has examined the sentencing range, and it’s the view of the [c]ourt that taking all matters into consideration, that a base *243offense level of 12 under 18 U.S.C. [section 922 would create a more appropriate sentence ... [resulting in a] sentence range of 15 to 21 months.” Thus, notwithstanding the absence of any basis for a departure, the district court decided it would simply reduce Filker’s sentence by sentencing Filker for the crime the Government agreed to dismiss rather than the one to which Filker had pleaded guilty.
I strongly disagree with the court’s view that affirming Filker’s illegal sentence is not a gross miscarriage of justice. Ante at 242. The district court’s arbitrary and insupportable decision to sentence Filker under an inapplicable statute and guideline because the court deemed the resulting sentence “more appropriate” is an outright disregard of the law, and it flies in the face of guidelines’ policy of ensuring rational and consistent sentencing decisions. In my view, “the district court committed plain error, resulting in a miscarriage of justice, by imposing a sentence in violation of law.” United States v. LeMay, 952 F.2d 995, 998 (8th Cir.1991) (per curiam).
Allowing a repeat offender to serve a sentence one-half the length commanded by the guidelines — with no basis in the record to support a departure — violates the law requiring that defendants be sentenced according to the guidelines. 18 U.S.C. § 3553(b) (1988); United States v. Anders, 956 F.2d 907, 910 (9th Cir.1992) (“[a] court must sentence within the applicable guideline range unless valid grounds exist for departure”). Congress enacted the guidelines to achieve honesty, uniformity, and proportionality in sentencing decisions, with deviations from the guidelines to occur only in rare circumstances. U.S.S.G. Ch. 1 (introduction and general application principles). The district court, however, found no basis to depart from the recommended sentencing range; instead, the court simply disregarded the guidelines and sentenced Filker according to its own view of what was appropriate. In so doing, the district court frustrated the guidelines’ central policy of ensuring similarly situated defendants receive consistent sentences regardless of individual judges’ views on what is an appropriate punishment. The district court thus violated the law in sentencing Filker contrary to the recommended guidelines sentence.
Because affirming Filker’s sentence allows a plain mistake of law to go uncorrected and gives tacit approval to the district court’s actions, I would reverse and remand this case for resentencing in conformity with the law. Accordingly, I dissent.