Court Opinion

ID: 9486079
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 11:37:21.604587+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:51:31.089258
License: Public Domain

HEANEY, Senior Circuit Judge,
concurring.
This case is but another in a growing list of eases in which the government charges an offender as a felon in possession with the knowledge that if the offender is convicted or pleads guilty to that charge, the sentencing will turn on some state law offense that the government will attempt to prove through hearsay at the sentencing hearing. Although I am compelled by this court’s “relevant conduct” precedents to concur, I remain firmly convinced that the use of so-called relevant conduct in this context violates Fleming’s right to due process of law.
I first addressed this issue in United States v. Wilson, 992 F.2d 156, 159 (8th Cir.1993) (Heaney, J., concurring). Wilson pleaded guilty to the felon in possession charge, only to be sentenced for attempted murder. My dispute in Wilson was “not over whether a preponderance of the evidence supported a finding of attempted first-degree murder, but whether we, or any federal court, should be making any finding in this regard” because the attempted murder alleged in that ease “is not a federal offense.” Id. A federal “prosecutor could not even have charged Wilson with the alleged attempted murder,” and therefore the proper place for that charge was “in state court, where Wilson would have the right to a jury trial, to confront witnesses, and to have the necessary findings made beyond a reasonable doubt.” Id.
Fleming’s case differs slightly in that he was charged and pleaded guilty to second-degree assault of a law enforcement officer in state court. See supra at 1265 n. 1. Presumably Fleming has been or will be sentenced in state court for this offense. Rather than simply rely on the state to see that he is punished, the sentencing guidelines, through their cross-reference provisions and related enhancements, double Fleming’s offense level based on this uncharged (and, before our court, unchargeable) conduct. See supra at 1266 n. 4 (offense level moves from 12 to 23). Fleming’s sentencing range tripled, moving from 21-27 months to 70-87 months.
This sentencing regime turns federalism on its head, but more importantly, it violates the offender’s right to due process of law. Attorney General Reno told the Judicial Conference last month that the federal prisons are filling faster than we can possibly build new prisons, and that the Bureau of Prisons *1268faces “gridlock” within three years. The guidelines (and the drug laws) could be modified in a variety of ways to deal with this problem. One obvious way would be to eliminate or severely restrict the use of these cross-reference provisions. It makes little sense, after all, that when our prisons are rapidly filling to the brink, we triple an offender’s sentence in order to ensure that he be punished for conduct that does not violate federal law.