Circuit Court Opinions

The Eleventh Circuit affirmed convictions arising from a check-cashing and mail-theft scheme, rejected a Dubin challenge to the defendant’s conviction for aggravated identity theft, vacated the “sophisticated means” enhancement for lack of defendant-specific conduct, and vacated restitution tied to the defendant’s pre-participation conduct.

In a sentencing appeal, the Tenth Circuit vacated a 60-month upward-variance sentence for attempted bulk-cash smuggling as substantively unreasonable, citing reliance on a material misstatement and inadequate treatment of sentencing-disparity evidence. The district court’s sentence was an outlier in light of national sentencing data and relied on a false belief that the defendant had been on bond during the offense.

In a drug-conspiracy appeal, the Tenth Circuit affirmed the conviction but vacated the sentence after finding the district court’s drug-quantity estimate relied on unreliable confidential-source hearsay. The court rejected a due-process challenge to an in-chambers evidentiary ruling and held any Rule 404(b) error harmless.

In a plea-agreement appeal, the Tenth Circuit affirmed the rejection of a Rule 11(c)(1)(C) agreement but held that the district court abused its discretion in subsequently rejecting a charge bargain plea agreement, citing deference to prosecutorial charging discretion.

In a habeas appeal concerning First Step Act credits, the Ninth Circuit held that earned time credits may be applied to reduce the length of a supervised release term, reversed the district court’s dismissal, and remanded for recalculation and transmission of credits to probation.

In a multi-party appeal, the Fifth Circuit affirmed drug- and money-laundering-conspiracy convictions under domestic promotional laundering (but rejecting concealment-based laundering), finding error in a Rule 1006 summary spreadsheet, upholding a CCE conviction, and vacating a § 924(c) sentence for lack of a jury finding on a short-barreled rifle.

The Fourth Circuit reversed the denial of a motion to dismiss a § 844(h)(1) “use of fire to commit a felony” charge predicated on interstate domestic violence resulting in death. The Court held that the interstate-domestic-violence offense ends when the victim dies, so post-death concealment by burning the body is not “using fire” to commit that felony.

The Third Circuit affirmed revocation of a defendant’s supervised release and a 48-month sentence where the district court credited hearsay statements from the alleged stabbing victim. The Court held the statements were sufficiently reliable, and the government showed good cause for the witness’s absence.

The Third Circuit affirmed the denial of a sentence reduction under § 3582(c)(2) based on the retroactive amendment under U.S.S.G. § 4C1.1. The Court held that § 6A1.3(a)’s notice-and-opportunity protections apply to § 3582(c)(2) proceedings, but there was no due-process violation because the district court relied on information used at the original sentencing, not “new information.”

The Second Circuit affirmed a conviction for receiving firearms purchased out of state, rejecting a Second Amendment challenge to 18 U.S.C. § 922(a)(3), which prohibits the interstate transport of firearms. The Court held the statute regulates the mode of acquiring firearms and does not meaningfully burden the right to keep and bear arms, and, in any event, it is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition under Bruen.