U.S. v. Jackson

• Decision Date: 21 April 2008
• Docket Number: No. 06-5205.,06-5205.
• Citation: 523 F.3d 234
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America v. Jacqulyn JACKSON, Appellant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit

523 F.3d 234

UNITED STATES of America v. Jacqulyn JACKSON, Appellant.

No. 06-5205.

United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.

Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a) March 13, 2008.

Filed: April 21, 2008.

James J. Brink, Esq., Pittsburgh, PA, for Appellant.

Mary Beth Buchanan, Esq., Rebecca Ross Haywood, Esq., Office of United States Attorney, Pittsburgh, PA, for Appellee.

Before: FUENTES, CHAGARES, and VAN ANTWERPEN, Circuit Judges.

OPINION OF THE COURT

VAN ANTWERPEN, Circuit Judge.

Appellant Jacqulyn Jackson appeals the District Court's December 22, 2006 Judgment of Sentence. Following her guilty plea to one count of making false statements to police, Jackson was sentenced to six months of imprisonment and three years of supervised release. Jackson, who was released from prison during the pendency of this appeal, argued in her opening brief that this sentence is unreasonable.

I. FACTS

Appellant Jacqulyn Jackson was charged with making false statements to police in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1001(a)(2). According to the facts adduced at the plea hearing and contained in the Pre-Sentence Report (PSR), Jackson attempted to obtain possession of a car seized by police following a high-speed chase; she claimed the car belonged to her and that she had reported it stolen after lending it to a friend who never returned it. In fact, Jackson knew her husband, whom police were investigating for drug trafficking, had borrowed the car and had abandoned it after being chased by the police.

On September 26, 2006, Jackson entered into a plea agreement with the Government. According to the plea agreement, Jackson waived her right to appeal the District Court's sentence unless the Government filed an appeal first, the sentence exceeded the statutory maximum for the offense to which she pled guilty, or the sentence unreasonably exceeded the Guidelines range determined by the District Court. See App. at 19. Following a hearing to determine whether her plea was knowing and voluntary, Jackson formally pled guilty to the charge.

The PSR, which was prepared following Jackson's guilty plea, assigned a criminal history score of I and an offense level score of 4 after a two-level downward adjustment for substantial assistance. Given these scores, Jackson's advisory Guidelines range was 0-6 months. This meant the advisory Guidelines called for up to six months of imprisonment, or a term of no more than three years of probation under U.S.S.G. § 5B 1.2(a)(2). The advisory Guidelines range called for a term of supervised release of at least two years, but not more than three years, which was the statutory maximum. See 18 U.S.C. § 3583(b)(2); U.S.S.G. § 5D1.2(a)(2).

On December 22, 2006, after hearing arguments from both sides, including Jackson's argument that she should be sentenced to probation, the District Court imposed a sentence of six-months' imprisonment. This term of imprisonment was to be followed by a three-year term of supervised release. Jackson filed a timely appeal, arguing that her sentence was unreasonable because the District Court did not give sufficient consideration to whether she should be sentenced to probation.

On February 25, 2008, this Court directed the parties to file supplemental letter-briefs addressing whether Jackson's appeal was moot in light of the fact that she was to be released from prison the following day. On February 26, 2008, as scheduled, Jackson was released from prison, having completed her sentence of imprisonment. The United States Attorney filed a letter-brief in accordance with this Court's request on March 4, 2008, and counsel for Jackson responded to our request on March 26, 2008.

II. JURISDICTION

The District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania had subject matter jurisdiction under 18 U.S.C. § 3231. Jackson's appeal was timely filed under Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 4(b)(1) because it was filed within ten days of the District Court's final judgment of sentence. Provided there is a live case or controversy in this matter, this Court has appellate jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 and 18 U.S.C. § 3742(a). See Spencer v. Kemna, 523 U.S. 1, 7, 118 S.Ct. 978, 140 L.Ed.2d 43 (1998). We review the validity of appellate waivers de novo. See United States v. Khattak, 273 F.3d 557, 560 (3d Cir.2001).

III. DISCUSSION

A.

We would normally begin our analysis by discussing whether Jackson, by entering into the plea agreement, has waived her ability to appeal. However, we must first determine whether we have jurisdiction to hear Jackson's appeal in this matter. We are required to confront a question about our jurisdiction before we can proceed to the question of whether Jackson's waiver is enforceable. See, e.g., United States v. Pantelidis, 335 F.3d 226, 232 (3d Cir.2003). On appeal, Jackson challenges only the reasonableness of her sentence. She is currently serving a term of supervised release that began when she was released from prison on February 26, 2008. These facts raise substantial questions about our jurisdiction, including whether this matter presents the live case or controversy required by Article III of the Constitution.

In Spencer v. Kemna, the United States Supreme Court confronted the question of whether jurisdiction exists over a defendant's appeal of his parole revocation, where the appeal reaches the appellate court after the defendant has served his sentence. The Court stated that:

This case-or-controversy requirement subsists through all stages of federal judicial proceedings, trial and appellate.... The parties must continue to have a personal stake in the outcome of the lawsuit. This means that, throughout the litigation, the plaintiff must have suffered, or be threatened with, an actual injury traceable to the defendant and likely to be redressed by a favorable judicial decision.... An incarcerated convict's (or a parolee's) challenge to the validity of his conviction always satisfies the case-or-controversy requirement because the incarceration (or the restriction imposed by the terms of the parole) constitutes a concrete injury, caused by the conviction and redressable by invalidation of the conviction.... In recent decades, we have been willing to presume that a wrongful criminal conviction has continuing collateral consequences (or, what is effectively the same, to count collateral consequences that are remote and unlikely to occur).

Spencer, 523 U.S. at 7, 118 S.Ct. 978 (citations omitted) (emphasis added). The defendant in Spencer, who was challenging the revocation of his parole, had completed the term of imprisonment imposed as a result of the parole violation by the time the District Court ruled on his habeas corpus petition. See id. at 5-6, 118 S.Ct. 978. The Supreme Court held that the presumption that criminal convictions have collateral consequences did not extend to revocations of parole. See id. at 12-14, 118 S.Ct. 978. In light of this holding, the Court affirmed the dismissal of Spencer's appeal as moot. See id. at 18, 118 S.Ct. 978. Accordingly, and in light of Spencer, there is no presumption of collateral consequences once the defendant is released if he challenges the revocation of his parole. See id. at 12-14, 118 S.Ct. 978. In such a case, the defendant must demonstrate that collateral consequences exist or jurisdiction will be lacking. See id. at 14, 118 S.Ct. 978.

A subsequent decision of our Court extended this holding to situations involving revocation of probation. See United States v. Kissinger, 309 F.3d 179, 181-82 (3d Cir.2002). The defendant in Kissinger had been sentenced to one year of probation; he later received a sentence of three-months' imprisonment and a new probationary term for violating his original probation. See id. at 180. The defendant challenged the "imposition and administration" of a condition of his new term of probation. See id. While the defendant's appeal was pending, he completed his three-month imprisonment term and all probationary terms. Accordingly, this Court held that he must demonstrate that collateral consequences existed or risk having his appeal dismissed as moot. See id. at 181-82. Because Kissinger could not point to any sufficient collateral consequence, his appeal was dismissed as moot. See id. at 183. In dismissing Kissinger's appeal, this Court specifically rejected the argument that one collateral consequence of an erroneous parole revocation was the possibility that it could impact some future sentence, noting that "Spencer rejected this collateral consequence." Id. at 182. In our opinion in Kissinger, this Court referred to cases from other circuits holding that Spencer's limitation on the reach of the presumption of collateral consequences also applied to challenges to revocations of supervised release. See id. at 181.

In United States v. Cottman, the defendant's appeal challenged the method of calculating the sentence that was imposed for his violation of 18 U.S.C. § 371. See United States v. Cottman, 142 F.3d 160, 163-64 (3d Cir.1998). Cottman claimed that an improper four-point upward adjustment under the Guidelines precluded the District Court from sentencing him to probation. See id. at 164-65. Cottman had completed his ten-month term of imprisonment and was serving a three-year term of supervised release at the time of his appeal. This Court held that although Cottman had completed his term of imprisonment, "a finding of mootness [was] forestalled ... because Cottman [might] still suffer `collateral legal consequences' from a sentence already served." Id. at 164. The main basis for this Court's determination that collateral consequences might exist was that a reduction in Cottman's Guidelines sentencing range "would likely merit a credit against Cottman's term of supervised release for the excess term of imprisonment to which Cottman was subjected." Id. at 165. The Court also mentioned the possibility that Cottman might commit and be convicted...