Dillon v. United States

• Decision Date: 17 June 2010
• Docket Number: No. 09–6338.,09–6338.
• Parties: Percy DILLON, Petitioner, v. UNITED STATES.
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

560 U.S. 817

130 S.Ct. 2683

177 L.Ed.2d 271

Percy DILLON, Petitioner,

v.UNITED STATES.

No. 09–6338.

Supreme Court of the United States

Argued March 30, 2010.

Decided June 17, 2010.

Lisa B. Freeland, Pittsburgh, PA, for Petitioner.

Leondra R. Kruger, Washington, DC, for Respondent.

Lisa B. Freeland, Federal Public Defender, Renee D. Pietropaolo, Assistant Federal, Public Defender, Michael J. Novara, First Assistant Federal Public Defender, Peter R. Moyers, Pittsburgh, PA, for Petitioner.

Elena Kagan, Solicitor General, Lanny A. Breuer, Assistant Attorney General, Michael R. Dreeben, Deputy Solicitor General, Leondra R. Kruger, Assistant to the Solicitor General, Deborah Watson, Attorney Department of Justice, Washington, DC, for Respondent.

Opinion

Justice SOTOMAYOR delivered the opinion of the Court.

A federal court generally “may not modify a term of imprisonment once it has been imposed.” 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c). Congress has provided an exception to that rule “in the case of a defendant who has been sentenced to a term of imprisonment based on a sentencing range that has subsequently been lowered by the Sentencing Commission.” § 3582(c)(2). In those circumstances, § 3582(c)(2) authorizes a court to reduce the term of imprisonment “if such a reduction is consistent with” applicable Commission policy statements. The policy statement governing § 3582(c)(2) proceedings instructs courts not to reduce a term of imprisonment below the minimum of an amended sentencing range except to the extent the original term of imprisonment was below the range then applicable. See United States Sentencing Commission, Guidelines Manual § 1B1.10(b)(2) (Nov.2009) (USSG). This case presents the question whether our decision in United States v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220, 125 S.Ct. 738, 160 L.Ed.2d 621 (2005), which rendered the Guidelines advisory to remedy the Sixth Amendment problems associated with a mandatory sentencing regime, requires treating § 1B1.10(b) as nonbinding. We conclude that Booker does not demand that result.

I

The Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 (SRA or Act), 98 Stat. 1987, established the Sentencing Commission and authorized it to promulgate Sentencing Guidelines and to issue policy statements regarding the Guidelines' application. See 28 U.S.C. §§ 991, 994(a). The Act also charged the Commission with periodically reviewing and revising the Guidelines. See § 994(o ). When a revision reduces the Guidelines range for a given offense, the Commission must determine “in what circumstances and by what amount the sentences of prisoners serving terms of imprisonment for the offense may be reduced.” § 994(u).

As enacted, the SRA made the Sentencing Guidelines binding. See Booker, 543 U.S., at 233–234, 125 S.Ct. 738. Except in limited circumstances, district courts lacked discretion to depart from the Guidelines range. See Burns v. United States, 501 U.S. 129, 133, 111 S.Ct. 2182, 115 L.Ed.2d 123 (1991). Under that regime, facts found by a judge by a preponderance of the evidence often increased the mandatory Guidelines range and permitted the judge to impose a sentence greater than that supported by the facts established by the jury verdict or guilty plea. See Booker, 543 U.S., at 235, 125 S.Ct. 738. We held in Booker that treating the Guidelines as mandatory in these circumstances violated the Sixth Amendment right of criminal defendants to be tried by a jury and to have every element of an offense proved by the Government beyond a reasonable doubt. Id., at 243–244, 125 S.Ct. 738.

To remedy the constitutional problem, we rendered the Guidelines advisory by invalidating two provisions of the SRA: 18 U.S.C. § 3553(b)(1) (2000 ed., Supp. IV), which generally required a sentencing court to impose a sentence within the applicable Guidelines range, and § 3742(e) (2000 ed. and Supp. IV), which prescribed the standard of review on appeal, including de novo review of Guidelines departures. 543 U.S., at 259, 125 S.Ct. 738. “With these two sections excised (and statutory cross-references to the two sections consequently invalidated),” we held that “the remainder of the Act satisfies the Court's constitutional requirements.” Ibid. Booker thus left intact other provisions of the SRA, including those giving the Commission authority to revise the Guidelines, 28 U.S.C. § 994(o ) (2006 ed.), and to determine when and to what extent a revision will be retroactive, § 994(u).

With respect to drug-trafficking offenses, the Sentencing Guidelines establish a defendant's base offense level according to the type and weight of the drug. See USSG §§ 2D1.1(a), (c). When the Commission first promulgated the Guidelines in 1987, it adopted the 100–to–1 ratio selected by Congress in setting mandatory minimum sentences in the Anti–Drug Abuse Act of 1986, 100 Stat. 3207. Under that framework, the Commission “treated every gram of crack cocaine as the equivalent of 100 grams of powder cocaine.” Kimbrough v. United States, 552 U.S. 85, 96, 128 S.Ct. 558, 169 L.Ed.2d 481 (2007). The Commission later sought to alleviate the disparity produced by this ratio. After several failed attempts at reform, see id., at 99, 128 S.Ct. 558, the Commission in 2007 amended the Guidelines to reduce by two levels the base offense level associated with each quantity of crack cocaine. See USSG Supp.App. C, Amdt. 706 (effective Nov. 1, 2007). In 2008, the Commission made that amendment retroactive. See id., Amdt. 713 (effective Mar. 3, 2008).

When the Commission makes a Guidelines amendment retroactive, 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(2) authorizes a district court to reduce an otherwise final sentence that is based on the amended provision. Any reduction must be consistent with applicable policy statements issued by the Sentencing Commission. The relevant policy statement, USSG § 1B1.10, instructs courts proceeding under § 3582(c)(2) to substitute the amended Guidelines range while “leav[ing] all other guideline application decisions unaffected.” § 1B1.10(b)(1).¹

Under § 3582(c)(2), a court may then grant a reduction within the amended Guidelines range if it determines that one is warranted “ after considering the factors set forth in section 3553(a) to the extent that they are applicable.”² Except in limited circumstances, however, § 1B1.10(b)(2)(A) forecloses a court acting under § 3582(c)(2) from reducing a sentence “to a term that is less than the minimum of the amended guideline range.”

II

A jury convicted petitioner Percy Dillon in 1993 of conspiracy to distribute and to possess with the intent to distribute more than 500 grams of powder cocaine and more than 50 grams of crack cocaine in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 846, possession with the intent to distribute more than 500 grams of powder cocaine in violation of § 841(a)(1), and use of a firearm during and in relation to a drug-trafficking offense in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1). Dillon's convictions exposed him to a statutory sentencing range of 10 years to life for the conspiracy, 5 to 40 years for cocaine possession, and a mandatory minimum sentence of 5 years for the firearm offense, to be served consecutively to the sentence for the drug offenses.

At sentencing, the District Court made additional findings of fact and concluded that Dillon was responsible for 1.5 kilograms of crack and 1.6 kilograms of powder cocaine. Under USSG § 2D1.1, those drug quantities produced a base offense level of 38. After offsetting adjustments for acceptance of responsibility, § 3E1.1, and reckless endangerment during flight, § 3C1.2, Dillon's total offense level remained 38. Coupled with a criminal-history category of II,³ that offense level produced a then-mandatory Guidelines range of 262 to 327 months' imprisonment for the drug counts.

The court sentenced Dillon at the bottom of the Guidelines range for those counts, followed by a mandatory 60–month sentence for the firearm count, for a total sentence of 322 months' imprisonment. At Dillon's sentencing, the court described the term of imprisonment as “entirely too high for the crime [Dillon] committed.” App. 13. Perceiving no basis for departing from the then-mandatory Sentencing Guidelines, the District Court felt constrained to impose a sentence within the prescribed range. The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed Dillon's convictions and sentence on appeal. See 100 F.3d 949 (1996).

After the Sentencing Commission made the amendment to the crack-cocaine Guidelines retroactive in 2008, Dillon filed a pro se motion for a sentence reduction pursuant to § 3582(c)(2). In the motion, Dillon asked the court to grant not just the two-level reduction authorized by the amendment but also a further reduction consistent with the sentencing factors found in § 3553(a). Based largely on his post-sentencing conduct, including his determined pursuit of educational and community-outreach opportunities, Dillon contended that a variance from the amended Guidelines range was warranted in his case. He further urged that, after Booker, the court was authorized to grant such a variance because the amended Guidelines range was advisory notwithstanding any contrary statement in § 1B1.10.

The District Court reduced Dillon's sentence to 270 months—the term at the bottom of the revised Guidelines range.⁴ But the court declined to go further. Concluding that the sentencing proceedings at issue in Booker are readily distinguishable from those under § 3582(c)(2), the court found Booker 's holdings inapplicable to the instant proceeding and accordingly held that it lacked authority to impose a sentence inconsistent with § 1B1.10.

The Third Circuit affirmed. 572 F.3d 146, 150 (2009). The court noted that § 3582(c)(2) is codified in a different section than the provisions invalidated in Booker and contains no cross-reference to those provisions. Finding no other indication that Booker “obviate[d] the congressional directive in § 3582(c)(2) that a sentence reduction pursuant to that section be consistent with Sentencing Commission...