Booth v. U.S., 92-8609
| Decision Date | 04 August 1993 |
| Docket Number | No. 92-8609,92-8609 |
| Citation | 996 F.2d 1171 |
| Parties | James Eugene BOOTH, Petitioner-Appellant, v. UNITED STATES of America, Respondent-Appellee. Non-Argument Calendar. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit |
James Eugene Booth, pro se.
William Louis McKinnon, Jr., Asst. U.S. Atty., Atlanta, GA, for respondent-appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.
Before HATCHETT, ANDERSON and COX, Circuit Judges.
James Booth appeals from the district court's denial of his pro se motion to vacate his sentence, filed pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255. After pleading guilty to transporting stolen goods in interstate commerce, Booth was sentenced to ten years imprisonment on July 27, 1983. Before being released on parole on January 8, 1988, Booth had accumulated 710 days of statutory good time credit. On August 1, 1988, Booth was reincarcerated for a parole violation. He subsequently discovered that the good time credits he had earned would not be available to reduce his sentence. Booth filed a motion to vacate his sentence in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, alleging that his good time credits were illegally forfeited upon his prior parole and that this action, taken without notice, violated his right to due process. The district court denied Booth's motion.
28 C.F.R. § 2.35(b) addresses the issue of whether good time credits may be applied to shorten a prisoner's period of incarceration following a parole violation. That regulation holds that good time credits do not survive conditional release, and may not be used either to shorten the period of supervision following conditional release or to shorten the period of imprisonment that may be imposed for a parole violation:
It is the Commission's interpretation of the statutory scheme for parole and good time that the only function of good time credits is to determine the point in a prisoner's sentence when, in the absence of parole, the prisoner is to be conditionally released on supervision, as described in subsection (a). Once an offender is conditionally released from imprisonment, either by parole or mandatory release, the good time earned during that period of imprisonment is of no further effect either to shorten the period of supervision or to shorten the period of imprisonment which the offender may be required to serve for violation of parole or mandatory release.
28 C.F.R. § 2.35(b) (1992). Section 2.35 was amended in 1985 to set forth the Commission's interpretation of the interaction between the parole statutes and the prison good time statutes. 50 Fed.Reg. 46, 282 (1985). At that time, the Parole Commission explained that the amendment was not a new interpretation of the law, but rather a formalization of the Commission's long-standing practice of treating good time credits as being "used up" once a prisoner is paroled or given mandatory release. Id. The Commission noted that its practice had not been to order the "forfeiture" of good time, although the result would be the same whether the time was considered used up or forfeited. Id.
Agency regulations are entitled to great deference. Chevron U.S.A., Inc. v Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 842-45, 104 S.Ct. 2778, 2781-83, 81 L.Ed.2d 694 (1984). We must also defer to a federal agency's construction of its own regulation unless it is...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Brown-El v. Virginia Parole Bd.
...early release.4 Put another way, petitioner "used up" his good time credits to win early release on parole. See Booth v. United States of America, 996 F.2d 1171 (11th Cir.1993). Later, when petitioner violated his parole, the VPB, pursuant to Virginia Code § 53.1-165, exercised its discreti......
-
Young v. Nickels, 97-3420-RDR.
...other circuits considered whether § 2.35(b) conflicts with the statute and concluded that it does not. It cited Booth v. United States, 996 F.2d 1171, 1172 (11th Cir.1993) holding that good time credits are `used up' upon release from parole and unavailable to reduce the term received for p......
-
Patterson v. Knowles
...have considered whether § 2.35(b) conflicts with the statutory provisions have concluded that it does not. See Booth v. United States, 996 F.2d 1171, 1172 (11th Cir.1993) (finding § 2.35(b) reasonable and holding that good time credits are "used up" upon release from parole and unavailable ......
-
Coleman v. U.S. Parole Comm'n
...that "under 28 C.F.R. § 2.35(b), the good time of one confinement does not carry over to a second confinement."); Booth v. United States, 996 F.2d 1171, 1173 (11th Cir. 1993).2 Coleman argues that because § 2.35(b) was instituted in 1985, after his conviction, it does not apply to his situa......