Bid to rescue the Claiborne issue
on Jun 2, 2007 at 5:30 pm
A public defender in St. Louis has urged the Supreme Court to find a way to decide in the current Term a significant issue about federal criminal sentencing law that was at stake in a case involving an individual who died last week. The case is Claiborne v. U.S. (docket 06-5618). The issue is whether a federal judge has the authority to impose a sentence that falls below the U.S. Sentencing Guideline range, if there are no “extraordinary circumstances” justifying the lesser punishment. The Court granted review of that issue in the case of Mario Claiborne on Nov. 6 and heard argument on Feb. 20; a decison was pending.
Michael Dwyer, assistant federal public defender in the Eastern District of Missouri, on Friday filed a motion asking the Court either to go ahead and decide the Claiborne case as presented, or to grant expedited review of another case from Dwyer’s office involving the same Guidelines question. The alternative case suggested is Beal v. U.S. (docket 06-8498) — like Claiborne, from the Eighth Circuit Court. The Supreme Court considered the Beal case at a Conference in February, but took no action on it, apparently intending to hold it until after it had decided Claiborne. Mario Claiborne’s death in a shooting incident in St. Louis on Wednesday has raised the question of what the Court would do with the case, and the issue.
Dwyer contended in his motion that “the close similarity of the facts and decisions of the districts courts and appellate panels in Claiborne and Beal makes the latter case an efficient and effective vehicle to resolve the urgent issues presented in Claiborne. Because of his representation of Claiborne, the Federal Public Defender for the Eastern District of Missouri could expeditiously prepare Beal for briefing and argument.”
Solicitor General Paul D. Clement, opposing Dwyer’s motion so far as it urged a decision in the Claiborne case itself, argued on Friday that “the Court should vacate the grant of certiorari and dismiss the petition.” There is no longer any controversy, now that Mario Claiborne has died, Clement argued.
The Solicitor General said in a footnote that his office would offer a separate filing on Dwyer’s alternative suggestion to grant review of the Beal case. That additional response apparently was not filed as of Friday.
The motion and response were filed electronically with the Court Friday. Dwyer’s motion can be found here, and the Solicitor General’s response on the disimissal issue is here.
The Claiborne case was argued in tandem with Rita v. U.S. (06-5754), and the two were expected to give the Court a chance to clarify key issues about federal judges’ authority in setting criminal sentences now that the Sentencing Guidelines are no longer mandatory, but advisory only (under Booker v. U.S., in 2005).. The Claiborne case involved a judge’s choice of a sentence below a Guidelines minimum, and the Rita case involved one within a Guidelines range. The common question between the two cases is what level of sentence is to be treated as “reasonable” in the advisory Guidelines regime, when a sentence is reviewed on appeal — in Rita, is a within-range sentence presumed to be reasonable, in Claiborne, is a below-range sentence presumed to be reasonable, absent “extraordinary circumstances.”
In Dwyer’s motion on Friday in the Claiborne case, the public defender suggested that the Court’s grant of review in the two cases “seemingly reflects a desire to comprehensively resolve the difficult issues surrounding post-Booker application of the Guidelines. Rita alone does not present the Court with the same opportunity to resolve issues concerning the reasonableness of below-guidelines sentences or the Eighth Circuit’s extraordinary circumstances rule.”
If only Rita were decided, and Claiborne were dismissed, “significant and constantly recurring issues in the post-Booker application of federal sentencing law may remain unresolved,” Dwyer contended. “Dismissal of Claiborne at this stage — if it prevents the Court from reaching the issues in that case — would deprive the federal criminal justice system of urgently needed guidance and coherence.”
The motion went on to argue that it is not clear that dismissal as moot is the only option the Court has in the Claiborne case, now that Mario Claiborne has died. Even if the case were moot because of the death, Dwyer contended, mootness does not necessarily deprive the Court of jurisdiction to rule. On that point, the public defender relied mainly upon a concurring opinion by the late Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist in Honig v. Doe in 1988.
Solicitor General Clement, while agreeing with Dwyer that “the federal criminal justice system would greatly benefit from the prompt resolution” of the issues posed in the Claiborne case, asserted that :this case cannot serve as the vehicle.” In light of Mario Claiborne’s death, Claiborne has no “concrete, personal stake” in the case now.
Dwyer, in discussing the possible alternative of review in the Beal case, said that case raises this question: “Is it consistent with Booker to require that a sentence substantially below the Gujideliens range be supported by extraordinary or compelling circumstances?” The Dwyer motion discusses in detail how similar that case is to Claiborne’s.
The Beal petition can be found here. The Eighth Circuit’s decision in that case can be found here.
