In United States v. Butler, No. 21-10659 (Wilson, Branch, Tjoflat), the Court affirmed the defendant’s life sentence for enticing a minor to engage in sexual activity and for production of child pornography. Although it was an upward variance from the guideline range of 292-365 months, the Court held that the life sentence was substantively reasonable.  [...]

In Hesser v. United States, No. 19-13297 (July 13, 2022) (Lagoa, Brasher, Tjoflat), the Court reversed the partial denial of a federal prisoner’s 2255 motion. The movant alleged that defense counsel was ineffective for failing to move for a Rule 29 judgment of acquittal after the government’s case in chief.  The district court granted the [...]

In United States v. Stapleton, No. 19-12708 (Newsom, Marcus, Covington) (July 12, 2022), the Court affirmed the defendant’s alien smuggling convictions. First, the Court rejected the defendant’s argument that the government’s four-year delay in extraditing him violated his constitutional right to a speedy trial.  The district court did not clearly err in finding that the [...]

In United States v. Cohen, No. 21-10741 (Wilson, Branch, Tjoflat) (July 6, 2022), the Court affirmed the denial of a motion to suppress. The Court held that Cohen had Fourth Amendment to standing to challenge the search of the rental car he was driving, even though he was not an authorized driver of the rental [...]

In Riolo v. United States, No. 20-12206 (June 29, 2022) (Jordan, Jill Pryor, Marcus), the Court affirmed the denial of Mr. Riolo's 28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion to vacate his 293-month prison sentence and convictions.     Mr. Riolo argued that his trial counsel provided ineffective assistance of counsel because she told him that if he pleaded guilty to [...]

In United States v. Jackson, No. 21-13963 (June 10, 2022) (Rosenbaum, Jill Pryor, Ed Carnes), the Court vacated Mr. Jackson's ACCA-enhanced sentence and remanded for resentencing without the ACCA sentence enhancement. In this appeal, the Court considered which version of the Controlled Substance Act Schedules incorporated into ACCA’s definition of “serious drug offense” applies when a [...]

In United States v. Stines, No. 20-11035 (May 31, 2022) (Wilson, Luck, Lagoa), the Court affirmed the defendant’s sentence for unlawfully exporting weapons. Ordinarily, under U.S.S.G. 2M5.2(a), the unlawful exportation of weapons carries a base offense level of 26, but there is an exception carrying a base offense level of 14 where the offense involved [...]

In United States v. Gardner, No. 20-13645 (May 27, 2022) (Newsom, Tjoflat, Hull), the Court affirmed the defendant’s ACCA sentence. The district court applied the ACCA based prior Alabama drug convictions.  The defendant argued that his convictions did not qualify as “serious drug offenses” because they did not have a “maximum term of imprisonment” of [...]

In United States v. Jimenez-Shilon, No. 20-13139 (May 23, 2022) (Newsom, Branch, Brasher), the Court held that 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(5)(A)—which prohibits illegal aliens from possessing firearms—does not violate the Second Amendment. The Court held that illegal aliens do not have Second Amendment rights.  The Court assumed, for the sake of argument, that the defendant here [...]

In United States v. Coglianese, No. 20-12074 (May 17, 2022) (William Pryor, Jordan, Brown (N.D. Ga.)), the Court affirmed the defendant’s low-end 168-month for child sex crimes. After upholding the procedural and substantive reasonableness of the sentence, the court upheld a special condition of supervision restricting the defendant from accessing computers and the internet, and [...]