United States v. Zavala-Marti, No. 11-1283 (1st Cir. 2013)
Annotate this CaseAppellant received a life sentence for his role in a large-scale drug operation that sold heroin, crack, cocaine, and marijuana at a public housing project in Puerto Rico. Appellant pled guilty to several drug offenses at the end of the first day of testimony. The First Circuit Court of Appeals vacated Appellant's sentence and remanded for resentencing before a different judge, holding (1) the imposition of a general sentence of life imprisonment on all counts when none of the crimes of conviction supported that penalty was improper, and the life term of imprisonment did not survive the plain error test; and (2) the district court erred in fixing Appellant's sentence by considering information obtained during an ex parte meeting with the probation department.
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