United States v. Thompson, No. 15-3086 (3d Cir. 2016)
Annotate this CaseIn 2008 and 2011, the two defendants pled guilty to drug offenses. In 2014, the Sentencing Commission promulgated Amendment 782 to the Guidelines, which retroactively reduced by two levels the base offense levels assigned to many drug quantities, including the drug quantities associated with defendants' offenses. Defendants filed 18 U.S.C. 3582(c)(2) motions for sentence reduction. That section permits a district court to exercise its discretion to reduce a sentence only if the sentence is “based on” a Guidelines range that has subsequently been lowered and a sentence reduction would be consistent with the Sentencing Commission’s policy statements. The Sentencing Commission’s policy statement prohibits a district court from reducing a defendant’s sentence unless a subsequent amendment to the Guidelines lowers the defendant’s “applicable guideline range.” Amendment 759, promulgated in 2011, provides that a defendant’s “applicable guideline range” is to be determined before any departures and variances. The Third Circuit affirmed denial of their motions, citing Amendment 759. Their pre-departure/pre-variance “applicable guideline ranges” were calculated using the base offense levels for career offenders in Guidelines 4B1.1, which have not been lowered. The court rejected an argument that Amendment 759 is an invalid ex post facto law.
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