552 U.S 38, 128 S.Ct. 586, 169 L.Ed.2d 445 (2007)
In February or March 2000, Brian Michael Gall, then a second-year college student at the University of Iowa, joined an ongoing enterprise distributing ecstasy.1 Gall accepted an invitation from Luke Rinderknecht to participate, receiving ecstasy pills from Rinderknecht and delivering them to other conspirators who sold them to consumers, netting over $30,000 during his seven months of involvement.2
A month or two after joining, Gall stopped using ecstasy.3 In September 2000, he advised Rinderknecht and other co-conspirators that he was withdrawing from the conspiracy and has not sold illegal drugs since.4 He graduated from the University of Iowa in 2002, moved to Arizona for construction work, and later to Colorado earning $18 per hour as a master carpenter, with no illegal drug use after college.5
After moving to Arizona, federal agents questioned Gall about his involvement, and he admitted his limited participation.6 On April 28, 2004, an indictment was returned in the Southern District of Iowa charging Gall and seven others with conspiracy to distribute ecstasy, cocaine, and marijuana beginning in May 1996 through October 2002.7 Gall moved back to Iowa, surrendered, and while free on recognizance started his own construction business with profits over $2,000 per month in the first year.8
Gall entered a plea agreement stipulating responsibility for at least 2,500 grams of ecstasy.9 The presentence report concluded he had no significant criminal history, was not an organizer, and recommended a Guidelines range of 30 to 37 months imprisonment.
At the May 27, 2005 sentencing hearing, the District Court heard testimony and letters praising Gall's character and rehabilitation, then sentenced him to 36 months of probation, explaining the decision based on his voluntary withdrawal, post-offense conduct, family support, lack of criminal history, and age.
The Government appealed to the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, which vacated the sentence, holding that a sentence outside the Guidelines range must be supported by extraordinary circumstances proportional to the variance.10 The Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the Eighth Circuit's approach and the reasonableness of the sentence.11
Whether the Eighth Circuit's requirement that a sentence outside the Guidelines range be supported by extraordinary circumstances proportional to the variance is consistent with United States v. Booker?12
Under United States v. Booker, the Sentencing Guidelines are advisory rather than mandatory, and appellate courts must review all sentences under a deferential abuse-of-discretion standard for reasonableness; neither a presumption of unreasonableness nor a requirement of extraordinary circumstances may be applied to sentences outside the Guidelines range.13
No. The Eighth Circuit's proportionality test requiring extraordinary circumstances for variances is inconsistent with Booker because it imposes a rigidity the advisory Guidelines do not possess.14 Upon Gall's involvement in the ecstasy distribution conspiracy in early 2000 as a college student, he participated for seven months, netting over $30,000 by delivering pills to other conspirators. Subsequently, in September 2000, Gall voluntarily withdrew from the conspiracy after stopping his own drug use, and he has not sold illegal drugs since that time. After graduating from the University of Iowa in 2002, Gall moved to Arizona and then Colorado, where he worked in construction and started his own successful business while remaining drug-free.
After being questioned by federal agents and later indicted in April 2004 for the conspiracy that ran from 1996 to 2002, Gall surrendered and entered a plea agreement stipulating responsibility for at least 2,500 grams of ecstasy. The presentence report recommended a Guidelines range of 30 to 37 months of imprisonment, noting his lack of criminal history and other mitigating factors. At the sentencing hearing in May 2005, the District Court heard extensive evidence of Gall's rehabilitation and character before imposing 36 months of probation. The Government appealed to the Eighth Circuit, which vacated the sentence under its proportionality test requiring extraordinary circumstances for such a variance.
The Supreme Court granted certiorari to address the standard of review for outside-Guidelines sentences and the reasonableness of Gall's sentence. The District Court correctly calculated the Guidelines range, considered the §3553(a) factors including Gall's voluntary withdrawal and post-offense rehabilitation, and made an individualized assessment supporting the probation sentence without any need for extraordinary justification.15
The Eighth Circuit's proportionality test requiring extraordinary circumstances is inconsistent with Booker, and sentences outside the Guidelines range are reviewed under the deferential abuse-of-discretion standard.16
Related opinions on this issue
I join the opinion of the Court.17 In Rita v. United States, I wrote separately to state my view that any appellate review of sentences for substantive reasonableness will necessarily result in a sentencing scheme constitutionally indistinguishable from the mandatory Guidelines struck down in United States v. Booker. Whether a sentencing scheme uses mandatory Guidelines, a proportionality test for Guidelines variances, or a deferential abuse-of-discretion standard, there will be some sentences upheld only on the basis of additional judge-found facts.
Although I continue to believe that substantive-reasonableness review is inherently flawed, I give stare decisis effect to the statutory holding of Rita. The highly deferential standard adopted by the Court today will result in far fewer unconstitutional sentences than the proportionality standard employed by the Eighth Circuit. Moreover, as I noted in Rita, the Court has not foreclosed as-applied constitutional challenges to sentences.
I join the Court's opinion here, as I do in today's companion case of Kimbrough v. United States.18 My disagreements with holdings in those earlier cases are not the stuff of formally perpetual dissent, but I see their objectionable points hexing our judgments today.19 After Booker's remedial holding, I continue to think that the best resolution of the tension between substantial consistency throughout the system and the right of jury trial would be a new Act of Congress reestablishing a statutory system of mandatory sentencing guidelines, though not identical to the original in all points of detail, but providing for jury findings of all facts necessary to set the upper range of sentencing discretion.
Whether appellate courts may apply a presumption of unreasonableness to sentences outside the Guidelines range?20
Appellate courts may not apply a presumption of unreasonableness to sentences outside the Guidelines range, although they may apply a presumption of reasonableness to within-Guidelines sentences.21
No. Such a presumption would come too close to creating an impermissible presumption of unreasonableness for outside-Guidelines sentences and would be inconsistent with the advisory nature of the Guidelines after Booker.22 The District Court correctly calculated the Guidelines range of 30 to 37 months based on Gall's stipulated responsibility for at least 2,500 grams of ecstasy, considered all §3553(a) factors, and imposed 36 months of probation after finding the sentence sufficient but not greater than necessary in light of Gall's voluntary withdrawal in September 2000, substantial rehabilitation, lack of criminal history, and age at the time of the offense.23 The Court of Appeals erred by effectively presuming the substantial variance unreasonable without according due deference to the District Court's individualized assessment.24
Appellate courts may not apply a presumption of unreasonableness to sentences outside the Guidelines range.25
Whether the District Court's sentence of 36 months of probation was reasonable?26
A sentence is substantively reasonable if the district court commits no significant procedural error, correctly calculates the Guidelines range, considers the §3553(a) factors, and the chosen sentence is justified under the totality of the circumstances under abuse-of-discretion review, with due deference to the district court's decision that the factors justify the extent of any variance.27
Yes. The District Court committed no procedural error, correctly calculated the Guidelines range, considered the §3553(a) factors including the seriousness of the offense and the need to avoid unwarranted disparities by inquiring about codefendants' sentences, and reasonably concluded that Gall's voluntary withdrawal from the conspiracy in September 2000, self-motivated rehabilitation, successful business, family support, lack of criminal history, and age at the time of the offense justified a sentence of 36 months of probation as sufficient but not greater than necessary.28 The Court of Appeals failed to give due deference when it engaged in what amounted to de novo review and disagreed with the weight the District Court assigned to these factors.29
The District Court's sentence of 36 months of probation was reasonable.30
Related opinions on this issue
Consistent with my dissenting opinion in Kimbrough v. United States, I would affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals because the District Court committed statutory error when it departed below the applicable Guidelines range.31 The Guidelines represent the considered judgment of the Sentencing Commission and Congress, and a sentence of probation in a case involving a significant drug conspiracy does not adequately reflect the seriousness of the offense.
The fundamental question in this case is whether, under the remedial decision in United States v. Booker, a district court must give the policy decisions that are embodied in the Sentencing Guidelines at least some significant weight in making a sentencing decision.32 I would answer that question in the affirmative and would therefore affirm the decision of the Court of Appeals.33 The District Court considered the sentence called for by the Guidelines, but I see no evidence that the District Court deferred to the Guidelines to any significant degree.34
Rather, the court determined what it thought was appropriate under the circumstances and sentenced petitioner accordingly. If the question before us was whether a reasonable jurist could conclude that a sentence of probation was sufficient in this case to serve the purposes of punishment set out in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a)(2), the District Court's decision could not be disturbed. But because I believe that sentencing judges must still give some significant weight to the Guidelines sentencing range, the Commission's policy statements, and the need to avoid unwarranted sentencing disparities, I agree with the Eighth Circuit that the District Court did not properly exercise its discretion.