By: WISCONSIN LAW JOURNAL STAFF//March 6, 2012//
United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit
Criminal
Criminal Procedure — collateral relief
Where a defendant’s attorney failed to seek certiorari in the Supreme Court, the defendant cannot obtain relief from his sentence, even though he would be entitled to a lower sentence if sentenced today.
“Wyatt would not be sentenced as a career offender today and likely would receive a substantially lower sentence; the taxpayer is footing the bill to keep Wyatt in prison far longer than Congress or the Sentencing Commission intended, but there is no longer any judicial procedure to remedy the situation. At this point, only the executive branch has the authority to grant Wyatt the relief he seeks. See Herrera v. Collins, 506 U.S. 390, 411-12 (1993) (clemency is the historic remedy for preventing miscarriages of justice where judicial process has been exhausted). As matters stand now, Wyatt’s claims are being batted back and forth between two circuits with differing views of how (and perhaps whether) he may be heard on the merits of his claim. This is an untenable and unseemly waste of judicial resources.”
Motion Denied.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Illinois, Herndon, J., Rovner, J.