Pleas & Sentencing

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: United States of America v. Justin Hancock

Case No.: 15-1779

Officials: WOOD, Chief Judge, and BAUER and WILLIAMS, Circuit Judges

Focus: Pleas & Sentencing

Judge properly addressed appellant arguments before imposing sentence.

“Hancock’s lawyer acknowledged the lack of precision, stating during the hearing that the comparison was “not scientific” and that the court could not devise any guidelines “from just looking at six cases.” He conceded that his analysis revealed “no discernible pattern as to how the judges of this district are dealing with the cases.” Hancock’s sentencing brief also noted the lack of a clear pattern, and urged only that the comparisons “provid[e] some information that may be of assistance” to the district court. That is hardly a “principal argument in mitigation” that the district court was required to address. United States v. Castaldi, 743 F.3d 589, 598 (7th Cir. 2014) (“Castaldi cannot prove that his sentence is unfair by pointing to a few other cases around the country where similar or worse defendants received lighter sentences, and this was not such a major part of his sentencing position as to trigger special obligations to explain … .”); United States v. Martinez, 650 F.3d 667, 672 (7th Cir. 2011) (“The key word, however, is principal—non-principal arguments can be considered and rejected by the district court without explicit discussion.”); United States v. Martinez, 520 F.3d 749, 753 (7th Cir. 2008). Hancock’s sentence was substantially below the low end of his Guidelines range, and it fell right in the middle of the range of sentences imposed on the offenders he identified. The district judge committed no error by not explaining why Hancock’s sentence did not create an unwarranted disparity with the sentence(s) of (one or more of) those offenders.”

Affirmed

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Attorney Derek A. Hawkins is the managing partner at Hawkins Law Offices LLC, where he heads up the firm’s startup law practice. He specializes in business formation, corporate governance, intellectual property protection, private equity and venture capital funding and mergers & acquisitions. Check out the website at www.hawkins-lawoffices.com or contact them at 262-737-8825.