Sentencing Guidelines

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: Michael Daniels v. United States of America

Case No.: 17-2618

Officials: EASTERBROOK, SYKES, and BARRETT, Circuit Judges.

Focus: Sentencing Guidelines

In 1991 Michael Daniels was sentenced to 35 years in prison for drug-trafficking crimes he committed while leading the violent Brothers of the Struggle street gang in Milwaukee in the 1980s. Based on two of his many prior crimes, he was sentenced as a career offender under the then-mandatory Sentencing Guidelines. But the designation did not affect his sentencing range, which was 360 months to life with or without it.

More than two decades later, Daniels moved to vacate his sentence under 28 U.S.C. § 2255 on the authority of Johnson v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 2551 (2015), which invalidated the “residual clause” in the Armed Career Criminal Act as unconstitutionally vague. Daniels argued that the identically phrased residual clause in the career-offender guideline is likewise unconstitutionally vague. Because one of the predicate convictions for his career-offender status qualified only under the residual clause, Daniels maintained that he was entitled to resentencing. The district judge disagreed, relying on Beckles v. United States, 137 S. Ct. 886 (2017), which forecloses vagueness challenges to the post-Booker advisory Sentencing Guidelines. The judge certified his decision for appeal based on uncertainty about the status of circuit precedent regarding vagueness challenges to the pre-Booker mandatory Guidelines.

The parties addressed that question in their initial briefs. In the meantime, a panel of this court issued a definitive answer, ruling that defendants who were sentenced under the mandatory Guidelines may bring Johnson-based vagueness challenges to the career-offender guideline. Cross v. United States, 892 F.3d 288, 304–06 (7th Cir. 2018). Applying Johnson, the panel in Cross invalidated the residual clause of the “crime of violence” definition in the career-offender guideline and applied that ruling retroactively, authorizing relief under § 2255. Id. at 299–304.

We directed the parties to file new briefs addressing the effect of Cross on this case. We now affirm. Under Johnson and Cross, Daniels was wrongly designated a career offender. But the error was harmless because it did not affect his sentence.

Affirmed

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Derek A Hawkins is trademark corporate counsel for Harley-Davidson. Hawkins oversees the prosecution and maintenance of the Harley-Davidson’s international trademark portfolio in emerging markets.