United States v. Armstead

On remand from the United States Supreme Court, the Fifth Circuit vacated defendant's sentence and remanded for resentencing in light of Hughes v. United States, 138 S. Ct. 1765 (2018).The district court had denied defendant's motion for a sentence reduction under 18 U.S.C. 3582(c)(2) based on Amendment 782 to the United States Sentencing Guidelines, which lowered the base offense levels in the drug quantity table of U.S.S.G. 2D1.1(c). In Hughes, the Supreme Court abrogated this circuit's holding in United States v. Benitez, 822 F.3d 807, 810 (5th Cir. 2016), and held that a sentence imposed pursuant to a Rule 11(c) or "Type-C" plea agreement was typically based on the sentencing guideline range because the court must first evaluate the stipulated sentence in light of the defendant's sentencing guideline range. The Court further held that a sentence imposed pursuant to a Type–C agreement is based on the defendant's Guidelines range so long as that range was part of the framework the district court relied on in imposing the sentence or accepting the agreement. In this case, defendant entered into a Type-C agreement and his sentence was based on his guideline range because it was part of the framework the court relied upon in imposing his sentence. View "United States v. Armstead" on Justia Law