Before: Newman, Pooler and Katzmann, C.JJ.
http://nycourts.law.com/CourtDocumentViewer.asp?view=Document&docID=118739
ON JAN. 31, 2008, defendant Nigerian citizen was sentenced to 87 months in prison after pleading guilty to interstate transportation of stolen property in connection with an elaborate conspiracy between December 2000 and January 2006 to steal and cash checks sent to a lockbox maintained by JP Morgan Chase. The conduct constituting the substantive offenses for which defendant was convicted took place between December 2005 and January 2006. Appealing the Jan. 31, 2008, judgment, defendant claimed he was improperly denied a minimal role adjustment that the district court had contemplated giving in a written sentencing opinion. On an issue of first impression, the Second Circuit, informed by the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2008 decision in Irizarry v. United States, noted that procedural errors occur when a defendant is not alerted to a likely change from a judge’s anticipated Sentencing Guidelines calculation and when that change is not sufficiently supported by the judge’s findings. Concluding that the decision not to impose the contemplated adjustment required findings, the appellate panel remanded defendant’s case. If an adjustment is warranted, sentence should be modified.
