If you represent a criminal defendant who is up for resentencing on remand, a new Third Circuit Court of Appeals opinion could be good news for your client. This week, the Third Circuit has clarified when post-sentencing rehabilitation considerations are appropriate in resentencing.

The court rejected Salinas-Cortez’s request to consider his post-sentencing rehabilitation, and reimposed the original sentence. A week later, the Supreme Court decided United States v. Pepper.

Salinas-Cortez appealed again, arguing that the district court erred in refusing to consider any evidence of his post-sentencing rehabilitation on remand as permitted by Pepper.

In Pepper, the Supreme Court ruled that, once an original sentence is set aside on appeal, a district court could consider post-sentencing rehabilitation in determining an appropriate sentence on remand. The Court reasoned that a defendant’s post-sentencing rehabilitation may, in some cases, be as significant in assessing the defendant’s likelihood of recidivism as the defendant’s conduct before he was forced to account for his anti-social behavior.

If the hope of supervised release is not enough to persuade a convicted client to mind his Ps and Qs in the pen, tell him to consider this: best behavior during a sentencing appeal could result in a lighter punishment if he wins resentencing.

Related Resources:

  • U.S. v. Salinas-Cortez (Third Circuit Court of Appeals)
  • Pepper v. United States (FindLaw’s CaseLaw)
  • Recalculate: Feds Win in Vincent Fumo Sentence Appeal (FindLaw’s Third Circuit blog)

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