United States Second Circuit

Defendant's child pornography distribution sentence is vacated where: 1) it appeared that the district court believed it was imposing a non-Sentencing Guidelines sentence when, in fact, it selected a sentence conforming exactly to the Guidelines, and thus committed procedural error; 2) the sentence was substantively unreasonable because of the district court's apparent assumption that defendant was likely to actually sexually assault a child, a view unsupported by the record evidence yet one that plainly motivated the court's perceived need "to protect the public from further crimes of the defendant"; and 3) the district court erred in considering it a foregone conclusion that the statutory maximum sentence "probably [would] be upheld" on appeal, apparently because it concluded that its sentence was "relatively far below" the initial Guidelines calculation.

Appellate Information

• Decided 05/11/2010
• Published 05/11/2010

Judges

Court

• United States Second Circuit

Counsel