United States Seventh Circuit

Defendant's conviction for conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud and sentence to five years probation, with a community-service obligation but no confinement and a $50,000 fine, is reversed and remanded as, while a judge can give a below-guidelines sentence, the sentence cannot stand if it is based on a legal, factual, or analytic error that is not harmless as it is in this case.

Appellate Information

• Argued 12/10/2009
• Decided 01/29/2010
• Published 01/29/2010

Judges

• POSNER, Circuit Judge., Before POSNER, MANION, and HAMILTON, Circuit Judges.

Court

• United States Seventh Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Christopher S. Niewoehner, Attorney, Office of the United States Attorney, Chicago, IL, for Plaintiff-Appellant.


• For Appellees:
  
• Barry A. Spevack, Attorney, Monico, Pavich & Spevack, Terence P. Gillespie, Attorney, Chicago, IL, for Defendant-Appellee.