United States Seventh Circuit

Convictions of defendants for violating various provisions of 21 U.S.C. sections 841, 843 and 846, for their respective roles in a narcotics conspiracy are affirmed and a limited remand ordered for resentencing for certain defendants where: 1) the government provided a satisfactory explanation in this case and therefore no evidence was excludable under section 2518(8)(a); 2) Confrontation Clause error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt; 3) defendant is not entitled to a multiple conspiracies instruction because the theory of defense was not supported by the evidence and the instruction given by the district court put the case before the jury in a straightforward and comprehensive manner; 4) the district court correctly applied an enhancement to a defendant's sentence for possessing a dangerous weapon during the course of the commission of the drug offense; and 5) a limited remand is ordered so that the district court may follow the procedures described in U.S. v. Taylor, 520 F.3d 746, (7th Cir. 2008), to address the effect of both the 2007 Amendment to U.S.S.G. section 2D1.1 and Kimbrough v. U.S., 552 U.S. 85 (2007).

Appellate Information

• Argued 10/07/2009
• Decided 08/24/2010
• Published 08/24/2010

Judges

• RIPPLE

Court

• United States Seventh Circuit

Counsel