United States Eighth Circuit

Neither Booker nor 18 U.S.C. section 3553(a) authorizes district courts to reject the 100:1 quantity ratio inherent in the U.S.S.G. and use a different ratio in sentencing defendants for crack cocaine offenses. A conviction for conspiracy to distribute crack and powder cocaine is affirmed over challenges to the sufficiency of the evidence and admission of evidence, but the sentence is reversed and remanded pursuant to the government's claim that the district court erred in granting a downward variance based solely on the district court's categorical rejection of the 100:1 powder cocaine to crack cocaine quantity ratio inherent in the sentencing guidelines.

Appellate Information

• Decided 12/05/2006
• Published 12/05/2006

Judges

• RILEY, Circuit Judge., Before LOKEN, Chief Judge, WOLLMAN, MURPHY, BYE, RILEY, MELLOY, SMITH, COLLOTON, GRUENDER, BENTON, and SHEPHERD, Circuit Judges, en banc.

Court

• United States Eighth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellees:
  
• Douglas Roehrich, Sioux City, IA, for appellant/cross-appellee., Shawn S. Wehde, Special Assistant U.S. Attorney, Sioux City, IA, for appellee/cross-appellant., Mark Osler, Waco, TX, for Amici on behalf of appellant/cross-appellee.