United States v. Nolan Nathaniel Edwards

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[PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
________________________
No. 19-13366
________________________
D.C. Docket No. 8:96-cr-00332-JDW-AAS-1
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
versus
NOLAN NATHANIEL EDWARDS,
Defendant-Appellant.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of Florida
________________________
(May 13, 2021)
Before JORDAN, NEWSOM, and TJOFLAT, Circuit Judges.
NEWSOM, Circuit Judge:
The First Step Act provides, as relevant to our purposes, that the district
court that originally sentenced a criminal defendant for a crack-cocaine-related
offense may, if certain conditions obtain, “impose a reduced sentence.” First Step
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Act, Pub. L. No. 115-391, 132 Stat. 5194, § 404(b) (codified at 21 U.S.C. § 841note). Section 3582(c)(1)(B) of Title 18, pursuant to which many First Step Act
motions are filed, is similar, but not quite identical. It authorizes (again, as
relevant here) a district court to “modify an imposed term of imprisonment to the
extent otherwise permitted by statute . . . .” 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(B).
The defendant here, who was initially sentenced for crack-related crimes to a
term of “life imprisonment without release,” moved to modify his sentence under
the First Step Act and § 3582(c)(1)(B). The district court granted the defendant’s
motion to reduce his prison term, but also concluded that the First Step Act
required it to impose an eight-year term of supervised release. On appeal, the
defendant argues that the First Step Act only empowers a court to subtract from a
sentence, not add to one, as he contends the district court did here when it
appended a term of supervised release to his otherwise reduced sentence.
This case presents two issues. First, a threshold procedural question: Must a
First Step Act motion be brought pursuant to § 3582(c)(1)(B)—or, instead, is the
First Step Act self-contained and self-executing, such that a defendant can proceed
under it directly? And second, the merits: Under the First Step Act, can a district
court, in the course of “reduc[ing]” a defendant’s overall sentence, impose a new
term of supervised release?
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For the reasons that follow, we hold (1) that the First Step Act is self-
contained and self-executing, and that a motion brought under that Act needn’t be
paired with a request for relief under § 3582(c)(1)(B), and (2) that a district court
has the authority under the First Step Act to impose a new term of supervised
release on a First Step Act movant, provided that it “reduce[s]” the movant’s
overall sentence.
I
In the late 1990s, Nolan Edwards was convicted in federal court of two
crack-cocaine-related offenses. Because Edwards had prior felony drug
convictions, he was sentenced to a mandatory term of “life imprisonment without
release” under the statutory provisions then in effect. See 21 U.S.C. §
841(b)(1)(A) (1996) (“If any person commits a violation of this subparagraph . . .
after two or more prior convictions for a felony drug offense have become final,
such person shall be sentenced to a mandatory term of life imprisonment without
release.”).
Years later, in 2010, Congress passed the Fair Sentencing Act, which was
aimed at correcting the sentencing disparities between crack and powder cocaine
offenses and which increased the quantities of crack cocaine necessary to trigger
certain penalties. See Fair Sentencing Act, Pub. L. No. 111-220, 124 Stat. 2372.
Then, in 2018, Congress enacted the First Step Act—at issue here—which made
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the Fair Sentencing Act’s reduced statutory penalties retroactively applicable to
what it called “covered offense[s].” See First Step Act, Pub. L. No. 115-391, 132
Stat. 5194, § 404. Under § 404(b) of the First Step Act, a court “that imposed a
sentence for a covered offense may, on motion of the defendant, the Director of the
Bureau of Prisons, the attorney for the Government, or the court, impose a reduced
sentence as if . . . the Fair Sentencing Act . . . were in effect at the time the covered
offense was committed.” Id. § 404(b).
Citing both the First Step Act and 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(B), Edwards
moved to modify his life-imprisonment-without-release sentence. All agree that
Edwards was convicted of a “covered offense” within the meaning of § 404(b) of
the First Step Act. Accordingly, the Act authorized the district court that had
initially imposed Edwards’s sentence to reduce it in accordance with the revised-
penalty provisions of the Fair Sentencing Act. The district court granted
Edwards’s motion and (fairly dramatically) reduced his prison term from “life
imprisonment without release” to “262 months . . . or time served.” The court also
concluded, though, that the Fair Sentencing Act—applied retroactively as the First
Step Act demands—required the imposition of an eight-year term of supervised
release. See 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(B).
On appeal, Edwards argues that the First Step Act only empowers a court to
“reduce[]” a sentence—not, he says, to add to one, as he contends the district court
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did here by appending a supervised-release term to his otherwise reduced
sentence.1
II
A
Before jumping into the merits, we must address a threshold procedural
question of first impression. As just explained, when Edwards moved for a
sentence modification, he invoked both § 404(b) of the First Step Act—which,
again, permits a court in certain circumstances to “impose a reduced sentence”—
and 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(B)—which, again, authorizes a court to “modify an
imposed term of imprisonment.”
The wrinkle: The term “sentence,” used in the First Step Act, isn’t
synonymous with the phrase “term of imprisonment,” used in § 3582(c)(1)(B). A
“term of imprisonment,” after all, is only one component of a “sentence”—as is a
term of supervised release or a fine. See, e.g., Mont v. United States, 139 S. Ct.
1826, 1834 (2019) (“Supervised release is a form of punishment that Congress
prescribes along with a term of imprisonment as part of the same sentence.”). To
the extent that there’s any doubt about that, the structure of Title 18 removes it—
1
We review questions regarding the jurisdiction of district courts and questions of statutory
interpretation de novo. United States v. Oliver, 148 F.3d 1274, 1275 (11th Cir. 1998); United
States v. Rojas, 718 F.3d 1317, 1319 (11th Cir. 2013).
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Chapter 227, titled “Sentences,” comprises separate subchapters on
“Imprisonment,” “Probation,” and “Fines.”
That mismatch tees up the following question: Is the First Step Act self-
executing, such that a defendant can proceed under it directly, or must a defendant
seeking First Step Act relief do so (as many do) in conjunction with, and through, §
3582(c)(1)(B)? The reason that question matters here: If a defendant has to pursue
First Step Act relief through § 3582(c)(1)(B), then a district court’s authority is
limited to “modify[ing] an imposed term of imprisonment”—which does not
include supervised release, which the district court adjusted here. If, however, the
First Step Act is self-executing, such that we needn’t even involve § 3582(c)(1)(B),
then it seems to us that the power to impose a “reduced sentence” is broad enough
to include the authority to add a term of supervised release—it being but one
component of a “sentence”—so long as the overall “sentence” is in fact “reduced.”
For the following reasons, we’re not convinced (as others have assumed)
that § 3582(c)(1)(B) must serve as the procedural vehicle for a First Step Act
motion—or, for that matter, that the First Step Act needs a separate vehicle. To the
contrary, we hold that the First Step Act is a self-contained, self-executing,
independent grant of authority empowering district courts to modify criminal
sentences in the circumstances to which the Act applies.
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We start from the unremarkable premise that while district courts lack the
inherent authority to modify criminal sentences, they “may do so . . . when
authorized by a statute or rule.” United States v. Puentes, 803 F.3d 597, 606 (11th
Cir. 2015). To be sure, Congress granted that “authoriz[ation]” in 1984, when it
enacted the statute now codified at 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c). But just as surely,
“statutes enacted by one Congress cannot bind a later Congress,” and there was
nothing in § 3582(c)—or in the law more generally—to prevent Congress from
doing so again. See Dorsey v. United States, 567 U.S. 260, 274 (2012).
Enter the First Step Act, which Congress passed in 2018. Section 404(b) of
the Act reads as a self-contained and self-executing grant of authority:
A court that imposed a sentence for a covered offense may, on motion
of the defendant, the Director of the Bureau of Prisons, the attorney
for the Government, or the court, impose a reduced sentence as if . . .
the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 . . . were in effect at the time the
covered offense was committed.
First Step Act, Pub. L. No. 115-391, 132 Stat. 5194, § 404(b). By its plain terms, §
404(b) independently vests district courts with the authority to reduce sentences
under the circumstances described in the statute. Not only does § 404(b)’s
language not suggest that it needs to piggyback on § 3582(c)(1)(B), it suggests the
opposite. For reasons already explained, § 404(b)’s broad authorization to reduce
“sentence[s]” is, to put the matter plainly, too big to fit into § 3582(c)(1)(B)’s
narrower authorization regarding modifications of “term[s] of imprisonment.”
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We conclude, therefore, that § 404(b)’s text is clear: It independently grants
a district court the authority, in the relevant circumstances, to “impose a reduced
sentence.” It is self-contained and self-executing. It requires no assist from §
3582(c)(1)(B). It is its own procedural vehicle.
The Seventh Circuit’s recent decision in United States v. Sutton, 962 F.3d
979 (7th Cir. 2020), is instructive, if not quite on all fours. There, a convicted
defendant proceeding pro se had originally brought a First Step Act motion
pursuant to § 3582(c)(1)(B)’s statutory neighbor, 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(2)—which
permits a district court to reduce the sentence of an individual whose “sentencing
range . . . has subsequently been lowered by the Sentencing Commission.” On
appeal from the district court’s denial, the defendant’s newly-appointed appellate
counsel agreed with the government that his client had initially invoked the wrong
vehicle, since it was Congress—not the Sentencing Commission—that passed the
Fair Sentencing Act and the First Step Act. See id. at 894. That seemingly left two
options: Either a First Step Act motion should proceed in tandem with—and under
the auspices of—§ 3582(c)(1)(B), or it could proceed independently, on its own.
For its part, the government argued—as it does here—that § 3582(c)(1)(B)
“must . . . provide the procedural vehicle under which § 404(b) of the First Step
Act operates to permit” a sentence modification. Id. The Sutton court disagreed; it
sided with the defendant’s lawyer and held that “the First Step is its own
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procedural vehicle.” Id. In so holding, the Seventh Circuit focused less on the
textual and structural considerations that we have emphasized—namely, that the
First Step Act’s language embodies a self-contained and self-executing grant of
sentence-reduction authority, and that there are important linguistic and conceptual
differences between “sentence[s]” and “term[s] of imprisonment”—than on §
3582(c)(1)(B)’s own inherent limitations:
Section 3582(c)(1)(B) does not itself provide a basis for a defendant
to move for a sentence reduction. It provides only that “the court may
modify an imposed term of imprisonment to the extent otherwise
permitted by statute” or [Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure] 35. It
offers no relief and imposes no conditions, limits, or restrictions on
the relief permitted by that other statute or the Rule. Critically . . .
subsection (c)(1)(B) does not even refer to who can move for
modification or how. All that information is contained in the other
statute, here § 404(b) of the First Step Act.
Id. (citations omitted). Although our analysis—or emphasis, at least—
differs from the Seventh Circuit’s at the margins, we agree with that court’s
bottom-line conclusion: “[T]he First Step Act is its own procedural vehicle”
for bringing a sentence-reduction motion. Id. 2
2
The Seventh Circuit went on in Sutton to say that § 3582(c)(1)(B) is not “irrelevant” and that it
did “not disagree” that the First Step Act should be read “in conjunction with” § 3582(c)(1)(B).
See 962 F.3d at 984–85. Maybe. Perhaps all the court meant was (1) that “[t]he value of §
3582(c)(1)(B)” is that “[i]t makes explicit what would otherwise be implicit: the general
prohibition against modification of a term of imprisonment gives way to specific exceptions
without either repealing the other,” and (2) that “to read the First Step Act in conjunction with §
3582(c)(1)(B) is just to read the First Step Act and assess what it permits.” Id. at 985. If so, then
we agree. Beyond that we wouldn’t go, except to reiterate our view that the First Step Act is a
self-contained, self-executing, independent grant of authority empowering district courts to
impose “reduced sentence[s]” in the circumstances to which it applies.
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The government contends that our decision in United States v. Denson, 963
F.3d 1080 (11th Cir. 2020), establishes that a First Step Act sentence-modification
motion necessarily involves § 3582(c)(1)(B). We disagree. The lone “issue on
appeal” in that case was “whether [a] district court is required to first hold a
hearing at which [the defendant] is present” before deciding a sentence-reduction
motion. Id. at 1082; see also id. at 1086 (“The only issue is whether [the
defendant] had a legal right to be present at a hearing before the district court ruled
on his motion.”). With respect to that issue, we held that “the First Step Act does
not require district courts to hold a hearing with the defendant present before ruling
on a defendant’s motion for a reduced sentence under the Act.” Id. at 1082. It’s
true that, along the way, we assumed (like others before us) that a First Step Act
motion would be brought in conjunction with § 3582(c)(1)(B). See id. at 1086.
But we weren’t confronted with the question we face today—whether the First
Step Act is an independent grant of sentence-reduction authority—and so, of
course, we had no occasion to resolve it. See Cooper Indus., Inc. v. Aviall Servs.,
Inc., 543 U.S. 157, 170 (2004) (“Questions which merely lurk in the record, neither
brought to the attention of the court nor ruled upon, are not to be considered as
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having been decided as to constitute precedents.” (quoting Webster v. Fall, 266
U.S. 507, 511 (1925)). 3
* * *
In short, we hold that the First Step Act is a self-contained and self-
executing provision that independently authorizes district courts to impose
“reduced sentence[s]” in the circumstances specified in the statute. That
conclusion follows from the Act’s plain language, as well as the textual and
conceptual differences between “sentence[s],” the term used in § 404(b), and
“term[s] of imprisonment,” the phrase used in § 3582(c)(1)(B)). 4
B
We turn, then, to Edwards’s merits argument. Again, Edwards contends that
the First Step Act only empowers a court to “reduce” a sentence, not to add to one,
as he insists the district court did here when, in the course of reducing his sentence
3
We recognize, as well, that the Fourth Circuit has said that Ҥ 3582(c)(1)(B) is the appropriate
vehicle for a First Step Act motion.” United States v. Wirsing, 943 F.3d 175, 185 (4th Cir.
2019). It said so, though, only in the course of choosing between § 3582(c)(1)(B)—which,
again, permits a court to “modify an imposed term of imprisonment to the extent otherwise
expressly permitted by statute”—and § 3582(c)(2)—which permits modification when “a
sentencing range . . . has subsequently been lowered by the Sentencing Commission” and which,
as all agreed in Sutton, has no relevance to a First Step Act request. Id.; accord United States v.
Holloway, 956 F.3d 660, 665 (2d Cir. 2020). If those two were our only options, we might well
agree. But we see no reason—and the Fourth Circuit’s decision doesn’t explain—why the First
Step Act can’t serve as its own procedural vehicle, separate and apart from § 3582(c)(1)(B).
4
Because we aren’t faced with a scenario in which the district court imposed any non-standard
conditions of supervised release, we have no occasion to determine what process or hearing, if
any, would be due in that circumstance.
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from “life imprisonment without release” to “262 months . . . or time served,” it
imposed a new term of mandatory supervised release. Because a supervised-
release term hadn’t been imposed as part of his original life-without-release
sentence, Edwards asserts that the district court exceeded its statutory authority
under the First Step Act when it included that term in his modified sentence.
We disagree. Edwards erroneously fixates on the supervised-release
“component” of his modified sentence. See Br. of Appellant at 6, 7, 12, 19.
Section 404(b)’s focus is the “sentence” itself—the unitary thing—and it
empowers the district court to “reduce[]” that “sentence.” So long as a defendant’s
overall “sentence” is “reduced,” therefore, it seems to us that the authority that §
404(b) confers is broad enough to empower a court to impose a new term of
supervised release, it being one aspect of the “sentence.” Here, Edwards’s overall
sentence was undoubtedly reduced. Edwards started out with a sentence of “life
imprisonment without release,” and ended up with a sentence of “262 months
. . . or time served” plus eight years of mandatory supervised release. Under any
reasonable understanding of the term, that modification constituted a sentence
“reduc[tion].”5
5
We needn’t address here hypos that occupy the other end of the spectrum. See, e.g., Reply Br.
of Appellant at 2 (“Suppose that a district court were to reduce a sentence by one day, but then
impose a term of supervised release not previously imposed totaling five years.”).
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III
For the foregoing reasons, we hold (1) that the First Step Act is a self-
contained and self-executing provision that independently grants district courts
authority to impose “reduced sentence[s],” such that a defendant can proceed under
the Act directly, without resort to § 3582(c)(1)(B), and (2) that when the district
court here modified Edwards’s sentence from “life imprisonment without release”
to “260 months . . . or time served” plus eight years of supervised release, it validly
“reduced” his sentence within the meaning of the Act.6
AFFIRMED.
6
In his brief, Edwards separately contended that even if the district court had the authority to
impose a new term of supervised release, he had a constitutional right to be present at a hearing
during which the supervised-release term was imposed. As already noted, though, since
Edwards filed his briefs in this case, we held in Denson that “the First Step Act does not require
district courts to hold a hearing with the defendant present before ruling on a defendant’s motion
for a reduced sentence under the Act.” 963 F.3d at 1082.
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