United States v. Ruffin Parker, III

NOT RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION
File Name: 21a0087n.06
Case No. 19-2362
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT
FILED
Feb 10, 2021
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, ) DEBORAH S. HUNT, Clerk
)
Plaintiff-Appellee, )
) ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED
v. ) STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR
) THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF
RUFFIN LEON PARKER, III, ) MICHIGAN
)
Defendant-Appellant. )
ORDER
BEFORE: SUTTON, COOK, and READLER, Circuit Judges.
SUTTON, Circuit Judge. May a federal court deny relief before it is requested? Tempting
though the reasons may be to say yes in this case, the answer is no. We accordingly vacate the
judgment of the district court denying a sentence modification.
Ruffin Parker pleaded guilty to conspiring to possess with intent to distribute over 1,000
kilograms of marijuana. See 21 U.S.C. §§ 846, 841(a)(1), 841(b)(1)(A)(vii). The district court
treated him as a career offender and sentenced him to 210 months of imprisonment. In re Parker,
No. 18-2187, at *1 (6th Cir. Feb. 26, 2019). Since then, the district court has once reduced Parker’s
sentence, it has once denied Parker’s § 2255 motion challenging his career-offender status, and we
have twice denied Parker’s requests to file a second or successive § 2255 motion. Id.
Case No. 19-2362, United States v. Parker
That brings us to today’s matter. After our decision in United States v. Havis, 927 F.3d
382 (6th Cir. 2019) (en banc) (per curiam), Parker asked the district court to appoint an attorney
to help him address how that decision—altering the use of prior convictions to establish
career-offender status—might affect his own case. The district court granted his request.
Parker’s appointed counsel filed a brief explaining that Havis does not provide grounds for
relief on collateral review. See Bullard v. United States, 937 F.3d 654, 658–59 (6th Cir. 2019).
He requested that the district court hold Parker’s “case” in abeyance pending a petition for a writ
of certiorari in Havis. (The Supreme Court did not grant the petition.)
Through it all, Parker never filed a successive § 2255 motion nor even applied for one.
In response to all of this, the district court “construe[d]” Parker’s brief—the one explaining
how Havis would not help him—“as a motion for sentence modification under Havis.” R.612 at
1. Without addressing the stay request, it reasoned that Havis did not offer any help to Parker and
explained that, “to the extent that Parker’s brief requests relief, it is DENIED.” Id. at 3.
Parker appeals.
There is a lot more that goes into being a district court judge than a court of appeals judge.
For that reason, we should be reluctant to interfere with the many challenges that confront trial
courts faced with all manner of filings, requests, and pleas for relief from incarcerated individuals.
The unusual sequence of events presented by today’s matter, we suspect, typifies the wide range
of requests faced by clerks of court and the trial courts they serve. All of this makes it tempting to
look the other way when one-of-a-kind filings unwittingly and unintentionally sidestep the
strictures of Article III. But just as federal courts may not permit “plaintiff-less complaints” filed
under novel circumstances, In re: 2016 Primary Election, 836 F.3d 584, 588 (6th Cir. 2016), they
may not decide controversy-less disputes under prosaic circumstances. A dispute must be real,
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Case No. 19-2362, United States v. Parker
substantial, and “admitting of specific relief through a decree of a conclusive character.” Aetna
Life Ins. Co. v. Haworth, 300 U.S. 227, 241 (1937). Potential cases fall short. Unless and until a
plaintiff seeks relief, federal courts must avoid offering “advisory opinions about what they might
do if an action were filed.” United States v. Asakevich, 810 F.3d 418, 420 (6th Cir. 2016).
All Parker sought was a stay pending a petition for a writ of certiorari. No more, no less.
In construing that request as a motion for a sentence reduction, the district court entertained a
dispute that did not—and may not ever—exist. See Trump v. New York, 141 S. Ct. 530, 535 (2020)
(per curiam). In construing Parker’s motion as one to modify his sentence and denying relief, the
court resolved a hypothetical request, not a live dispute. Because “[f]ederal courts do not lightly
grant relief in non-existent cases,” Asakevich, 810 F.3d at 420, the district court ventured a step
too far.
The mishap springs from the best of intentions. Parker’s own attorney (helpfully)
explained that our intervening precedent does not affect Parker’s sentence. Why wait to say just
that? The laudable aims of judicial efficiency sometimes must bend to the imperatives of Article
III. While federal courts may be tempted to do here and now what likely (maybe surely) will be
done there and then, the Constitution demands that we wait. If Parker files an application for a
successive § 2255 motion, we can address whether his claim clears the certification threshold at
that point. See 28 U.S.C. § 2255(h). Until then, the federal courts lack the power to do so
preemptively.
One matter lingers. The district court’s order did have some legal effect. Because Parker
requested a stay, the district court had the power to deny that relief. And because a district court’s
order denying a stay of its own proceedings is not generally appealable, we lack jurisdiction to
consider his appeal of that decision. Swanson v. DeSantis, 606 F.3d 829, 834 (6th Cir. 2010).
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Case No. 19-2362, United States v. Parker
To the extent the district court denied a request to modify Parker’s sentence, that judgment
is VACATED and the case is REMANDED with instructions to dismiss Parker’s motion for lack
of subject matter jurisdiction. The appeal of the district court’s order denying Parker’s request for
a stay is DISMISSED for lack of jurisdiction.
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