Opinion
Case No. 3:93-CR-00714-JGC-1
11-23-2020
UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff v. Wilson de Jesus RENDON-MARIN, Defendant.
ORDER
James G. Carr, Sr. U.S. District Judge
Pending in this case is the defendant, Wilson de Jesus Rendon-Marin's, motion for compassionate release from custody under 18 U.S.C. § 3582 and the First Step Act of 2018, Pub. L. No. 115-391, 132 Stat. 5194. (Doc. 160, 164).
Mr. Rendon-Marin, now fifty-nine years old, has been an inmate of the Bureau of Prisons ("BOP") since 1994. He contends that his deteriorating physical condition and the risks associated with the COVID-19 pandemic justify the requested relief. The government has responded to, but does not oppose, the motion (Doc. 165). Mr. Rendon-Marin has not replied.
For the following reasons, I grant Mr. Rendon-Marin's motion.
Background
On March 5, 1993, the government charged Mr. Rendon-Marin with conspiracy to distribute cocaine in violation of 21 U.S.C. § 846 and interstate travel in aid of racketeering in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1952. On June 2, 1994, a jury found Mr. Rendon-Marin guilty of both counts. On September 21, 1994, I sentenced Mr. Rendon-Marin to life imprisonment because, given Mr. Rendon-Marin's two prior felonies, I was required to under 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A).
Mr. Rendon-Marin is a Colombian national. He has an active Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainer request.
Mr. Rendon-Marin suffers from medical conditions, including, inter alia , obesity, schizophrenia, and depression. (Doc. 164, pgID 3-4).
The government concedes that Mr. Rendon-Marin's medical conditions are extraordinary and compelling reasons to grant compassionate release. (Doc. 165, pgID 1). Perhaps more importantly, the government makes no argument against compassionate release and defers to my discretion on the matter.
Legal Standard
Section 3582(c)(1)(A)(i) states that a court:
may reduce the term of imprisonment (and may impose a term of probation or supervised release with or without conditions that does not exceed the unserved portion of the original term of imprisonment), after considering the factors set forth in section 3553(a) to the extent that they are applicable, if it finds that--
(i) extraordinary and compelling reasons warrant such a reduction;
Pursuant to the requirement of 28 U.S.C. § 994(t), the Sentencing Commission promulgated a policy statement setting out the criteria for sentence reduction in U.S.S.G. § 1B1.13 which require that:
(1)(A) extraordinary and compelling reasons warrant the reduction;
(2) the defendant is not a danger to the safety of any other person or to the community, as provided in 18 U.S.C. § 3142(g) ; and
(3) the reduction is consistent with this policy statement.
Section 3553(a) lists the sentencing factors a court must consider as:
(1) the nature and circumstances of the offense and the history and characteristics of the defendant;
(2) the need for the sentence imposed-- (A) to reflect the seriousness of the offense, to promote respect for the law, and to provide just punishment for the offense;
(B) to afford adequate deterrence to criminal conduct;
(C) to protect the public from further crimes of the defendant ....
Discussion
As discussed above, Mr. Rendon-Marin's medical conditions put him at greater risk of severe illness and possibly death were he to contract COVID-19.
Mr. Rendon-Marin has shown that he meets the requirements for compassionate relief because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The CDC considers people with his medical conditions to be at an increased risk of severe effects if infected, and, as of this date, FMC Rochester has ten inmate COVID-19 cases and another ten cases involving staff members, https://www.bop.gov/coronavirus/ (last visited Nov. 16, 2020). Given the speed at which cases can proliferate and the danger posed, I find that Mr. Rendon-Marin is at risk for contracting the disease.
Applying the relevant factors under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a), I find that Mr. Rendon-Marin has shown "extraordinary and compelling reasons" warranting his release.
A. Nature and Circumstances of the Offense
Mr. Rendon-Marin's life sentence stems from his involvement in a conspiracy to transport and distribute narcotics. (Doc. 164-4, pgID 3-4).
In 1993 Rendon-Marin paid two couriers to travel from Newark, New Jersey to Detroit, Michigan to pick up and transport a van containing $665,540 (Id. , pgID 5). The couriers were intercepted by the Ohio State Highway Patrol. They revealed that Mr. Rendon-Marin hired them to transport the money. (Id. ).
Federal agents arrested Mr. Rendon-Marin at his home in Watchung, New Jersey. (Id. ). While at Mr. Rendon-Marin's home, the agents found a lock box. Inside the lock box were rental contracts for storage units located in New Jersey. The agents obtained a search warrant for the storage units. Inside the storage units were two vans. One van contained twenty-nine kilograms of cocaine.
B. Defendant's History and Characteristics
I sentenced Mr. Rendon-Marin to life imprisonment based on the mandatory minimum life sentence requirement of 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A) – a provision of the law which has since been abrogated. (Doc. 164, pgID 6). At the time, § 841 (b)(1)(A), required me to impose a life sentence on any drug offender who had two prior felony drug offense convictions. Mr. Rendon-Marin was such an offender.
In 1980, at the age of eighteen, Mr. Rendon-Marin was convicted for criminal sale of a controlled substance. (Doc. 164-4, pgID 9). In 1989 Mr. Rendon-Marin was convicted of being in possession of less than one gram of cocaine. (Id. ). Even though in both instances Mr. Rendon-Marin had very small amounts of cocaine, each qualified as a predicate crime under the prior version of § 841 (b)(1)(A).
While Mr. Rendon-Marin's low-level crimes technically did trigger a mandatory life sentence under § 841 (b)(1)(A), it was and is clear to me that imposing a life sentence because of such crimes was and is unjustifiably extreme. Indeed, Congress removed the mandatory minimum sentence requirement that, at the time of sentencing, applied to Mr. Rendon-Marin. Congress did so precisely because it swept too broadly and most often indiscriminately applied to defendants, like Mr. Rendon-Marin, with low level prior drug convictions.
This factor weighs in favor of granting Mr. Rendon-Marin's requested relief. C. Need for the Sentence to "Reflect the Seriousness of the Crime, to Promote Respect for the Law, and to Provide Just Punishment for the Offense"
A just punishment reflects the seriousness of criminal conduct and enhances respect for the law. A just punishment takes into account the consequences of a defendant's crimes, and their impact on the victims, others, and the community.
Mr. Rendon-Marin had possessed approximately twenty-nine kilograms of cocaine. Because of his (remarkably trivial) prior drug-related criminal conduct, he received a life sentence. The law has since changed. Were I to sentence Mr. Rendon-Marin today, he would likely receive, at worst and if applicable, a mandatory minimum sentence of twenty years.
This factor weighs overwhelmingly in favor of granting compassionate relief.
D. Need "to Afford Adequate Deterrence to Criminal Conduct"
Mr. Rendon-Marin has spent more than twenty-five years in prison for a serious, but non-violent drug crime. This is more than enough to afford adequate personal and public deterrence, at least to those who are of this term.
This factor weighs in favor of granting relief.
E. Present Danger to the Community
Mr. Rendon-Marin, regardless his age and poor health (which alone make him no danger to the community), will be remanded to Immigration and Customs Enforcement and then deported to Colombia. He poses no danger to anyone or any community in this country.
This factor – by itself – weighs heavily in favor of granting relief.
Conclusion
After a quarter-century, I remember Mr. Rendon-Marin vividly. He accepted his life sentence unflinchingly. He could have avoided that outcome had he cooperated with the government agents who, no doubt, wanted to know about those "up the (Colombian) ladder."
He did not do so. That he did not do so was understandable: sometime after his arrest, someone killed his sixteen-year old daughter by slitting her throat.
After that, any sentence I could impose was, to a considerable extent, superfluous: what can be worse than knowing, as Mr. Rendon-Marin surely did, that one's actions had led to the murder of his innocent child? Whether inside or outside prison walls, he remains condemned to a life of inconsolable regret and remorse.
Were he to have come before me today, I could even have imposed no prison term and had him deported, thereby separating him from his family in New York forever. Under all the circumstances, that would have been an even more punitive sanction. Doing so would, moreover, have underscored even more emphatically the consequences of working for a cartel, Removal and separation would have emphasized the deterrent function of punishment. I could not do so, and probably would not have done so, given the need for public deterrence.
Mr. Rendon-Marin's penance as an inmate in an American prison has lasted more than long enough. His penance as the father of a dead daughter remains lifelong. If he still has and can reunite with family in Colombia, as I hope he can, I hope as well that they welcome him home to help moderate in his enduring grief, and to give him such comfort as they can.
If ever a supplicant for compassionate release deserves to go home, Mr. Rendon-Marin is that supplicant. His reason for allowing him to do so are beyond the merely "extraordinary and compelling." They are simply indisputable – and it is to the government's credit that it chose not to oppose his motion.
Therefore, it is hereby
ORDERED THAT
1. The defendant's motion for compassionate release (Docs. 160, 164) be, and the same hereby is, granted;
2. The defendant's sentence be, and the same hereby is, reduced to time served in federal custody; and
3. The defendant shall be immediately released into the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement for deportation.
So ordered.