Opinion
23-2252
04-01-2024
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. MATTHEW A. TURNER, Defendant-Appellant.
NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION
Argued March 5, 2024
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of Illinois. No. 07cr40084 Michael M. Mihm, Judge.
Before Diane S. Sykes, Chief Judge John Z. Lee, Circuit Judge Joshua P. Kolar, Circuit Judge
ORDER
In 2009, Matthew Turner was convicted of a conspiracy to distribute large amounts of crack and powder cocaine. The district judge sentenced him to the statutory minimum term of life imprisonment. See 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A) (2009). After Congress passed the First Step Act of 2018, which permits retroactive sentencing relief for certain offenders, Turner asked for a reduced sentence. The judge denied the request because the First Step Act did not affect the penalties for Turner's powder-cocaine offense, and the statutory minimum sentence for that offense alone was life in prison. Turner appealed, and we affirmed on the same basis. He later filed another request for a sentence reduction under the Act. The judge denied that motion too, concluding that the Act permitted just one review of a sentence-reduction motion on the merits. Because Turner already obtained the one complete review permitted under the First Step Act, we affirm.
In 2009, a jury convicted Turner of conspiring to distribute crack and powder cocaine, see 21 U.S.C. §§ 841(b)(1)(A), 846, and possessing a firearm in furtherance of a drug-trafficking crime, see 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A). Because of the large quantities of drugs (5 kilograms of powder, 50 grams of crack) and Turner's three prior felony drug convictions (two for cocaine offenses), he faced a mandatory term of life imprisonment for the drug conspiracy. See 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A) (2009). For the firearm offense, he faced a mandatory consecutive term of at least five years' imprisonment. See 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(A)(i). Accordingly, the district judge imposed the mandatory minimum sentence of life and five years in prison. Turner later received an executive grant of clemency, lowering his total sentence to 30 years' imprisonment.
One year after Turner's sentencing, Congress passed the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010, Pub. L. No. 111-220, 124 Stat. 2372, which prospectively lowered the penalties for certain crack-cocaine offenses. For example, if Turner had been sentenced after the Fair Sentencing Act, he would have faced a 10-year mandatory minimum sentence for conspiring to distribute 50 grams of crack, not life imprisonment. Compare 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A) (2009), with id. § 841(b)(1)(B) (2010). The Fair Sentencing Act, however, did not alter the penalties for powder cocaine; even if sentenced after the Act, Turner would have faced a mandatory minimum sentence of life imprisonment for 5 kilograms of powder cocaine. See 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A) (2010).
In 2018, Congress passed the First Step Act, which made the Fair Sentencing Act retroactive. See First Step Act of 2018, Pub. L. No. 115-391, 132 Stat. 5194. Specifically, § 404 of the First Step Act permits a judge to "impose a reduced sentence as if" relevant sections of the Fair Sentencing Act "were in effect at the time the covered offense was committed." Id. § 404(b). The Act defined a "covered offense" as "a violation of a Federal criminal statute, the statutory penalties for which were modified by .. the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010." Id. § 404(a).
Two years later, Turner unsuccessfully moved for a reduced sentence under the First Step Act. He argued that his drug conspiracy was a "covered offense" because it involved crack cocaine and the penalties for crack cocaine had changed. The judge denied the motion, concluding that Turner was "ineligible for relief." The judge explained that the Fair Sentencing Act did not modify the penalties for powder cocaine, and Turner's statutory minimum sentence, for just the powder-cocaine offense, was life. Turner appealed, but we agreed with the district judge that the First Step Act did not offer Turner relief. See United States v. Hible, 13 F.4th 647, 652 (7th Cir. 2021) (Turner's direct appeal). We discussed United States v. Hudson, 967 F.3d 605, 610 (7th Cir. 2020), in which we said that a district judge had discretion under the First Step Act to reduce an aggregate sentence that had been imposed for both covered and non-covered offenses. But Hudson did not help Turner, we explained, because he was sentenced to a statutory minimum of life in prison, and a judge does not have discretion to ignore a statutory minimum. Hible, 13 F.4th at 652.
One week after we decided Turner's appeal, he moved again for relief under the First Step Act. Turner disagreed with our ruling that, based on his powder cocaine alone, his statutory minimum term was life imprisonment. He cited United States v. Ruth, 966 F.3d 642 (7th Cir. 2020), in which we observed the categorical mismatch between statutory definitions of cocaine under Illinois and federal law. Turner argued that under Ruth, two of his convictions in Illinois for cocaine offenses should not have enhanced his mandatory minimum for the 2009 federal conviction. Without that enhancement, he continued, his mandatory minimum would be lower than life imprisonment, thus giving the judge discretion to reduce his life sentence. See 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A) (2010) (mandatory minimum of 20 years' imprisonment for powder cocaine if only one prior felony drug conviction).
The district judge denied Turner's second motion. The judge repeated his earlier conclusion-which we had affirmed-that Turner was "ineligible for relief under the First Step Act because his sentence reflects the statutory mandatory minimum sentence for powder cocaine." The order did not address Turner's Ruth argument, and Turner did not appeal.
Five months later, Turner filed his third motion to reduce his sentence under the First Step Act. The district judge appointed counsel, who amended Turner's motion. Turner (through counsel) repeated his argument that the judge had discretion to reduce his sentence based on his lower mandatory minimum after Ruth. The judge denied the motion without reaching the Ruth argument, reasoning that § 404(c) of the First Step Act limited Turner to just one motion reviewed on the merits, and the judge had completed that review in deciding Turner's initial motion.
The issue on appeal is whether § 404(c) of the First Step Act bars Turner's latest motion for a sentence reduction. That subsection states that "[n]o court shall entertain a motion made under this section to reduce a sentence .. if a previous motion made under this section to reduce the sentence was . denied after a complete review of the motion on the merits." First Step Act § 404(c). A "complete review" is "a baseline of process that includes an accurate comparison of the statutory penalties . as they existed during the original sentencing and as they presently exist." United States v. Corner, 967 F.3d 662, 665 (7th Cir. 2020). We review de novo a district judge's procedure in ruling on a First Step Act motion. United States v. McSwain, 25 F.4th 533, 537 (7th Cir. 2022).
Turner contends that the judge failed to perform a "complete review" of his initial motion under the First Step Act, but his arguments are unpersuasive. First, in Turner's view, the judge never compared his statutory penalties as they existed during his original sentencing and as they existed when he asked for relief. But the record shows that the judge did so. When ruling on Turner's initial motion, the judge observed that his statutory penalty at both times was life imprisonment, thus completing "an accurate comparison" of the penalties. In Corner, we held that if the judge had discretion to reduce the sentence, the "complete review" under § 404(c) needed to acknowledge the scope of that discretion. See 967 F.3d at 665-66. But we did not require, in Corner or any other case, that a "complete review" contemplate a reduction the judge did not have discretion to entertain. Turner derides the judge's analysis of his initial motion as "cursory," but in this case it constituted a complete review. Cf. McSwain, 25 F.4th at 540 (where the judge did have discretion, a cursory statement that the defendant was not eligible for relief "amount[ed] to 'non-exercise of discretion'") (quoting United States v. Fowowe, 1 F.4th 522, 527 (7th Cir. 2021)). The judge did not need to elaborate further because nothing beyond the President's clemency power could have reduced Turner's sentence below the statutory minimum of life. See Hible, 13 F.4th at 652.
Second, Turner contends that the judge's comparison of statutory penalties was insufficient because the judge incorrectly concluded that Turner's mandatory minimum remained life imprisonment. Turner cites United States v. McSwain, in which the defendant was convicted of a drug conspiracy involving crack cocaine and heroin and sentenced to an enhanced mandatory minimum of 20 years in prison. McSwain, 25 F.4th at 535. The enhancement was based on the defendant's prior felony conviction in Illinois for possessing cocaine. Id. The district judge denied the defendant's motion under the First Step Act because the penalty for heroin-independent of the penalty for crack cocaine-was the same statutory minimum of 20 years' imprisonment. Id. at 536. The judge said nothing about Ruth, even though that case was decided a month earlier. Id. at 539. Because Ruth might have lowered the defendant's statutory minimum by disqualifying the Illinois conviction used to enhance that minimum, we remanded to ensure that the judge considered that intervening decision. Id. at 540. Turner believes Ruth similarly disqualifies two of the three Illinois felonies used to enhance his statutory minimum.
But Turner ignores a significant difference between this case and McSwain: The judge here ruled on Turner's initial motion before we decided Ruth, and Ruth applies only prospectively. See United States v. Vaughn, 62 F.4th 1071, 1072 (7th Cir. 2023); see also McSwain, 25 F.4th at 539-41 (discussing the relevance of caselaw that postdates the original sentence but precedes the ruling on sentencing relief). Moreover, although nothing barred him from doing so, Turner never raised a Ruth-like argument in his first motion to contend that his prior Illinois convictions for cocaine offenses should not have been used to enhance his mandatory minimum. Turner raised these arguments only in his later motions for First Step Act relief, but by then, he had already received the single "complete review" permitted by statute. See First Step Act § 404(c); cf. United States v. Williams, 65 F.4th 343, 347 (7th Cir. 2023) (defendants cannot circumvent normal process for challenging sentencing errors: direct appeal or collateral review under 28 U.S.C. § 2255).
Finally, to the extent Turner argues that the judge's ruling on his initial motion was not a "complete review" under Concepcion v. United States, 597 U.S. 481 (2022), his argument fails. Turner cites the instruction in Concepcion that district judges' discretion to reduce a sentence is limited only by the text of the First Step Act, see 597 U.S. at 496, and he argues that nothing in the Act prevented the judge from granting his initial request for a sentence reduction. But Concepcion discussed what judges may consider if they already have discretion to reduce a sentence under the Act; the Court did not authorize judges to disregard limits on statutory minimums that are outside of and unchanged by the Act. See Hible, 13 F.4th at 652.
AFFIRMED