UNITED STATES OF AMERICA v. MARCUS D. FLEMING - Articles

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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA v. MARCUS D. FLEMING

Posted by: Landry Butler on Jul 2, 2018

Court: 6th Circuit Court (Published Opinions)

Attorneys 1:

ARGUED: Eric C. Nemecek, FRIEDMAN & NEMECEK, L.L.C., Cleveland, Ohio, for Appellant. Matthew B. Kall, UNITED STATES ATTORNEY’S OFFICE, Cleveland, Ohio, for Appellee.

Attorneys 2:

ON BRIEF: Eric C. Nemecek, FRIEDMAN & NEMECEK, L.L.C., Cleveland, Ohio, for Appellant. Matthew B. Kall, UNITED STATES ATTORNEY’S OFFICE, Cleveland, Ohio, for Appellee.

Judge(s): KEITH, ROGERS, and KETHLEDGE, Circuit Judges.

Court Appealed: Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio at Akron.

ROGERS, Circuit Judge. Marcus Fleming was convicted of a cocaine offense, and the United States Sentencing Guidelines provided for a recommended sentence of 60 months’ imprisonment. At his sentencing hearing, the district court doubled that. It did so based in large part on a brief local news article that described a recent surge in drug overdose deaths, mostly due to powerful opioids like fentanyl. Neither this article, nor the underlying Ohio state report on which it was based, was provided to the parties before the start of the sentencing hearing. Nor was Fleming notified before the hearing that the district court planned to consider the article or the issues it addressed. Because this procedure denied Fleming a meaningful opportunity to comment on information that led to a substantial increase in his sentence, the resulting sentence was procedurally unreasonable.

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For these reasons, we vacate Fleming’s sentence and remand for resentencing consistent with this opinion.

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