[00:00:00] Speaker 02: 23-1367, United States versus Davis. [00:00:08] Speaker 02: Good morning, and may it please the Court. [00:00:10] Speaker 02: I'm John Grebelius on behalf of Omari Davis. [00:00:14] Speaker 02: I will try to carve out three minutes of rebuttal time if I'm able to, Your Honors. [00:00:20] Speaker 02: This case presents a straightforward question. [00:00:23] Speaker 02: Whether Mr. Davis's conviction in Colorado for distributing baking soda was punishable by more than a year in prison [00:00:30] Speaker 02: which was the statutory maximum in Colorado for his particular conviction? [00:00:36] Speaker 02: The answer is no. [00:00:37] Speaker 02: In order for the Colorado court to have imposed a sentence above a year, it would have first had to have found that Mr. Davis or that his case had an aggravating factor present. [00:00:48] Speaker 02: And even before that, it would have had to have given him a chance of notice and a chance to contest that that aggravating factor existed and a basis for a sentence above a year was present. [00:00:58] Speaker 02: Of course, none of this happened in this case, and so my client was ineligible for 922-G1 prosecution. [00:01:06] Speaker 02: Starting with Colorado law. [00:01:08] Speaker 02: In Colorado, a sentencing court may not impose a sentence in the aggravated range in any case unless it finds an aggravating factor is present. [00:01:20] Speaker 02: Before it may do so, as I just discussed, the defendant has to have the opportunity [00:01:24] Speaker 02: to contest that fact's existence and that it's an aggravating factor. [00:01:29] Speaker 02: Now here, what happened below was the parties in the plea agreement stipulated there were no aggravating facts. [00:01:36] Speaker 02: And I think the government and I at least agree in so far as the court accepted that agreement that it accepted there were no aggravating circumstances here. [00:01:45] Speaker 02: Certainly the Colorado court did not advise Mr. Davis that he could face a sentence above a year and it did not find any aggravating factors in that case. [00:01:54] Speaker 02: Under Colorado law, therefore, Mr. Davis did not face a sentence above a year. [00:02:00] Speaker 02: That is all that matters under this court's decisions in Heisey and Brooks. [00:02:04] Speaker 02: Because what we know from those decisions is that we pay attention to the defendant's specific conviction, ignoring hypotheticals and what a hypothetical defendant could face in that scenario. [00:02:15] Speaker 02: And when we do that, we look at the defendant's record of conviction. [00:02:19] Speaker 02: And the defendant's record of conviction [00:02:21] Speaker 02: If we want to be able to determine whether a certain sentencing range is available, and if it's contingent upon certain findings, we look to see whether those findings were made. [00:02:30] Speaker 02: And that comes from Heisey. [00:02:31] Speaker 01: Council, can I ask you about comparison with Heisey and Brooks? [00:02:35] Speaker 01: So those cases, we're reviewing Kansas sentencing scheme. [00:02:39] Speaker 01: And in Kansas, the aggravating factors are [00:02:43] Speaker 01: pronounced, and there's even a form and a box that has to be checked. [00:02:48] Speaker 01: But my reading of the briefs here is that in Colorado, aggravating circumstances are mentioned in the sentencing statute, but that there's no real limitation on what the judge can determine is an aggravating circumstance. [00:03:02] Speaker 01: Is that right? [00:03:04] Speaker 02: Yes. [00:03:04] Speaker 02: The fund of information, the facts, is not limited by the statute. [00:03:08] Speaker 02: Your Honor has that correct. [00:03:10] Speaker 01: So in other words, the court, anything the court [00:03:13] Speaker 01: on its own determined to be aggravating, it could use to then sentence above the presumptive box, even if it's not listed in the statute anywhere or any case law can just on its own whim? [00:03:24] Speaker 02: Well, within reason and within appellate review and guardrails, correct. [00:03:29] Speaker 02: But I will point. [00:03:29] Speaker 01: But that's what I'm getting. [00:03:30] Speaker 01: What are those guardrails? [00:03:31] Speaker 02: OK. [00:03:32] Speaker 02: Well, first of all, in the briefs, as I discuss, the fact itself has to be unique to the defendant. [00:03:41] Speaker 02: for the crime itself. [00:03:42] Speaker 02: So it actually has to be unique. [00:03:44] Speaker 02: It can't just be commission of the crime itself, for instance. [00:03:48] Speaker 02: So I cited the Manley case where the court just said, hey, I think for deterrence purposes, I'm going to aggravate this. [00:03:55] Speaker 02: And the Court of Appeals said, no, that's not an aggravating factor. [00:03:58] Speaker 02: That's not unique to this case. [00:04:00] Speaker 02: It's common to every case. [00:04:02] Speaker 02: So we do have guardrails. [00:04:03] Speaker 02: But more importantly, Your Honors, the fund and universe of evidence or facts that a Colorado court may consider [00:04:11] Speaker 02: is irrelevant for our purposes, because what has to happen is the court has to find that the aggravating factor actually exists. [00:04:19] Speaker 02: Now, in Colorado, there might be a bigger fund of information available than in Kansas, but there are also really important essential procedural safeguards and limitations on the court's ability to find aggravating factors, which comes from that Lopez decision, which is also an upshot of the Blakely decision, as we all know. [00:04:42] Speaker 01: Both Lopez and Mountjoy, those Colorado Supreme Court cases, as I recall, they were reviewing the Colorado felony sentencing statute. [00:04:51] Speaker 01: Here we're talking about the drug statute. [00:04:53] Speaker 01: Is there any meaningful difference between those two sentencing statutes that makes a difference in our application of Mountjoy or Lopez? [00:04:59] Speaker 02: No, Your Honor, I don't believe so. [00:05:01] Speaker 02: Neither the government or I seem to disagree on that. [00:05:05] Speaker 02: The only real difference between them is there's a slight wording difference between the two, but essentially, [00:05:11] Speaker 02: Colorado's drug felony sentencing statutes almost verbatim copy in relevant respects the 181.3401 regular felony statutes in Colorado. [00:05:23] Speaker 02: So there is no meaningful difference. [00:05:25] Speaker 03: What is the aggravating factor that the government relies on here? [00:05:30] Speaker 03: The government doesn't identify one. [00:05:32] Speaker 03: It wasn't the prior conviction? [00:05:34] Speaker 02: The government notes that there was a prior misdemeanor in the record, but it does not specifically identify that as the factor here. [00:05:43] Speaker 02: The government's position is we don't need a specific factor. [00:05:46] Speaker 02: The aggravated range is always available in any case, no matter what, and that the court has essentially freewheeling open-ended discretion to impose whatever sentence within the aggravated range. [00:06:02] Speaker 03: And more important, the government's position. [00:06:07] Speaker 02: It isn't. [00:06:10] Speaker 02: Because under Lopez, the Colorado Supreme Court had to reconcile its sentencing scheme with Apprendi and Blakely. [00:06:18] Speaker 02: And what the Colorado Supreme Court said was, [00:06:21] Speaker 02: Look, the presumptive is the maximum range in any given case without additional fact finding. [00:06:27] Speaker 02: In order to go above the presumptive, there has to be additional fact finding. [00:06:31] Speaker 02: However, we are limited by Blakely. [00:06:33] Speaker 02: So the judge cannot just perform that willy nilly. [00:06:36] Speaker 02: There has to be a waiver of Blakely rights, or it has to be found by a jury beyond a reasonable doubt. [00:06:41] Speaker 02: But the Colorado Supreme Court, instead of striking that statute that the government reads as providing this open ended discretion, instead the Colorado Supreme Court [00:06:51] Speaker 02: interpreted it to severely limit the judge's discretion so that it would be constitutive. [00:06:57] Speaker 03: It's got to be found by the jury, although a judge could find prior convictions. [00:07:01] Speaker 03: Is that right? [00:07:02] Speaker 03: That is correct. [00:07:04] Speaker 03: But then the judge, even if it found a prior conviction, would still have to make a fact finding that it was in aggravating circumstances. [00:07:11] Speaker 03: Is that correct? [00:07:12] Speaker 02: Well, so what the judge would have to do is fact find that the prior conviction existed. [00:07:18] Speaker 02: Excuse me, Your Honor. [00:07:19] Speaker 02: The next determination is whether that fact is in fact aggravating. [00:07:24] Speaker 02: And that itself is a legal determination, but the court still must make that as well on the record in order to impose an aggravated sentence. [00:07:33] Speaker 02: So there's really a multi-step process. [00:07:36] Speaker 02: before a court can impose an aggravated range sentence. [00:07:38] Speaker 03: And was there any reference of sentencing to this prior conviction in the state court? [00:07:44] Speaker 02: Not by the court itself. [00:07:46] Speaker 02: This came up sort of in passing by the parties when they were working out logistically how they were going to work out the probation sentence that was handed down. [00:07:55] Speaker 02: But we don't know what that misdemeanor was for. [00:07:58] Speaker 02: We don't know when it was committed. [00:08:01] Speaker 02: We don't know from the record. [00:08:02] Speaker 02: But we know nothing about the misdemeanor. [00:08:04] Speaker 03: Not from the record of the conviction, no. [00:08:07] Speaker 03: And from the record of sentencing in state court, do we know anything about that? [00:08:12] Speaker 02: Oh, no. [00:08:12] Speaker 02: And I'm sorry, Your Honor. [00:08:13] Speaker 02: I'm basically using the record of conviction and the record in the sentencing proceeding synonymously. [00:08:18] Speaker 02: But no. [00:08:20] Speaker 02: The transcript of the sentencing hearing is what I'm referring to, and that's the only place that it appears. [00:08:24] Speaker 02: And again, that's just where the parties mention it in passing. [00:08:28] Speaker 02: And I think the only other thing we knew about it was... Did they say what the misdemeanor was? [00:08:31] Speaker 02: They did not. [00:08:32] Speaker 02: The only thing we know, I think, is that it was out of Adams County. [00:08:36] Speaker 02: I think that's the only thing that they mentioned, and that he had probation for it. [00:08:39] Speaker 02: But again, we don't know how long, when it was committed, what it was for, just that it was there. [00:08:44] Speaker 02: And the court never found that it was there. [00:08:46] Speaker 02: It certainly never found that it was aggravating. [00:08:50] Speaker 02: In your honors, if we look at the record of conviction, as I just said, it does not support that my client was punishable by more than a year in prison. [00:09:00] Speaker 02: And so therefore, under Heisey and Brooks, this court should reverse. [00:09:04] Speaker 01: Does one more question? [00:09:07] Speaker 04: Oh, go ahead. [00:09:08] Speaker 04: Does the party's stipulation control, if the parties say there aren't any aggravators, the court is bound to say I can't enhance? [00:09:18] Speaker 04: No, I mean, the court can reject a plea stipulation. [00:09:21] Speaker 04: If it accepts the plea with the stipulation, is that game over as far as an aggravated penalty? [00:09:28] Speaker 04: In Colorado, yes. [00:09:30] Speaker 04: But there's one other thing I want to point out. [00:09:32] Speaker 04: Why could the court not say, all right, I'm willing to help clear the docket here, even though I think there was an aggravator here? [00:09:40] Speaker 04: I'm not going to push it. [00:09:42] Speaker 04: And so go ahead, and we'll go with the [00:09:46] Speaker 04: lesser sentencing. [00:09:47] Speaker 04: But had you gone to trial, the judge is thinking to himself or herself, I think you would have been subject to an aggravator. [00:09:55] Speaker 04: And why would that not be punishable? [00:09:58] Speaker 02: Well, because in that situation, the judge isn't making a formal finding that's giving the defendant a chance to contest that. [00:10:05] Speaker 02: The judge is basically referring to a contingency or a hypothetical that we do not follow under Heisei and Brooks. [00:10:13] Speaker 02: pay attention to the hypotheticals. [00:10:14] Speaker 02: But there's one other point I wanted to make about this plea agreement. [00:10:17] Speaker 02: I'm not just hanging my hat on the plea agreement. [00:10:21] Speaker 02: Under Colorado law, under Lopez, a Colorado court is required, before imposing a sentence, to consider whether there are aggravating circumstances or mitigating circumstances in the case. [00:10:32] Speaker 02: In any case, even a plea. [00:10:34] Speaker 02: So by implication, if a Colorado court does not find that this aggravating factor exists or any aggravating factor exists, [00:10:42] Speaker 02: It therefore does not exist. [00:10:43] Speaker 02: It's an implicit finding that there is no aggravation. [00:10:46] Speaker 02: And that's also what happened here. [00:10:50] Speaker 01: Council, the discussion between Judge Moore at the hearing to determine the motion to dismiss the indictment. [00:10:58] Speaker 01: At one point, as I recall, Judge Moore's engaged in a colloquy with the defense counsel about the underlying predicate that the Colorado state sentencing judge [00:11:10] Speaker 01: was considering or the facts that that sentencing judge could consider. [00:11:14] Speaker 01: And Judge Moore says to the defense lawyer that the state judge could have sentenced him above the sentencing range, not based on facts, but based upon, quote, his judgment. [00:11:26] Speaker 01: And the defense lawyer at the district court agreed with that. [00:11:30] Speaker 01: Do we take that as any sort of concession here that was made before the district court that sort of led Judge Moore into the decision that he made? [00:11:38] Speaker 02: No, Your Honor, I'll say that for a couple of reasons. [00:11:41] Speaker 02: Certainly the government has never pressed a theory of waiver. [00:11:44] Speaker 02: The government has conceded that this issue is reviewable and that it's preserved. [00:11:48] Speaker 02: Moreover, I would direct the court actually to several pages later in the district court transcript at page 126 where defense counsel brings the Lopez case to the court's attention, asking the court to follow the Lopez decision [00:12:04] Speaker 02: And CITES are actually, better yet, quotes the language, the operative language, that an additional fact finding is required. [00:12:11] Speaker 02: He says, when he's explaining the Lopez decision, quote, the judge cannot make that judgment, that is, aggravation, without finding some facts to support it beyond the bare elements of the offense. [00:12:24] Speaker 02: And so this is defense counsel quoting the Lopez case and certainly asking Judge Moore to follow it. [00:12:29] Speaker 02: Also point out the defense counsel repeatedly says there must be some sort of finding in order to have the aggravating fact. [00:12:36] Speaker 02: A finding or found, I mean, that's a legal term of art. [00:12:40] Speaker 02: Judges don't find judgments or opinions. [00:12:44] Speaker 02: Judges find facts. [00:12:46] Speaker 02: So I don't think there's any sort of waiver here or anything like that. [00:12:49] Speaker 02: Counsel is clearly trying to get the court to follow the Lopez decision. [00:12:54] Speaker 01: I'm sorry. [00:12:55] Speaker 01: Also, a moment ago, you said the Colorado law requires a sentencing court to consider whether there are aggravating circumstances or factors. [00:13:02] Speaker 01: Is that in the Colorado statute, and if so, where? [00:13:04] Speaker 02: I believe it is in the Colorado statute. [00:13:07] Speaker 02: I can't say that right off the top of my head. [00:13:10] Speaker 02: It is actually stated in Lopez, and there is a citation. [00:13:14] Speaker 02: It might be in the general sentencing scheme under 18.1.3401, but I'm not positive on that. [00:13:23] Speaker 02: Unless there are further questions, I'll reserve my time. [00:13:33] Speaker 00: Morning, Your Honors, and may it please the Court, Rajiv Mohan for the United States. [00:13:38] Speaker 00: I would submit that the question here is not whether the trial court found an aggravating circumstance, but whether it could have based on Mr. Davis's record of conviction. [00:13:48] Speaker 00: I think that is consistent with Heisey's definition of the term punishable as capable of being punished by law or right. [00:13:56] Speaker 00: And it is further not inconsistent with Heisey's warning that we cannot rely on a hypothetical defendant. [00:14:03] Speaker 00: Now I want to address state law and make two fundamental points to try and show why that sentence was possible here. [00:14:12] Speaker 00: And the first point goes to this question of Lopez and the Sixth Amendment and whether additional fact finding is necessary to impose an aggravated sentence. [00:14:23] Speaker 00: And the fundamental point I would make about Lopez is that it does not say that additional fact finding is necessary, it simply says that [00:14:32] Speaker 00: If the trial court engages in additional fact finding, it must do so in accordance with the Sixth Amendment. [00:14:40] Speaker 00: To quote Lopez, and this is 113 p. [00:14:42] Speaker 00: 3 at page 727, in some instances, this analysis may involve additional fact finding by the trial judge. [00:14:50] Speaker 00: If it does, the rule of Blakely applies. [00:14:53] Speaker 00: Now, I think the reason why additional fact finding is not always necessary [00:14:59] Speaker 00: is because an aggravating circumstance can be based on facts that tend to establish the elements of the offense itself and are therefore included in the record of conviction. [00:15:09] Speaker 00: I think Lopez expressly recognized this, and the Colorado Supreme Court had earlier held the same in People v. Leske. [00:15:19] Speaker 00: The second point I want to make about state law is the one you heard about the circumstance needing to be unusual or unique to the defendant [00:15:28] Speaker 00: which was advanced in Mr. Davis's reply brief. [00:15:31] Speaker 00: And here I would point out a difference in text and therefore meaning between the drug sentencing statute at issue here and the general sentencing statute at issue in the cases that Mr. Davis relies on. [00:15:46] Speaker 00: The drug sentencing statute simply refers to an aggravating circumstance. [00:15:50] Speaker 00: The general sentencing statute refers to an extraordinary aggravating circumstance. [00:15:56] Speaker 00: I think if this court looks at the cases Mr. Davis relies on, and I would point specifically to People v. Phillips, which is 652 p. [00:16:05] Speaker 00: 2nd, 575, I think it'll see that this unusual or unique to the defendant requirement under the general statute stems from the word extraordinary. [00:16:18] Speaker 00: And I would submit that the same limitation doesn't apply to the drug sentencing statute, given that clear difference in meaning. [00:16:27] Speaker 00: The upshot of all of this from our perspective is that given the breadth of Colorado law, whatever underlies the record of conviction can support an aggravating circumstance, even if all that underlies the record of conviction is a bare admission to the elements of the events. [00:16:47] Speaker 00: I think that is enough to authorize an aggravated sentence. [00:16:51] Speaker 00: Now to say that an aggravated sentence is authorized is not necessarily to say that one is warranted. [00:16:58] Speaker 00: But I think those are two distinct questions. [00:17:00] Speaker 00: I think the first one goes to what the offense is punishable by for purposes of Section 922 G1. [00:17:08] Speaker 04: So is this offense always punishable? [00:17:12] Speaker 00: Your honor, I would say it is always punishable by more than a year of imprisonment, given how broad Colorado law is when it comes to aggravating circumstances. [00:17:22] Speaker 03: It requires a finding. [00:17:24] Speaker 03: There has to be a finding of an aggravating circumstance before the judge can impose a sentence greater than a year. [00:17:33] Speaker 03: Is that correct? [00:17:35] Speaker 00: That is correct, Your Honor. [00:17:36] Speaker 03: There was no finding made. [00:17:38] Speaker 03: Is that correct? [00:17:39] Speaker 00: Correct. [00:17:40] Speaker 03: So the federal judge would have to say that there could have been a finding made. [00:17:48] Speaker 03: But that seems inconsistent to me with Apprendi in terms of how the fact finding has to be made. [00:17:57] Speaker 03: Sometimes it will be a conviction. [00:18:00] Speaker 03: will be the basis of the aggravating circumstance. [00:18:03] Speaker 03: And the judge can do that. [00:18:04] Speaker 03: But then there has to be a finding that that conviction justifies an aggravating circumstance. [00:18:11] Speaker 03: Sometimes the aggravating circumstance will be facts that need to be found. [00:18:16] Speaker 03: And under the Colorado statute, they need to be found. [00:18:19] Speaker 03: And Apprendi, too. [00:18:21] Speaker 03: Those facts need to be found by a jury. [00:18:25] Speaker 03: What am I missing here? [00:18:27] Speaker 00: Sir, I think under our position, [00:18:29] Speaker 00: the federal district court would not have to find that there was, in fact, an aggravating circumstance. [00:18:36] Speaker 00: I think it is enough that the state trial court was authorized based on the conviction alone that it could have found an aggravating circumstance based on the conviction. [00:18:50] Speaker 00: Again, I would distinguish between the sentence actually imposed and what sentence could have been imposed. [00:18:57] Speaker 00: And I think our position is that, [00:19:00] Speaker 00: given that Colorado law is not limited to specific aggravating circumstances, given that the court can rely on facts that tend to establish the elements of the offense, which are necessarily encompassed with the record of conviction for the offense, that the possibility always exists. [00:19:19] Speaker 03: OK, so there has to be a finding. [00:19:22] Speaker 03: under Colorado law before a sentence greater than a year is imposed. [00:19:27] Speaker 03: And your position is, well, the judge could always make a finding or a jury could always make a finding of an aggravating circumstance. [00:19:35] Speaker 03: So the sentence can always be greater than a year. [00:19:38] Speaker 03: I think that's the gist of your argument. [00:19:40] Speaker 00: I think that's the gist of our argument. [00:19:42] Speaker 00: And I think it stems from the fact that Colorado law is not limited to specific aggravating circumstances. [00:19:51] Speaker 00: This would be a different case. [00:19:53] Speaker 00: This would probably be Brooks or Heisey if Colorado law were limited to specific aggravating circumstances. [00:20:01] Speaker 00: And this distinction is not one I just pulled out of thin air. [00:20:05] Speaker 00: It's one that the Ninth Circuit emphasized in Valencia Mendoza in dealing with Washington sentencing system. [00:20:13] Speaker 00: And I think Washington sentencing system was once similar to Colorado's in that there were no [00:20:19] Speaker 00: specific enumerated aggravating circumstance. [00:20:22] Speaker 00: Washington then made its system more restrictive and limited aggravated sentences to specific circumstances. [00:20:29] Speaker 00: And the Ninth Circuit explained that that distinction mattered because it went to what punishment the legislature assigned to the offense itself. [00:20:38] Speaker 00: And I think the same distinction applies here. [00:20:41] Speaker 03: Would you acknowledge that there's some [00:20:46] Speaker 03: guardrails, I think was the term, that the state Supreme Court might say that is not an aggravating, that's not a sufficient aggravating circumstance to justify the enhanced sentence. [00:20:59] Speaker 00: Is that correct? [00:21:00] Speaker 00: I do, Your Honor, but I'm not sure the question, I'm not sure the punishable question under section 922 G necessarily incorporates every aspect of a state sentencing law. [00:21:11] Speaker 00: And let me maybe use an example that I think illustrates that point. [00:21:15] Speaker 00: I think if a federal district court imposed a 60-month sentence on a 922G and said that any greater sentence would be greater than necessary and therefore in violation of Section 3553A, I don't think we would say that that necessarily caps what the crime is punishable by. [00:21:36] Speaker 01: Isn't that a poor example, though, to compare the federal sentencing scheme to Colorado? [00:21:46] Speaker 01: this court and every court post-booker has talked about how the sentencing guidelines are imposed in federal court, which is different than Colorado. [00:21:53] Speaker 01: But can I go back to something I'm hung up on a little bit? [00:21:57] Speaker 01: Even if it's true that Colorado doesn't define aggravating circumstances, so sort of the universe of what that means, perhaps it could just be anything that satisfies the goals of sentencing and the judge's determination. [00:22:12] Speaker 01: But because there still has to be a factual finding, I thought you heard you say a moment ago, well, because it's possible the court could find these facts, therefore it's punishable. [00:22:23] Speaker 01: Why doesn't that violate Heise? [00:22:25] Speaker 01: I mean, Heise says explicitly the mere possibility that there are other facts is not something that we can consider now when looking back on the record of the case. [00:22:34] Speaker 01: We're confined to looking back at what the record of this case for this defendant was. [00:22:38] Speaker 00: Sure. [00:22:39] Speaker 00: And perhaps I misspoke, and let me try and be a little more precise. [00:22:43] Speaker 00: I'm not saying that the state trial court could have found additional facts that constitute an aggravating circumstance. [00:22:49] Speaker 00: I'm saying that the court could have found an aggravating circumstance based on the facts encompassed in the particular defendant's record of conviction. [00:22:58] Speaker 00: And I think that again goes back to the breadth of Colorado law, where in Lesky, for example, the Colorado Supreme Court said that the facts that tend to establish the elements themselves can be relied on [00:23:12] Speaker 00: by the trial court to justify an aggravating circumstance. [00:23:16] Speaker 00: So it's not the reliance on the possibility of facts outside of the record. [00:23:21] Speaker 00: It is the possibility of facts within the record constituting an aggravating circumstance. [00:23:27] Speaker 04: If every conviction for the imitation controlled substance is punishable by more than a year, why even have presumptive and aggravating? [00:23:37] Speaker 04: Why not just have it to one range in the court consentence anywhere within it, depending on what the court thinks? [00:23:43] Speaker 00: Certainly Lopez rejected that argument, and I'm not disputing that point. [00:23:48] Speaker 00: I think Lopez is a little more nuanced. [00:23:50] Speaker 00: I think Lopez recognizes that. [00:23:51] Speaker 04: Did Lopez contemplate what I just asked? [00:23:54] Speaker 04: Lopez is talking about Blakely and Apprendi. [00:23:58] Speaker 04: Correct. [00:23:58] Speaker 04: And my example is not a Blakely or Apprendi. [00:24:01] Speaker 04: It's just open sentencing. [00:24:02] Speaker 00: Right. [00:24:03] Speaker 00: And I think Lopez rejected the notion that the statute sets a simple range from [00:24:09] Speaker 00: half the presumptive range to two times the presumptive range, which was the range in the general statute. [00:24:15] Speaker 00: So I am not disputing that point, which I think goes to your concern that my argument is essentially doing that. [00:24:21] Speaker 00: And let me try and address that point. [00:24:25] Speaker 00: I think what Lopez recognizes that in some instances, [00:24:29] Speaker 00: going above the presumptive range will require additional fact finding. [00:24:33] Speaker 00: And there, we get all the Blakely-Apprendi protections. [00:24:37] Speaker 00: But in some instances, it doesn't. [00:24:39] Speaker 00: And I think that slightly more open path is what ultimately makes the offense punishable by the record of conviction alone, in our view. [00:24:49] Speaker 00: And ultimately, the way I see this case, I think, [00:24:53] Speaker 00: If, based on whatever facts were properly before the trial court here, it thought that a sentence of more than a year was appropriate, it could have imposed that sentence. [00:25:02] Speaker 00: It would have had to make certain findings. [00:25:05] Speaker 00: But it could have imposed that sentence in a way that I think was impossible in Brooks and Heisey. [00:25:11] Speaker 00: And I think that's what distinguishes this case from those cases and why this court should affirm. [00:25:19] Speaker 00: Further questions? [00:25:20] Speaker 00: That is what I would ask the court today. [00:25:21] Speaker 04: So every one of these cases, by definition, has an aggravating circumstance that can be proved beyond a reasonable doubt? [00:25:30] Speaker 00: No. [00:25:30] Speaker 00: I would say that every one of these cases has the potential for an aggravating circumstance included in the record of conviction because Colorado law permits an aggravating circumstance to be based on the facts that tend to establish the elements. [00:25:47] Speaker 04: That sounds like yes to me. [00:25:49] Speaker 04: I heard the no, but everything that followed sounded like yes. [00:25:55] Speaker 00: Again, I would distinguish between whether or not the trial court ultimately finds an aggravating circumstance versus whether it could based on the record of conviction. [00:26:06] Speaker 00: Thank you. [00:26:07] Speaker 01: So in other words, if the sentencing court in Colorado says, well, I see you distributed the baking soda in July. [00:26:14] Speaker 01: And the date of the offense is part of the elements. [00:26:20] Speaker 01: And I find that particularly aggravating, because people who deal baking soda in July disrupt the flow of summer. [00:26:27] Speaker 01: So I'm going to sentence you above the presumptive range. [00:26:30] Speaker 01: That would be lawful? [00:26:33] Speaker 00: So I think it may not be lawful as a matter of the court's exercise of its sentencing discretion. [00:26:40] Speaker 00: I don't think you would necessarily have a Sixth Amendment issue there. [00:26:44] Speaker 00: The punishable inquiry in going to what is punishable based on the record of conviction overlaps with the Sixth Amendment inquiry. [00:26:53] Speaker 00: We acknowledge that. [00:26:55] Speaker 00: So I think it might be a different error. [00:26:57] Speaker 00: It might be unlawful in other respects. [00:26:59] Speaker 00: But I don't think we would say that the crime is limited in terms of what it's punishable. [00:27:13] Speaker 00: All right. [00:27:14] Speaker 00: Thank you. [00:27:23] Speaker 02: Your Honors, on Colorado law, I asked the court to look at footnote five in my reply brief. [00:27:30] Speaker 02: It is clearly established in Colorado that in order to aggravate a sentence, fact finding is required beyond the elements of the crime itself. [00:27:40] Speaker 02: I quoted Mountjoy, which says to aggravate a defendant's sentence under a sentencing scheme such as the one in Blakely or R18.1.3.4016, [00:27:49] Speaker 02: The trial court must rely on facts outside the elements itself. [00:27:54] Speaker 02: This court said the same thing in its Allen v. Reed case. [00:27:57] Speaker 02: I bring this up because what this means is that it imposes significant procedural limitations on the trial court's fact-finding abilities. [00:28:08] Speaker 02: Here, Mr. Davis pled guilty [00:28:11] Speaker 02: to distribution of an imitation substance. [00:28:15] Speaker 02: He did not plead guilty to an aggravated crime of distribution of imitation substance or a DF4+. [00:28:24] Speaker 02: These additional findings have to be made because they are elements of an offense under Blakely. [00:28:30] Speaker 02: That is constitutionally significant. [00:28:32] Speaker 02: And so, Your Honors, [00:28:34] Speaker 02: With the limited time, I just want to mention that, yes, we are not talking about hypotheticals. [00:28:40] Speaker 02: Brooks and Heisey eschew that. [00:28:42] Speaker 02: The fact that there might be some sort of hypotheticals lurking in the record is irrelevant. [00:28:47] Speaker 02: We look at the record of conviction, and that's- Let me ask you a question, because your time's almost up. [00:28:51] Speaker 03: Yeah. [00:28:53] Speaker 03: Do you think Murillo, the Ninth Circuit opinion, was wrongly decided, or how would you distinguish it? [00:29:00] Speaker 03: Sorry, which opinion? [00:29:01] Speaker 03: Murillo, M-U-R-I-L-L-O. [00:29:04] Speaker 02: I don't recall that one. [00:29:06] Speaker 02: I know it's discussed among the Ninth Circuit opinions. [00:29:10] Speaker 03: Well, the more recent opinion distinguished it, saying that was a statute that was different. [00:29:18] Speaker 03: And I noticed it has a red mark on the west check. [00:29:25] Speaker 03: But it really wasn't overruled, maybe in part, by the later decision of the Ninth Circuit. [00:29:33] Speaker 03: OK. [00:29:36] Speaker 03: Yeah. [00:29:37] Speaker 02: I'm not familiar with Murillo, but I'm familiar with McAdrie and the other Ninth Circuit cases, which are basically indistinguishable, which do not refer to hypotheticals. [00:29:48] Speaker 02: They refer to what was found in the record. [00:29:50] Speaker 02: Thank you. [00:29:56] Speaker 03: Thank you, counsel. [00:29:57] Speaker 03: Case is submitted. [00:29:59] Speaker 03: Counselor excused.