United States v. Pho’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

96 federal appellate · 7 district ·

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 126 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “(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; and (D) to provide the defendant with needed educational or vocational training, medical care, or other correctional treatment ...; (3) the kinds of sentences available; (4) the kinds of sentence and the sentencing range established for ... the applicable category of offense committed by the applicable category of defendant as set forth in the guidelines ...; (5) any pertinent policy statement .., issued by the Sentencing Commission ...; (6) the need to avoid unwarranted sentence disparities among defendants with similar records ...; and (7) the need to provide restitution to any victims of the offense.”

   3 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. United States v. Dixon · United States v. Smith

2. “This argument misapprehends the nature of the disparity that ought to concern us. Although the district court’s approach does ameliorate the disparity in sentences for crack and powdered cocaine offenses, what counts is the uniformity in sentencing sought by Congress. That uniformity “does not consist simply of similar sentences for those convicted of violations of the same statute” but “consists, more importantly, of similar relationships between sentences and real conduct.” Booker, 125 S.Ct. at 761 . Congress plainly believed that not all cocaine offenses are equal and that trafficking in crack involves different real conduct than trafficking in powder. Otherwise, it would not have ordered dissimilar treatment of the two types of offenses in the [Anti-Drug Abuse] Act [of 1986], Clearly, then, Congress' intended that particular disparity to exist, and federal courts are not free to second-guess that type of decision.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. United States v. Duhon · 412 F. Supp. 2d 87 - United States v. Doe

3. “Congress has directed the Commission to devise policies that “avoid[] unwarranted sentence disparities,” while at the same time providing “sufficient flexibility to permit individualized sentences when warranted by mitigating or aggravating factors.” 28 U.S.C. § 991 (b)(1)(B) (emphasis supplied). The ‘ clear import of this statutory framework is to preserve Congress’s authority over sentencing policy and to guarantee that the exercise of judicial discretion over sentencing decisions be based on case-specific circumstances, not .on general, across-the-board policy considerations.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 409 F. Supp. 2d 1358 - United States v. Valencia-Aguirre · United States v. Spears