Justices open escape hatch for far-out criminal sentences under appellate waivers

WASHINGTON (CN) — The Supreme Court on Thursday said criminal defendants who waive rights to appeal shouldn’t lose those privileges when faced with outlandish sentences.

In an 8-1 ruling, the high court said appeal waivers were unenforceable when they would result in a miscarriage of justice, noting that such a result would tarnish the judicial system.

To show the idea’s obviousness, Justice Elena Kagan cited the lower court’s example of “[I]f the parties stipulated to trial by 12 orangutans[,] the defendant’s conviction would be invalid notwithstanding his consent, because some minimum of civilized procedure is required by community feeling regardless of what the defendant wants.”

Kagan, a Barack Obama appointee, said the judiciary and the public had an interest in correcting grossly prejudicial errors of law that undermine confidence in the legal system. Writing for the majority, she said in extreme circumstances, courts should have an option to overcome an appeal waiver to correct such wrongs.

“If, say, the sentencing judge was biased against individuals of one race or religion, and unconstitutionally considered that factor in imposing a sentence,” Kagan wrote. “Or if the judge (as in an actual case) imposed as a condition of supervised release that the defendant not become pregnant.”

Prosecutors often convince defendants to sign waivers of appellate rights as a bargaining chip to forgo certain charges and guarantee finality in a case. Munson Hunter III joined one such agreement after he was charged with bank and wire fraud.

But a judge required Hunter to be forcibly medicated for anxiety and depression disorders as a special condition to his supervised release. The condition was intended to make the probation officer’s job easier.

During oral arguments in March, Lisa Blatt, an attorney with Williams & Connolly representing Hunter, noted that other judges compelled church attendance or prescribed medical castrations.

Blatt pushed the justices to create exceptions to appellate waivers for rare circumstances where everyone can agree there was a clear error. She said a narrow exception based on contract principles would allow defendants like Hunter to have the same rights to challenge plea agreements as the government.

The government presented an unyielding opposition to any appeal exceptions, arguing the contract between prosecutors and defendants was enforceable despite a judge’s sentencing decisions. The government warned that opening up exceptions would create a flood of litigation, negating the benefit of plea agreements for prosecutors.

The Supreme Court sided with Blatt, sending Hunter’s case back to the lower courts to be reviewed under the “miscarriage of justice” approach.

Kagan said there was a high bar to qualify for such an exception. She said examples of these included sentences of years above the maximum prescribed, infected with blatant constitutional error or imposed without some minimum of civilized procedure.

Kagan dismissed the government’s concerns about opening the floodgates to waived appeals, noting that some courts had already been using the approach.

“Thankfully, the kinds of sentences that raise miscarriage-of-justice concerns, as we have described them, are rare in our justice system,” Kagan wrote. “The possibility of correction helps keep them so, and thus safeguards that system’s integrity, without imposing excessive burdens on either the appeals courts or the government.”

In a concurring opinion, Justice Neil Gorsuch, a Donald Trump appointee, said the ruling was an important step in reining in plea bargains, stressing their prevalence in the modern criminal justice system.

“The most remarkable thing about Mr. Hunter’s plea-bargaining journey may be how unremarkable it is,” Gorsuch wrote. “Our criminal justice system is no longer dominated by trials and sentences based on them, but plea bargains that work out in ways not unlike his own.”

Since the high court encouraged plea bargaining in previous cases, Gorsuch said prosecutors have taken advantage of the latitude granted to them — including, in one case, threatening a life sentence for a forged check worth less than $100.

Gorsuch said Thursday’s decision was a welcome first step, noting that the lower courts would need to flesh out the standard.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, another Obama appointee, and Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, a Joe Biden appointee, joined Gorsuch’s concurrence.

Justice Clarence Thomas, a George H.W. Bush appointee, penned a solo dissent, saying his colleagues were acting on a policy concern outside of the court’s authority.

“Without any legal justification for its rule, the court appeals primarily to the policy instinct that unfairness could result from its farfetched hypotheticals,” Thomas wrote. “Surely, the court reasons, a defendant must be able to appeal a sentence selected by an orangutan.”

Thomas said the decision would undermine the finality of plea agreements. Unlike the majority, he said it would be easy to imagine “a hundred thousand claims” that would fall under the court’s exception.

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