Esteras v. United States (23-7483)

argument 23-7483

Esteras v. United States

Supreme Court of the United States 1h 15m 8 speakers 8 chapters transcribed 1 month ago official recording ↗

▲ 0

Transcript

jump: chapters · speakers · find in transcript

Transcript

Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.

What statutory factors does Congress list for supervised release and why were some omitted?

John G. Roberts 0:00

We will hear argument first this morning in case twenty three seventy four eighty three, Esteris

Evan T. Grostic 0:05

versus United States. Mr Grostik? Mr Chief Justice, and may it please the court. In section thirty five eighty three E, Congress listed factors that courts must consider when terminating, modifying, or revoking supervised release. and omitted the factors that it intended to preclude. Most important here is Section thirty five fifty three A two A's retribution factors. thirty five fifty three A expressly states that A twos four subsections are the purposes of sentencing. Which courts must satisfy when imposing prison, a fine, or probation. Courts have wide discretion about what to consider and how to fulfill those purposes. but they do not have discretion about what purposes to satisfy. In thirty five eighty three E

Evan T. Grostic 0:50

Congress was surgical and removed one of those purposes. Retributive punishment under A two A. That was different from every other sentencing option, including the otherwise identical language in the probation statute. Congress thereby precluded courts from considering A two A's retributive purposes in the supervised release context, as this court recognised intopia regarding the identical list in subsection C. And the Senate report confirms what we see in the text. Under subsection C, courts quote, may not uh supervised release quote may not be imposed for purposes of punishment. And the identical list in subsection E has the same meaning. That also fits with the history of the statute. When Congress abolished parole, it created supervised release to fulfill the red re the rehabilitative purposes following

Evan T. Grostic 1:42

a prison sentence that satisfies A to A. Congress gave courts tools to adjust supervisions, such as extending or modifying, but only for the limited purposes listed in thirty five eighty three E. Congress did not add A to A to that list when uh in later amendments, when it added the revocation tool and when it added additional fac uh factors to consider. Congress thus precluded courts from relying on A two A in the supervised release context. I welcome the courts' questions.

Clarence Thomas 2:14

How do you square your argument with uh provisions that more expressly uh limit consideration of other sentencing factors?

Evan T. Grostic 2:23

What Congress did here was rely on a well-established uh mechanism for excluding factors, which was the negative implication canon. And in particular, there's two aspects of that that I believe put the that implication its highest here. The first, as this court noted, I believe most recently in Johnson v. Guzman Chavez, uh, when uh when Congress specifies one item from a list of associated uh in associated group or series. It excludes those that it does not mention. Here we don't have just have an associated group or series, we have a defined list. We know the exact universe. So that that puts that associated group or series implication at its highest point. The second, as this court said in uh for example in Bittner,

Evan T. Grostic 3:06

When Congress includes language in one statute but omits it in a neighbor, That also brings the negative implication canon to the fore. And here we have again multiple neighbors where A2A is listed and an id otherwise identical language in the probation statute. So again, that's at its highest there. And one further point, uh the Congress did actually remove two factors uh from from 3583e, the second being A3, the kinds of sentences available. If that were also permissive, as the government contends, that would be nonsensical. Courts could or could not at their option consider other kinds of sentences. So when we put all of those things together, we believe that the negative implication can in here is at its highest and and Congress thus excluded uh the A two A factors.

John G. Roberts 3:55

How do you um Uh How precise is the split? I mean let's say under C the judge says, I have to consider what's necessary to protect the public from further crimes, right? And because that was such a serious offense and there was no respect for the law, uh I'm going to do this or that. Is

Evan T. Grostic 4:16

is that acceptable or not?