Johnson v. United States
529 U.S. 694 (2000)
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Rule of Law:
The pre-1994 version of 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e)(3) grants district courts the authority to impose an additional term of supervised release following the revocation of an initial term and the reimprisonment of the defendant. This authority is derived from the statute's language, congressional intent to provide post-release supervision for those who need it, and the historical context of the parole system that supervised release replaced.
Facts:
- In October 1993, Cornell Johnson committed a Class D felony.
- In March 1994, Johnson was sentenced to 25 months' imprisonment followed by a three-year term of supervised release.
- On August 14, 1995, Johnson was released from prison and began his term of supervised release.
- Approximately seven months into his supervised release, Johnson was arrested in Virginia for forgery-related offenses.
- Johnson was subsequently convicted of four state forgery-related offenses.
- Johnson's new criminal conduct and his act of leaving the judicial district without permission constituted violations of his supervised release conditions.
Procedural Posture:
- The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee revoked Cornell Johnson's supervised release.
- The district court sentenced Johnson to 18 months' imprisonment, to be followed by a new 12-month term of supervised release.
- Johnson, as appellant, appealed the sentence to the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.
- Johnson argued that the district court lacked statutory authority to impose a new supervised release term and that applying a 1994 statutory amendment to his case violated the Ex Post Facto Clause.
- The Sixth Circuit affirmed the district court's sentence, holding that the punishment was for the new conduct of violating release conditions, so there was no retroactive application of the law and no Ex Post Facto violation.
- The United States Supreme Court granted Johnson's petition for a writ of certiorari to resolve a conflict among the circuit courts.
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Issue:
Does 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e)(3) (1988 ed., Supp. V), which allows a court to 'revoke a term of supervised release, and require the person to serve in prison all or part of the term of supervised release,' authorize that court to impose an additional term of supervised release to follow the period of reimprisonment?
Opinions:
Majority - Justice Souter
Yes. The pre-1994 version of 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e)(3) authorized a district court to impose an additional term of supervised release following reimprisonment. The Court first determined that post-revocation penalties are attributable to the original criminal offense, making the application of a later-enacted statute, § 3583(h), retroactive. However, by applying the presumption against statutory retroactivity, the Court avoided the Ex Post Facto issue and instead interpreted the original statute, § 3583(e)(3). The Court reasoned that Congress's use of the word 'revoke' rather than 'terminate' implied that the term of supervised release was not completely extinguished. Instead, the term retained some vitality, as evidenced by the provision that a defendant serves 'the term of supervised release' in prison. This interpretation aligns with the congressional purpose of supervised release, which is to provide supervision to those who need it most, such as individuals who have already failed on release. Finally, the historical practice under the parole system, which supervised release replaced, allowed for reparole after revocation, suggesting Congress intended a similar power to exist for supervised release.
Dissenting - Justice Scalia
No. The plain language of 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e)(3) does not authorize the imposition of an additional term of supervised release. The ordinary meaning of 'revoke' is to 'annul' or 'cancel,' which means the original term of supervised release is extinguished completely. The statute provides no authorization for the creation of a new term. The majority's reliance on an 'unconventional' and obscure meaning of 'revoke' is an 'act of willpower rather than of judgment.' The phrase allowing a defendant to serve 'all or part of the term of supervised release' in prison merely uses the length of the now-defunct term as a measure for the duration of imprisonment. The Court's appeal to congressional purpose is an improper judicial function; the Court's obligation is to enforce the statute's plain text, which is entirely plausible on its own and does not lead to an absurd result.
Concurring - Justice Kennedy
Yes. The statute permits imposing further supervised release after reimprisonment. The most convincing analysis is that the statutory language allowing a court to require a person to serve 'all or part of the term of supervised release' in prison indicates that an unexpired term of supervised release continues to exist after revocation. This unexpired term can then be allocated, at the court's discretion, between further confinement and further supervised release. This textual reading is sufficient to resolve the case, and it is unnecessary to discuss other statutory subsections like § 3583(a) or § 3583(e)(2).
Concurring - Justice Thomas
Yes. The Court's textual analysis of 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e)(3) is correct and sufficient to decide the case. However, it is unnecessary to rely on discussions of other statutory sections or any apparent congressional purpose to support this reading.
Analysis:
This case serves as a key example of the constitutional avoidance doctrine, where the Court sidesteps a difficult constitutional question (here, the Ex Post Facto Clause) by resolving the case on statutory interpretation grounds. It also highlights the tension between textualist and purposivist interpretive methods, with the majority blending textual analysis with congressional intent and historical context, while the dissent argues for a strict adherence to the ordinary meaning of the text. The decision established that post-revocation sanctions are punishment for the original offense, a critical holding for future retroactivity analyses in sentencing law. Although Congress later explicitly provided this authority in § 3583(h), this ruling clarified the law for all offenders sentenced under the prior, ambiguous version of the statute.
