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THE SEVENTH CIRCUIT AFFIRMED THE DECISION IN UNITED STATES v. EURAL BLACK, 2025 U.S. App. LEXIS 5634 (7th Cir. Mar. 11, 2025).
Eural Black sought a sentence reduction under the compassionate release statute, 18 USC 3582(c)(1)(A), citing the First Step Act's anti-stacking amendment. Black is serving a 40-year sentence, 30 years of which were due to stacked 924(c) convictions. The First Step Act, passed in 2018, restricted the stacking of sentences under 924(c), but Congress made this amendment nonretroactive. In 2024, the United States Sentencing Commission amended a policy statement to allow prisoners serving unusually long sentences to seek reductions due to changes in the law.
The United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois denied Black's motion relying on the Seventh Circuit's decision in United States v. Thacker held that the First Step Act's anti-stacking amendment is not an extraordinary and compelling reason for compassionate release. Black appealed the decision.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit reviewed the case. The court reaffirmed its holding in Thacker stating that the anti-stacking amendment cannot be considered an extraordinary and compelling reason for a sentence reduction, even when combined with other factors. The court found that the Sentencing Commission's policy statement in USSG 1B1.13(b)(6), which allowed for such consideration, exceeded its statutory authority and conflicted with the First Step Act. Consequently, the court held that Black was ineligible for a sentence reduction based on the anti-stacking amendment and affirmed the district court's decision.
Judge Hamilton dissented and noted that a circuit split had emerged before the Commission acted in 2023 is powerful evidence that the Commission's new policy statement resolving the circuit split is reasonable and does not conflict with other statutes. See, e.g., United States v. Jean, 108 F.4th 275, 288‒90 (5th Cir. 2024), overruled by United States v. Austin, 125 F.4th 688 (5th Cir. 2025). In adopting the new policy in U.S.S.G. § 1B1.13(b)(6), the Commission did not treat the § 924(c) change alone as extraordinary and compelling. Rather, it struck a compromise position regarding the circuit split. Only if a defendant received and has served at least ten years of an "unusually long sentence," and if there is a "gross disparity" between the sentence the defendant received and what he would receive today, then a district court may modify that sentence after giving full consideration to the individual defendant's circumstances. The Commission's middle-ground position does not conflict with § 924(c). It can easily co-exist with Congress's decision in the First Step Act to deny full retroactive effect to the change in § 924(c)'s stacking provision, which would have automatically entitled all defendants with stacked § 924(c) charges to full and immediate consideration of resentencing. See, e.g., United States v. Chen, 48 F.4th 1092, 1098-1101 (9th Cir. 2022).
We should respect Congress's delegation of this choice to the Commission. We should clarify that Thacker did not intend to answer the statutory question definitively, regardless of what the Commission might say in the future. And we should remand this case for an exercise of the discretion granted to the district court under § 3582(c)(1)(A) and § 1B1.13(b)(6). the Samaritan Project believes this issue will be accepted for review by the Supreme Court shortly.
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