Criminal Law: Conspiracy to Commit Bribery-Plea Agreement-Government’s Sentencing Argument

Defendant appealed the sentence imposed following his guilty plea to conspiracy to commit federal programs bribery. In the plea agreement, the parties jointly recommended the base offense level, application of specific increases and decreases in offense level, and the appropriate criminal history category; the parties reserved the right to argue for any lawful sentence. The Government recommended a sentence consecutive to defendant’s other federal sentences, while defendant argued for a concurrent sentence. The district court imposed a within-Guidelines consecutive sentence. On appeal, defendant argued that the Government’s conduct during sentencing breached the plea agreement, as the rules required the government to either join or not oppose the defense recommendation.

Where the plea agreement did not designate an appropriate final sentence or state whether the sentence should be concurrent or consecutive but instead allowed the parties to recommend any lawful sentence, the Government did not breach the plea agreement.

Judgment is affirmed.

U.S. v. Hutchinson (MLW No. 82037/Case No. 23-2247 – 5 pages) (U.S. Court of Appeals, 8th Circuit, per curiam) Appealed from U.S. District Court, Western District of Missouri, Wimes, J.