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The low-hanging fruit and long sentencing options of § 922(g)

By Douglas A. Berman

The Fourth Circuit has an interesting sentencing decison today in US v. Wright, No. 08-4679 (4th Cir. Feb. 3, 2010) (available here).  First, consider the panel's description of the defendant's crime: Jeremy Wright sprayed twenty-two rounds from an AK-47 assault rifle into a crowded night club parking lot, killing a man sleeping in a car with a single bullet to the head.  Wright fired his rifle until he ran out of ammunition even though there were some two or three hundred people at the club, many of whom were pouring outdoors as the result of a fight that Wright had just instigated with rival gang members.  In addition to the man he killed, Wright also wounded a club patron in the course of his rampage. Now, guess Wright's crime of conviction in federal court (hint: it is not murder, but it did lead to a sentence of life imprisonment)...continue to full post

Full post as published by Sentencing Law and Policy on February 03, 2010 (boomark / email).