Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Criminal Law Blogs -> Sentencing Law and Policy

Criminal Law

: Sentencing Law and Policy

Questionable(?) DC Circuit ruling on safety-valve burden of proof

By Douglas A. Berman

The DC Circuit has a very intriguing little opinion this morning in US v. Gales, No. 08-3040 (DC Cir. Apr. 23, 2010) (available here), concerning burdens of proof and eligibility for statutory safety valve relief from an applicable mandatory minimum sentencing term.  At issue in Gales is whether the defendant satisfied the safety valve requirement to truthfully provide all information about his offense: the defendant claimed he did, prosecutors claimed he did not.  After saying it was not clear error for the district court to not believe the defendant, the DC Circuit has to respond to these claim by the defendant about the applicable burdens of proof: Gales contends that the district court ?misunderstood and misapplied? the burden of proof under the safety valve provision, claiming that after the government expressed its doubts to the district court about Gales? story concerning his drug supplier, the district court shifted the burden of proof to Gales to prove that he had not lied...continue to full post

Full post as published by Sentencing Law and Policy on April 23, 2010 (boomark / email).