Pulsifer v. United States (Statutory Construction / Sentencing)

PULSIFER v. UNITED STATES

No. 22–340. Argued October 2, 2023—Decided March 15, 2024 After pleading guilty to distributing at least 50 grams of methamphetamine, petitioner Mark Pulsifer faced a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years in prison. At sentencing, he sought to take advantage of the “safety valve” provision of federal sentencing law, which allows a sentencing court to disregard the statutory minimum if a defendant meets five criteria. Among those is the requirement, set out in Paragraph (f)(1), that the sentencing court find that—

(1) the defendant does not have—
(A) more than 4 criminal history points, excluding any criminal history points resulting from a 1-point offense, as determined under the sentencing guidelines;
(B) a prior 3-point offense, as determined under the sentencing guidelines; and
(C) a prior 2-point violent offense, as determined under the sentencing guidelines.

The Government argued that Pulsifer could not satisfy that requirement because he had two prior three-point offenses totaling six criminal-history points. In the Government’s view, each of those prior offenses disqualified him under Subparagraph B and the six total points disqualified him under Subparagraph A. But Pulsifer claimed he remained eligible. He pointed out that his criminal record lacked a two-point violent offense, as specified in Subparagraph C. And in his view, only the combination of the items listed in the subparagraphs could prevent him from getting safety-valve relief. The District Court agreed with the Government, and the Eighth Circuit affirmed.

Held: A defendant facing a mandatory minimum sentence is eligible for safety-valve relief under 18 U. S. C. §3553(f)(1) only if he satisfies each of the provision’s three conditions—or said more specifically, only if he does not have more than four criminal-history points, does not have a prior three-point offense, and does not have a prior two-point violent offense. Pp. 6–28. 

Read by Jeff Barnum