Case Citator › United States v. David C. Hughes, the Office of the Federal Public Defender, Amicus Supporting

United States v. David C. Hughes, the Office of the Federal Public Defender, Amicus Supporting

Is it still good law? What later courts have actually done to this case.

Declined by some courts
Court
Fourth Circuit
Citation
401 F.3d 540
Decided
Confirmed treatments
3
Flagged citations read
49 of 49
Citing cases (total)
49
Treatment dates
2005

Status

Declined by some courts
At least one reviewed court has declined to follow this case. No reviewed court has overruled it. United States v. Hughes drew three confirmed refusals to follow its post-Booker plain error approach. The Eighth, Ninth, and Eleventh Circuits adopted different prejudice or remand rules, as detailed below.
More on how this was screened

All 49 flagged citations have been read; other citing courts applied Hughes or discussed different decisions.

Every treatment on this page is written from the citing opinion itself, with a verbatim quote, never copied from a commercial citator. A citation flagged by our screen but not shown here was read and found not to weaken this case.

49 later cases cite United States v. David C. Hughes, the Office of the Federal Public Defender, Amicus Supporting; 49 of those citations sat close to treatment language and were flagged for reading, and all of them have been read. Citations that did not sit near treatment language were not flagged and were not read one by one, so a court that weakened this case without using any of that language would not appear here.

Relying on United States v. David C. Hughes, the Office of the Federal Public Defender, Amicus Supporting?

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Treatments

Declined to follow

  • The Eighth Circuit rejected Hughes's definition of plain error under Booker.

    United States v. Pirani · Eighth Circuit (en banc) · filed

    The Fourth Circuit in a thorough opinion concluded that all pending appeals in which the district court committed Sixth Amendment error by imposing a mandatory, judge-found guidelines enhancement must be remanded because of plain Booker error. United States v. Hughes, 401 F.3d 540 (4th Cir. 2005). ... Like most other circuits, we disagree with the Fourth Circuit’s definition of the plain error at issue.
    Read the full opinion on CourtListener →
  • The Ninth Circuit rejected Hughes's measure of sentencing prejudice because an advisory Guidelines sentence could be the same.

    United States v. Ameline · Ninth Circuit (en banc) · filed

    If the former sentence would have been more favorable to the defendant, the defendant was prejudiced. See, e.g., Hughes, 401 F.3d at 548-49. As discussed above, however, we view judicial factfinding as erroneous only when coupled with a mandatory guidelines system. Moreover, upon remand the district court will consult the guidelines as required by Booker and will be free to impose exactly the same sentence.
    Read the full opinion on CourtListener →
  • The Eleventh Circuit found Hughes unpersuasive on plain error review and affirmed the sentence under its own rule.

    United States v. Herman · Eleventh Circuit · filed

    Finally, to the extent Herman relies upon United States v. Hughes, 401 F.3d 540 (4th Cir. 2005) in support of his plain error argument, this Court has considered Hughes and found it unpersuasive. See Rodriguez, 398 F.3d at 1301-1304. Accordingly, we conclude that Herman has not met his burden under plain error review.
    Read the full opinion on CourtListener →

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