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Supreme Court Lets 55 Year Drug Sentence Stand

By Jeralyn, Section Court Decisions
Posted on Mon Dec 04, 2006 at 12:19:52 PM EST
Tags: Weldon Angelos, mandatory minimums (all tags)
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Even though the trial judge, a conservative, called the 55 year sentence of Weldon Angelos excessive, the Supreme Court let it stand today.

Angelos' crime? Carrying a handgun during three 8 oz. marijuana sales.

The Supreme Court on Monday let stand a mandatory 55-year prison sentence, condemned as excessive by the federal judge who imposed it, for a man convicted of carrying a handgun during three marijuana deals.

It didn't matter than he never brandished or used the gun.

Record producer Weldon Angelos received the minimum sentence under the law - a harsher sentence than a child rapist or a terrorist who detonates a bomb aboard an aircraft would receive, according to his attorneys. The justices, without comment, left the prison term undisturbed.

Four former attorneys general and 145 former prosecutors and judges wrote in support of a lighter sentence for Angelos. Even the sentencing judge, U.S. District Judge Paul Cassell, an appointee of President Bush, called the sentence "unjust, cruel and irrational." But he said the law left him no choice.

Background here and here. As I wrote here, Harry Rimm, who authored the brief for the 10th Circuit, told me

We had 163 signatories for the Brief to the 10th Circuit, including former US Attorneys General, former US Attorneys, other former high ranking DOJ officials, retired federal Circuit judges and retired federal District Judges.

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