Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals Reverses Sentencing and Makes the Government Play Fair
In an unpublished Eleventh Circuit appeal opinion issued April 24, 2025, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with the defendant/appellant that the government breached a plea agreement in which is agreed to a stipulated amount of loss in an unemployment fraud crime case, then provided information of a higher loss amount to probation for inclusion in the presentence investigation report.
Terms of Plea Agreement
The agreement in United States v. Isaac Camon (No. 24-10926) included an agreement that the government that the guilty plea was “in full satisfaction of all possible federal criminal charges known . . . at the time of [his] guilty plea, which might have been brought solely in this district against [him],…” The defendant was also facing a supervised release revocation based on the same conduct as that charged in the indictment. The defendant and the government agreed that the sentence in the new case and the revocation sentence should be served concurrently.
The plea agreement also contained a non binding stipulation of facts in which the defendant and the government agreed that for purposes of “relevant conduct” the defendant was responsible for a loss of $19,452.00.
The government provided probation with information that the defendant was involved in a separate fraud scheme (note charged in the case) in which the intended loss was $97,400. This information appeared in the presentence investigation report.
At sentencing, the government requested a sentence consistent with the agreed upon loss of $19,452.00; 18 months. But the government also presented evidence at the sentencing hearing of the uncharged fraud scheme.
Motion to Enforce Plea Agreement
The defendant filed a motion to enforce the plea agreement in which he argued that the government had breached the plea agreement by prompting and advocated the inclusion of the uncharged fraud scheme in the presentence investigation report, which was contrary to the agreed upon position limiting the loss in terms of relevant conduct. In the motion, the defendant noted statements made by the government during the plea negotiations showing agreement that the government agreed not to charge the other fraud scheme in exchange for the defendant’s guilty plea on the unemployment fraud charge. Email correspondence to that effect were attached to the motion.
The sentencing judge struck the reference to the $97,400.00 intended loss from the uncharged fraud scheme, but still sentenced the defendant to a term of 36 months on the new charges and a consecutive sentence of 36 months on the revocation, for a total of 72 months.
The Eleventh Circuit applied the following principles in reviewing the case:
Application of an objective standard to “decide whether the government’s actions are inconsistent with what the defendant reasonably understood when he entered his guilty plea.”
Generally interpret plea agreements as contracts, but not in “hyper-technical” manner.
Ultimately, the Eleventh Circuit held that its prior decision in United States v. Boatner governed the appeal. In Boatner, the Eleventh Circuit held that the government breached a plea agreement where it stipulated to a particular drug quantity for sentencing purposes, but then supplied information to probation for inclusion in the PSR that asserted the defendant had participated in activities involving a very much larger quantity of drugs. The Court held that the government could not skirt their agreement in the plea agreement as to quantity by indirectly introducing contrary evidence of quantity through the PSR that could lead the sentencing court to believe that the defendant was involved in a larger amount than agreed upon in the plea agreement.
We gleaned three key points from this Eleventh Circuit appeal decision:
- First, it is important to document the plea negotiations. This can be done by confirming discussions and statements in the form of correspondence (letter or email). All discussions should also be memorialized in written memos to the file.
- Second, the government cannot “back door” information and facts that are contrary to those agreed upon in the plea agreement. Monitor closely what appears in the PSR. In our experience, it is common for probation to simply lift facts provided by the government from discovery documents, agency reports, etc. This also means that diligence is required in making objections to the factual content of presentence investigation reports. This is particularly important because unless there is an objection to the content of the PSR, it is assumed that the defendant agreed upon the inclusion in the report.
- Third, where warranted, file a motion to enforce the agreement. This will allow you to document the issue in the record for purposes of a potential appeal. Filing a written motion is a much more concrete way of raising the issue. This is particularly important in light of the inclusion of appeal waivers in the plea agreement. An appeal regarding a potential breach of the plea agreement is not generally subject to the appeal waiver, because the issue is directly related to the plea agreement and its validity itself.
