Great opinion on local variations and other post-Booker issues

When it rains, it pours fine sentencing opinions from the federal district courts.  Yesterday I received, and posted here, Judge Stewart Dalzell's thoughtful opinion in US v. Schwartz (which a reader declared "one of the most finely crafted trial court sentencing opinions" he had ever read).  And today I received more great district court work in the form of Judge Charles Sifton's opinion in US v. Luciana & Cavero, No. 04-410 (E.D.N.Y. July 28, 2005) (available for download below).

The Luciana & Cavero decision covers lots of post-Booker ground in astute ways, and Judge Sifton's discussion of the appropriateness of local sentencing variations within a national system is especially thorough and thoughtful.  Here is one of many highlights from this discussion:

[A]lthough subjective considerations such as "local mores" or feelings about a particular type of crime may not be an appropriate basis for granting a Guidelines departure or a non-Guidelines sentence, that the crime will have a greater or lesser impact given the locality of its commission is appropriately considered in crafting a reasonable sentence post-Booker.

The Luciana & Cavero opinion also covers important post-Booker ex post facto/due process issues and a number of other matters that should be of interest to everyone operating in the post-Booker universe.

Download sifton_cavera_opinion.pdf