DOJ seeking rehearing on consideration of state/federal disparity

As noted in this post last month, the First Circuit in US v. Wilkerson, No. 02-1729 (1st Cir. June 9, 2005) (available here), at the end of a lengthy opinion, seemed to endorse post-Booker consideration of disparities between state and federal sentencing.  Thanks to a helpful FOB ("friend of blog"), I can now provide for downloading below a copy of the government's petition for panel rehearing in Wilkerson.   The petition asks for the First Circuit to amend its Wilkerson opinion "to eliminate any suggestion that federal-state sentencing disparity is a proper consideration in federal sentencing proceedings."

The petition's assertions about post-Booker consideration of disparities between federal and state sentences are fascinating (and, notably, a footnote cites to this blog and to this post at Appellate Law & Practice and to this post at the PRACDL blog).  And the petition argues that "federal-state sentencing disparity is never an appropriate consideration in federal sentencing, even in a post-Booker setting" (emphasis in original).

This is an important post-Booker issue, though it comes now before the First Circuit in a somewhat unusual procedural posture.  I will be intrigued to see what the First Circuit makes of this matter.

Download wilkerson_doj_petition_for_rehearing.pdf

UPDATE: AL&P is excited by the cite and then asks a bunch questions about what the cite means for law blogging.  My added question is what this tells us about the pros and cons of the Bluebook's new (and flawed) rules for citing blogs.