In United States v. Roper, --- F.4th ---, No. 22-30021 (9th Cir. 2023), the Court vacated the district court’s denial of Jerramey Lyndell Roper’s motion for a sentence reduction under 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A)(i), and remanding for the district court to consider the motion anew.
The Court held that district courts may consider non-retroactive changes in post-sentencing law affecting the applicable Sentencing Guidelines when assessing whether a defendant has established the requisite “extraordinary and compelling reasons.”
This is true, the Court held, for both statutory and decisional changes. In other words, regardless of whether the sentencing change resulted from a modification of the relevant statute or from a court decision, the district court can consider the change in assessing whether the defendant has established “extraordinary and compelling reasons.”
