7/20/2004 07:38:20 AM|||Nathan Moore|||

SCOTUS Blog has sources, above and beyond what we can muster, that tell him the Solicitor General is preparing a request for cert from the SCOTUS in light of a circuit split on how Blakely applies to the federal sentencing guidelines.
 
Our sources who litigate these cases and have excellent contacts (you know who you are, and we thank you) tell us that there is an excellent prospect that the Solicitor General will likely take the post-Blakely questions under the Guidelines to the Supreme Court on Wednesday. One or both of two filings are contemplated: a cert. petition in the Seventh Circuit's Booker case (in which Judges Posner and Easterbrook divided); and a petition for cert. before judgment in United States v. Fanfan (a district court decision from the District of Maine that was just appealed by the government to the First Circuit). Both cases involve drug conspiracies. The government will move to expedite both the cert. and merits stages of the cases, seeking: that any response to the petitions be filed within a week, that cert. be granted by August 2, and that merits briefing be completed by mid-September or early-October (under alternative schedules that are being discussed). Argument would be held immediately thereafter.
 
I wouldn't hold my breath for a clear answer (considering that Blakely was to clarify Apprendi, ha).  Regardless, the High Court can be clear when they want to be, and are vague when the purpose suits them.  The Guidelines do need to be ruled upon - this sort of limbo is unsustainable.  If the Court was hoping to muddy the waters a bit with Blakely, just to see what solutions and applications the federal district courts and the circuit courts would come up with, they've gotten their wish, and can now proceed to select the best option.  It sounds like a quasi-federalist approach to adjudication, which is peculiar, but not necessarily a bad thing.

|||109032758091316437|||Blakely Marches On