Nice simple account of Rita from the Seventh Circuit

Though I am still awaiting (and may wait a long time for) a blockbuster post-Rita opinion from the circuit courts, the Seventh Circuit on Thursday provided this effective brief account of the Rita decision in US v. Sachsenmaier, No. 05-3505 (7th Cir. June 28, 2007) (available here):

[T]he Supreme Court has now expressly endorsed the rebuttable presumption of reasonableness for appellate review of a district court’s sentencing decision.  See Rita v. United States, No. 06-5754, 2007 WL 1772146 (June 21, 2007); United States v. Nitch, 477 F.3d 933, 937- 38 (7th Cir. 2007)United States v. Gama-Gonzalez, 469 F.3d 1109 (7th Cir. 2006). The Rita decision emphasized that this is a standard for appellate review only. Rita, 2007 WL 1772146, at *9.  The district courts must calculate the advisory sentencing guideline range accurately, so that they can derive whatever insight the guidelines have to offer, but ultimately they must sentence based on 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) without any thumb on the scale favoring a guideline sentence.  If, however, a district court freely decides that the guidelines suggest a reasonable sentence, then on appellate review the defendant must explain why the district court was wrong.