Eighth Circuit needs no Gall to affirm above-guideline sentence

As many folks recognize, the pro-discretion ruling in Gall does not ensure lighter sentences for everyone: Gall seems to give district courts even more discretion to sentence above the guidelines and should lead circuit courts to review these decisions more deferentially.  However, a decision handed down this morning by the Eighth Circuit in US v. Jones, No. 07-1212 (8th Cir. Dec. 11, 2007) (available here), highlights that district and circuit courts really did not need Gall to feel comfortable imposing and approving above-guideline sentences. 

In Jones, the district court relied on the defendant’s misconduct in jail while awaiting sentencing to add nearly 1.5 years of additional imprisonment to his suggested guideline sentence.  The Eighth Circuit panel in Jones, not surprisingly, finds a way to uphold this enhanced sentence despite a thin sentencing record that it has previously found insufficient to support reduced sentences.  This Jones opinion was likely completed last week; it does not mention Gall, though Jones now seems sounder in the wake of the Supreme Court’s repeated assertion that reasonableness review should be highly deferential.