District court may consider sentencing disparities between defendants when deciding to vary from guidelines sentencing range

SENTENCING United States v. Smart, No. 06-6120, ___ F.3d ___ (10th Cir. Mar. 4, 2008)(W.D. Oklahoma). Government appeal of district court’s downward variation from sentencing guidelines range in case in which defendant was convicted of inducing a minor to engage in sexually explicit conduct for the purpose of producing videotapes depicting such conduct in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2251(a). HELD: (1) Defendant is not entitled to variance from presumptively reasonable guidelines sentence merely because he received larger sentence than codefendant. However, district court may consider disparities between defendants when deciding to vary from guidelines sentencing range in order to avoid unwarranted sentencing disparities among similarly situated defendants. (2) Under "abuse of discretion" standard of review, court of appeals must give both formal and practical deference to sentencing court’s assessment of facts under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) and may not assume that sentencing guidelines perfectly express the § 3553(a) sentencing factors in an individual case in face of district court’s conclusion to contrary. Read the opinion here.