Alejandra Tapia, Petitioner v. United States (564 U.S. 319)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided June 16, 2011 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 564 U.S. 319 · 131 S. Ct. 2382
- Decided
- June 16, 2011
- Term
- October Term 2010
- Vote
- 9–0
- Majority author
- Justice Kagan
- Issue area
- Criminal Procedure
- Disposition
- Reversed and remanded
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Liberal
Opinion excerpt
Justice Kagan delivered the opinion of the Court. We consider here whether the Sentencing Reform Act precludes federal courts from imposing or lengthening a prison term in order to promote a criminal defendant’s rehabilitation. We hold that it does. I Petitioner Alejandra Tapia was convicted of, inter alia, smuggling unauthorized aliens into the United States, in violation of 8 U. S. C. §§ 1324(a)(2)(B)(ii) and (iii). At sentencing, the District Court determined that the United States Sentencing Guidelines recommended a prison term of between 41 and 51 months for Tapia’s offenses. The court decided to impose a 51-month term, followed by three years of supervised release. In explaining its reasons, the court referred several times to Tapia’s need for drug treatment, citing in particular the Bureau of Prison’s Residential Drug Abuse Program (known as RDAP or the 500 Hour Drug Program). The court indicated that Tapia should serve a prison term long enough to qualify for and complete that program: “The sentence has to be sufficient to provide needed correctional treatment, and here I think the needed correctional treatment is the 500 Hour Drug Program. “Here I have to say that one of the factors that — I am going to impose a 51-month sentence,... and one of the factors that affects this is the need to provide treatment. In other words, so she is in long enough to get the 500 Hour…
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