Darren Smith v. United States

I. Whether a district court commits procedural error under 18 U.S.C. § 3553, Rita v. United States, 551 U.S. 338 (2007), and Gall v. United States, 552 U.S. 38 (2007), when it imposes a within-Guidelines sentence without addressing the defendant’s nonfrivolous mitigation arguments or explaining its rejection of a different sentence. II. Whether a defendant who admits factual guilt at trial as to his offenses of conviction but only proceeds to trial to contest charges on which he is acquitted or is never found guilty, may be categorically denied an acceptance of responsibility reduction under Application Note 2 of § 3E1.1(a)? By its terms, Application Note 2 does not apply to every trial defendant—only those defendants who deny factual guilt, is convicted and only accepts responsibility after conviction. III. Whether the official victim enhancement under U.S.S.G. § 3A1.2(a) may be applied absent proof that the defendant specifically knew the victim was a government officer and the offense was motivated by that official status.