Ronald Bruce Myers v. United States

This case presents a square and acknowledged conflict over an important question of federal criminal law. Section 3664(n) requires an incarcerated defendant who “receives substantial resources from any source” to apply “the value of such resources” to restitution. 18 U.S.C. § 3664(n). The First, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Circuits have held that § 3664(n) does not reach modest funds merely because they accumulate over time. A divided Ninth Circuit held the opposite, allowing the government to aggregate years of modest deposits from family and friends and seize them once the inmate’s account balance becomes substantial. Four judges dissented from the denial of rehearing en banc. They explained that the case “involves questions of exceptional national importance for prison management, inmates, and the courts,” and that the panel’s decision “creates a circuit split in an area of law which is best applied uniformly nationwide.” Three more judges wrote separately to express that “[a] principled reading of the statute does not support [the panel’s] result.” The panel’s rule follows inmates sentenced in the Ninth Circuit wherever the Bureau of Prisons houses them, subjecting inmates in the same federal prisons to different restitution regimes based solely on where they were sentenced. The question presented is: Whether 18 U.S.C. § 3664(n), which requires an incarcerated defendant who “receives substantial resources” to apply them to restitution, applies only when the defendant receives resources that are substantial at the time of receipt, or also permits the government to aggregate modest, periodic deposits over time and seize them once the inmate’s trust-account balance becomes substantial.