United States v. Wardle

1

United States of America, Plaintiff, v. Patsy Wardle, Defendant.

CRIMINAL No. 5:18-57-KKC

United States District Court, E.D. Kentucky, Central Division, Lexington

October 14, 2021

OPINION AND ORDER

KAREN K. CALDWELL, DNTTED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

This matter is before the Court on Defendant Patsy Wardle's motion requesting that the Court order her release from prison. (DE 386.) On April 24, 2019, a jury convicted Wardle of two counts of distribution of oxycodone and one count of conspiracy to distribute oxycodone. (DE 287 at 2.) Her projected release date is October 21, 2029 and she is currently incarcerated at FCI Perkin.

Wardle now moves the Court to modify her sentence under 18 U.S.C § 3582(c)(1)(A), which provides for what is commonly referred to as “compassionate release.” She states that various sections of the First Step Act of 2018 and her rehabilitative efforts justify early release. For the following reasons, Wardle's motion (DE 386) is dismissed without prejudice.

I. Exhaustion of Administrative Remedies

A. Legal Standard

Prior to the First Step Act, PL 115-391, 132 Stat 5194 (Dec. 21, 2018), the Court could not grant a motion for compassionate release unless the director of the Bureau of Prisons (“BOP”) filed the motion. See 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A) (2002). The First Step Act amended § 3582(c)(1)(A) to allow the court to grant a motion for compassionate release filed by the defendant himself “after the defendant has fully exhausted all administrative rights to appeal a failure of the Bureau of Prisons to bring a motion on the defendant's behalf or the lapse of 30 days from the receipt of such a request by the warden of the defendant's facility, whichever is earlier . . . .” 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A); PL 115-391, 132 Stat 5194 § 603 (Dec. 21, 2018). The Sixth Circuit has determined that the occurrence of one of the two events mentioned in the statute is a “mandatory condition” to the Court granting compassionate release. United States v. Alam, 960 F.3d 831, 833 (6th Cir. 2020). If the government “properly invoke[s]” the condition, the Court must enforce it. Id. at 834 (citation and quotation marks omitted).

District courts are split as to whether a defendant's administrative remedies have been exhausted under § 3582(c)(1)(A) when the grounds for relief presented in a motion to the Court differ from those included in a compassionate release request to the BOP. Compare United States v. Parker, 461 F.Supp.3d 966, 976-77, (C.D. Cal. May 21, 2020) (surveying cases rejecting the argument that an inmate must first raise COVID-19 in a request to the warden to raise COVID-19 in a motion seeking release by the court), with United States v. Jeffers, 466 F.Supp.3d 999, 1005-06, (N.D. Iowa June 1, 2020) (collecting cases finding that that COVID-19 must be raised in defendant's request to the BOP). Indeed, within this very circuit district courts have reached opposite conclusions on this issue. Compare United States v. Poole, 472 F.Supp.3d 450, 456 (W.D. Tenn. 2020) (“The statute contains no language requiring that a court consider only arguments raised first to the BOP or requiring a defendant to raise each ground for relief to the BOP.”), with United States v. Asmar, 465 F.Supp.3d 716, 719 (E.D. Mich. 2020) (citations omitted) (“Where the factual basis in the administrative request and the motion before the court are different, a defendant does not satisfy the exhaustion requirement.”).

While the question of whether § 3582(c)(1)(A) requires “issue exhaustion” has not been directly addressed by the Sixth Circuit, the court has stated that the exhaustion requirement is meant “to implement an orderly system for reviewing compassionate-release applications, not one that incentivizes line jumping.” United States v. Alam, 960 F.3d 831, 834 (6th Cir. 2020). In Alam, the court stresses that review by the BOP is not “futile” and that “[p]reventing prisoners from charging straight to federal court serves important purposes.” Id. at 835. Requiring that prisoners first present their arguments in a request to the warden “ensures that the prison administrators can prioritize the most urgent claims” and “that they can investigate the gravity of the conditions supporting compassionate release and the likelihood that the conditions will persist.” Id.; see also Asmar, 465 F.Supp.3d at 719 (“There is undeniable value in having the BOP make the initial review before an inmate is released . . . [it gives] the BOP the opportunity to gather an inmate's medical documentation and other records, evaluate the request, and decide in the first instance whether it justifies seeking compassionate release or pursuing some other form of relief.”).

The Sixth Circuit's opinion in Alam suggests that issue exhaustion is required under § 3582(c)(1)(A). Alam, 960 F.3d 831. The important purposes of the administrative exhaustion would be undermined if prisoners could present entirely new arguments and issues in a motion without first presenting those arguments to the BOP.

B. Wardle's Motion is Not Timely

The Government argues that Wardle has not met this requirement, because she did not submit a new compassionate release request to her warden before filing her second motion. In its view, although Wardle has previously requested compassionate release, she has not exhausted her administrative remedies because her second motion makes arguments to the Court that were not first made in a request to the BOP. While at least one court in this circuit has taken a different view and concluded that issue exhaustion is not required, Poole, 472 F.Supp.3d 450, Wardle has failed to satisfy the administrative exhaustion requirement under either an issue exhaustion or more lenient standard.

On July 6, 2020, Wardle submitted a request for compassionate release to the warden of her facility. That request was denied on July 29, 2020 and Wardle then properly filed a motion for compassionate release on February 5, 2021. This Court denied that motion on April 1, 2021, and she filed a notice of appeal on April 5, 2021. While her first motion was still on appeal, she filed the instant motion on August 3, 2021, and the Sixth Circuit has since affirmed this Court's denial of her first motion. (See DE 390.)

Wardle's first motion asserted various health conditions and the COVID-19 pandemic as grounds for relief. (DE 359 at 5-8.) Her second motion states that she “isn't in good health” and “has survived being incarcerated through a ‘pandemic' [sic], ” but she does not assert these as reasons for her release. (DE 386.) Rather, her second motion seeks compassionate release based on certain sections of the First Step Act of 2018 and rehabilitation, (id.), entirely new bases that were not included in her first motion or request to her warden. (See DE 359 at 5-8, Exhibit 1.)

Wardle's arguments that the First Step Act and rehabilitation constitute grounds for compassionate release were never presented to the BOP and thus plainly fail to satisfy an issue exhaustion requirement. But even under a more lenient view, such as that adopted by the Western District of Tennessee, Poole, 472 F.Supp.3d 450, Wardle has not satisfied the exhaustion requirement. In that case, only one motion and one request to the warden were at issue. Here, Wardle did not merely present new arguments in her first motion following her request to the warden, she asserted new grounds in a completely new motion after her first motion had already been denied and appealed. Two motions are at issue, and the second is entirely unconnected to the initial request made to the warden. Wardle cannot rely on the first request to the warden to satisfy the exhaustion requirement for her second motion.

Common sense supports this conclusion. If a prisoner were only required to make one request to the BOP and forever after able to file new motions asserting new grounds for relief, the purpose of the exhaustion requirement would be severely undermined. It would incentivize exactly the kind of “line jumping” and “charging straight to federal court” that administrative exhaustion is meant to prevent and removes the BOP from the important role it plays in evaluating prisoners' claims. Alam, 960 F.3d at 834. Under any interpretation, Wardle's current motion has failed to satisfy the exhaustion requirement of § 3582(c)(1)(A) because she did not submit a request for compassionate release to the warden of her facility.

Because the administrative exhaustion requirement is a mandatory condition that has been properly invoked by the Government, Wardle's motion must be dismissed without prejudice. Alam, 960 F.3d at 836.

II. Extraordinary and Compelling Reasons

A. Legal Standard

Even if Wardle's motion were timely (which it is not), the grounds for relief asserted in her motion do not rise to the level of “extraordinary and compelling.” The compassionate release statute permits this Court to “reduce the term of imprisonment” and “impose a term of probation or supervised release with or without conditions that does not exceed the unserved portion of the original term of imprisonment.” 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A). Under the applicable provision of § 3582(c)(1)(A), however, the Court may grant this relief only if it finds that “extraordinary and compelling reasons warrant such a reduction, ” and the “reduction is consistent with applicable policy statements issued by the Sentencing Commission.” Id.

The statute does not define what it means to be “extraordinary and compelling.” The commentary to the policy statement by the Sentencing Commission applicable to Section 3582(c)(1)(A) provides some guidance; however, the Sixth Circuit has recently determined the policy statement applies only to motions filed by the BOP and does not...