Reducing the term of supervised release can satisfy Article III’s case‐or‐controversy requirement
“On September 20, 2013, the district court convicted Pauline Wiltshire of violating her supervised release by 1) making false statements to a probation officer; and 2) leaving the district of her supervision without permission. Wiltshire was sentenced to ninety days in custody, to be served on weekends, to be followed by five years of supervised release.” Pauline Wiltshire (Wiltshire) pled guilty to distribution of Adderall and was sentenced on April 16, 2012. She was placed on supervised release and, as with other people placed on supervised release, had to conform to the rules placed on her by the Court. Perhaps understandably or perhaps not, "Wiltshire did not inform either the district court, during her sentencing, or probation, on a standard questionnaire, that she worked occasionally as an exotic dancer at Platinum Plus in Lexington, Kentucky." She explained that she thought that this would "reflect poorly on her character." She travelled to her job and, by doing so, violated her supervisory release.
Standing: The Case or Controversy Clause of Article III, Section 2 of the United States Constitution limits the subject matter jurisdiction of the federal courts such that the “parties must continue to have a personal stake in the outcome of thelawsuit.” Lewis v. Cont’l Bank Corp., 494 U.S. 472, 477–78 (1990) (internal quotation marks omitted). To maintain a live case or controversy, “an individual challenging the revocation of his parole—and whose term of re‐incarceration has expired—bears the burden of demonstrating that some concrete and continuing injury continues to flow from the fact of the revocation.” United States v. Probber, 170 F.3d 345, 348 (2d Cir. 1999). Jurisdiction will not lie where the alleged injury is “too speculative to satisfy the case‐or‐controversy requirement of Article III.” Id. at 349.
Analysis: The court here looks at the penalty and the consequences. The injury here is that Wiltshire’s sentence of supervisory release is extended from the end date of 2017 to the new end date of 2019. “Wiltshire’s “appeal is not moot because a favorable appellate decision might prompt the district court to reduce [her] . . . term of supervised release.” United States v. Kleiner, 765 F.3d 155, 157 n.1 (2d Cir. 2014). Moving to the merits, the Court finds that there is little issue that Wiltshire violated her terms of Supervisory release. The Second Circuit finds that there was no abuse of discretion here and disregards Wiltshire’s arguments about the government’s burden of proof as to her violation of Supervisory Release.
The case is United States v. Pauline Wiltshire, 13-3590 (2d Cir. Dec. 1, 2014).
