United States v. Haymond

The case asked whether a federal supervised-release law could require at least five years of prison based on a judge's own finding, using a preponderance-of-the-evidence standard. On June 26, 2019, the Supreme Court said that part of 18 U.S.C. 3583(k) violated the right to a trial by jury.

The case was argued on February 26, 2019, and decided on June 26, 2019. The prompt does not provide the vote count, opinion author, or lineup.

The decision limits when judges can send someone on supervised release back to prison for a long mandatory term without a jury verdict. It affects federal defendants accused of certain new conduct while under court supervision.

The Supreme Court has finished this docket action. The decision left the lower courts to apply the ruling to Haymond and similar supervised-release cases.

The dispute was over whether a judge could impose at least five more years in prison after finding new conduct by a lower proof standard. The Court said that feature of Section 3583(k) violated the jury-trial right.

Federal defendants on supervised release are most directly affected. Judges cannot use this provision to impose a mandatory five-year prison term based only on their own fact-finding.

The Supreme Court's work in this case ended on June 26, 2019. Lower courts then had to carry out and apply that decision in Haymond's case and others.