Christopher Texidor, Petitioner v. United States

1. Whether United States v. Watts, 519 U.S. 148 (1997), which permits sentencing courts to consider conduct underlying charges of which a defendant was acquitted, remains constitutionally valid in light of the Sixth Amendment ’ s guarantee that the jury is the exclusive constitutional arbiter of criminal facts, and whether an acquittal — rendered by the constitutionally designated fact-finder under the beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard with full adversarial protections — forecloses any subsequent use of the acquitted conduct at sentencing for any purpose that increases the sentence above what the convicted conduct alone supports. 2. Whether 18 U.S.C. § 3661, which authorizes sentencing courts to consider unlimited information about a convicted person ’ s background, character, and conduct, can constitutionally be applied to permit consideration of conduct underlying charges of which the defendant was acquitted, where the jury ’ s verdict is the constitutional resolution of the factual question submitted and where the statute ’ s application overrides that resolution through judicial fact-finding under a standard lower than the Constitution requires for criminal punishment. 3. Whether the Sentencing Commission ’ s November 2024 amendment to USSG § 1B1 .3, which restricts the use of acquitted conduct in calculating the guideline range but leaves its use as a § 3553(a) discretionary factor entirely unrestricted — with acquitted conduct re-entering through USSG § IB 1.4 and 18 U.S.C. § 3661 — creates a constitutionally meaningful distinction or merely a formal prohibition with no functional effect on the sentence actually imposed, as demonstrated by the sentencing court ’ s own express admission in this case.