Hunter v. United States
The Court holds that a defendant's agreement not to appeal his sentence is unenforceable when enforcing it would result in a miscarriage of justice — that is, when it would leave in place the kind of egregious, obvious error that would bring the judicial system into disrepute. This is a high bar that ordinary mistakes in applying sentencing law cannot meet. The Court remands for the Fifth Circuit to decide whether Hunter's challenge clears it.
Case background
Munson Hunter III was charged with 10 counts of bank and wire fraud for a years-long scheme that cost various financial institutions about half a million dollars. He entered into a written plea agreement with the Government, pleading guilty to one count of aiding and abetting wire fraud in exchange for dismissal of the remaining nine charges and a promise not to prosecute him for the described conduct. The agreement included an appeal waiver covering both his conviction and his sentence, and provided that any modification of its terms had to be in writing and signed by all parties. At sentencing, the District Court imposed 51 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release, including a condition — over Hunter’s objection — that he take all mental-health medications prescribed by his treating physician. At the close of the hearing the court told Hunter he had “a right to appeal,” and the prosecutor did not object. Hunter appealed the medication condition, and the Government sought dismissal based on the appeal waiver. The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit dismissed the appeal, holding that under Circuit precedent appeal waivers are enforceable except in two circumstances: when the waiver was tainted by ineffective assistance of counsel, and when the sentence exceeded the statutory maximum.
Questions Presented
(1) Whether the only permissible exceptions to a general appeal waiver are for claims of ineffective assistance of counsel or that the sentence exceeds the statutory maximum.
(2) Whether an appeal waiver applies when the sentencing judge advises the defendant that he has a right to appeal and the government does not object.
Holding
An agreement not to appeal a sentence is unenforceable when it would result in a miscarriage of justice — meaning, when it would leave in place the kind of egregious error that would bring the judicial system into disrepute. Because courts must approve and implement appeal waivers, the standard for enforcing them implicates the integrity of the judiciary, not just the interests of the parties. The miscarriage-of-justice limit sets a high bar: the error must be obvious, not one a judge could reasonably make, and of a type that would undermine public confidence in the judiciary. Ordinary mistakes in applying sentencing law cannot cancel an appeal waiver. The Court declined to decide in the first instance whether Hunter’s challenge to the mandatory-medication condition meets that standard, and vacated and remanded for the Fifth Circuit to decide that question.
The Court
Justice Kagan delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Alito, Sotomayor, Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, Barrett, and Jackson joined. Justice Gorsuch filed a concurring opinion, in which Justices Sotomayor and Jackson joined. Justice Kavanaugh filed a concurring opinion, in which Justices Alito and Barrett joined. Justice Barrett filed a concurring opinion. Justice Thomas filed a dissenting opinion.
What this episode contains
This episode is an AI-narrated reading of the majority opinion in Hunter v. United States, written by Justice Kagan.
AI disclosure: The voice in this episode is AI-generated, using a machine learning model styled to loosely resemble the authoring justice. Tone, inflection, pacing, and emphasis are artifacts of the model and should not be attributed to Justice Kagan. The text being read is the Court’s published majority opinion, lightly adapted to improve readability for the spoken format.