Judicial clashes can be pretty amusing, particularly because we expect judges to be stoic and unflappable. But clearly there has been some flapping on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.
Last August, a split Second Circuit panel upheld a high school field hockey coach’s 30-year sentence for attempting to produce child pornography. Circuit Judge Reena Raagi wrote the majority opinion, explaining that the sentence, which fell within the Guidelines range, was reasonable because “no limitation shall be placed on the information concerning the background, character, and conduct of a person convicted of an offense which a court of the United States may receive and consider for the purpose of imposing an appropriate sentence” within the prescribed range.”
Chief Judge Dennis Jacobs dissented, arguing that the sentence unfairly reached beyond “the offense of conviction,” which “amounts to a single act of attempted sexting.”