# United States v. Ricky A. Caruthers

> Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit · August 11, 2006 · 458 F.3d 459

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9499107

## Case

- **Full name:** UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Ricky A. CARUTHERS, Defendant-Appellant
- **Court:** Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
- **Decided:** August 11, 2006
- **Citations:** 458 F.3d 459; 2006 U.S. App. LEXIS 20569; 2006 WL 2320942
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by McKEAGUE
- **Judges:** Moore, McKeague, Polster
- **Cited by:** 228 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- **Red flag:** Abrogated on other grounds by Larry Cradler v. United States, 891 F.3d 659 (2018).
- Negative treatments: 2
- Distinguished by: 0
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9499107

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- stating that there was “no doubt” that an anonymous emergency call describing a man’s appearance and stating that he had a gun did not by itself provide reasonable suspicion, but concluding that police officers had reasonable suspicion after the man fled and attempted to conce…
- finding that Caruthers’s action of “ ‘hurr[ying]’ away in a ‘semi-running’ manner” while not the same as “headlong flight” was still a relevant consideration in examining the reasonableness of an investigatory Terry stop
- finding that Caruthers’s action of “‘hurr[ying]’ away in a ‘semi-running’ manner” while not the same as “headlong flight” was still a relevant consideration in examining the reasonableness of an investigatory Terry stop
- finding that the defendant’s “flight from the police immediately preceding his unusual posture ... could reasonably suggest that [he] fled ... so that he could discard a weapon or other contraband”
- stating that an anonymous tip alone is not enough to establish reasonable suspicion and cautioning against "relying too easily or too heavily” on the designation of a “high-crime area”

## Opinion text

McKEAGUE, Circuit Judge,
concurring.
I join the majority opinion in full, but write separately to address two points related to the discussion of whether Caruthers’s waiver of appellate rights with regard to his sentencing argument was enforceable. First, the majority opinion states that one court, in dicta, has held that a defendant cannot waive the right to appeal a sentence above the statutory maximum because a district court is without jurisdiction to impose such a sentence. This decision misconceives the nature of jurisdiction. A district court either has jurisdiction to sentence a defendant or does not have such jurisdiction. 1 A sentence imposed above the statutory maximum would certainly be legal error, but saying that a judge is wrong is not the equivalent of saying that a judge has acted beyond his or her jurisdiction. Fortunately, the majority *477 opinion wisely refrains from relying on the jurisdictional rationale in support of its assumption in this case that Caruthers’s appellate waiver is unenforceable.
Second, while I agree with the approach of avoiding resolution of the waiver issue, both because it was not adequately addressed by the parties and because it is unnecessary to resolve it in this case, I write separately to briefly note my view on the issue. I do not believe that Caruthers’s appeal of his sentence should be characterized as a challenge on the grounds that it exceeds the statutory maximum. Instead, I adhere to the view that being a felon in possession of a firearm and being an armed career criminal in possession of a firearm are not two separate offenses, but simply recidivism-contingent variants of the same offense, and therefore the statutory maximum of this offense is life. 2
. In this case, the district court had jurisdiction to sentence Caruthers pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 3231 which provides that "[t]he district courts of the United States shall have original jurisdiction, exclusive of the courts of the States, of all offenses against the laws of the United States.”
. I further note that where ACCA status is an issue, district courts are required to advise the defendant that the statutory maximum is life. See Fed.R.Crim.P. 11(b)(1)(H) (requiring the trial court to ascertain that a defendant understands “any maximum possible penalty” before accepting a guilty plea (emphasis added)).

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9499107. Public record. Not legal advice.