United States v. De La Mora

I. FACTS AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

In April 1987, Jose Delamora was convicted on all counts of a nine-count indictment relating to his participation in a cocaine trafficking ring. Delamora’s conviction occurred dur- ing the “window period” between the effective date of two federal statutes that govern post-confinement monitoring of drug offenders. Before the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, some drug offenders, like Delamora, were eligible for parole, but would have to serve an additional term of “special parole” following their incarceration. See Gozlon-Peretz v. United States, 498 U.S. 395, 397-99 (1991). The Anti-Drug Abuse Act replaced special parole with supervised release, see Pub. L. No. 99-570, §§ 1002(2), 1004, 100 Stat. 3207 (1986) (codi- fied as amended at 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A)), but did not dis- turb drug offenders’ eligibility for parole. The Sentencing Reform Act, effective November 1, 1987, after Delamora’s conviction, abolished probation and all forms of parole and imposed a unified system of supervised release for all federal crimes. See Pub. L. No. 98-473, tit. II, § 212(a)(2), 98 Stat. 1837 (1984) (codified as amended at 18 U.S.C. § 3583).1 1 The Sentencing…