Timothy Paul Ware v. United States

Relying on 28 U.S.C. § 2255 , appellant Timothy Paul Ware commenced proceedings in the District of Guam to challenge his sentence. Ware had been sentenced in that district as an adult, the court having found that the Federal Youth Corrections Act (FYCA), 18 U.S.C. §§ 5005-5026 , is inapplicable to a territorial court. The controlling statute provides “This chapter shall apply in the states of the United States and the District of Columbia,” so there is some basis for the interpretation that Congress, either deliberately or by oversight, did not intend the Federal Youth Corrections Act to apply in the territories. Ware claims, however, that if the statute is so construed, the exclusion of territories denies him due process, and its equal protection component under Bolling v. Sharpe, 347 U.S. 497 , 74 S.Ct. 693 , 98 L.Ed. 884 (1954), on the ground there is no rational basis for depriving a defendant of the benefits conferred by the FYCA simply because he is sentenced in a territorial district court. If territorial courts are excluded from the FYCA, the constitutional issue is a substantial one; but we decline to reach these questions at this stage of the case.

Neither this court…