United States v. Kelly Kay Wegner

Kelly Kay Wegner (“Wegner”) appeals her sentence under the Sentencing Guidelines following her guilty plea for drug manufacturing and trafficking. She argues that the district court miscalculated her base offense level by erroneously applying the one kilo gram to one marijuana plant conversion ratio in U.S.S.G. § 2Dl.l(e) n.*.

FACTS AND PRIOR PROCEEDINGS

On November 10,1992, Kelly Wegner pled guilty to one count of an indictment alleging that she manufactured and possessed with intent to distribute “at least 100 marijuana plants.” Wegner admitted to growing and harvesting marijuana in the basement of her rented house. She, however, maintained that the number of plants involved was less than one hundred, and objected to having her sentence based on the number of plants grown over a period of time but not seized by the government. Instead, she claimed that only the dry weight of marijuana actually produced by the plants, approximately 10 to 20 kilos, should be used for determining her base offense level. With her Criminal History Category of II, this would have resulted in a base offense level of 16 under U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1.

The government contended that between 100 and 400…