United States v. Stephen Brines

MEMORANDUM

Stephen Jay Brines pleaded guilty to the charge of knowingly receiving child pornography, in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 2252A(a)(2)(A). Although the mandatory minimum penalty for this crime is five years of imprisonment pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 2252A(b)(l), the district court sentenced Brines to just two years of imprisonment, to be followed by 10 years of supervised release.

The government has appealed the sentence imposed by the district court, contending that the sentence is unlawful under 18 U.S.C. § 2252A(b)(l). We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 , and we vacate Brines’s sentence.

Section 2252A(b)(l) provides, inter alia, that a person who violates § 2252A(a)(2)(A) “shall be ... imprisoned not less than 5 years.... ” This minimum sentence “is mandatory, not optional.” See United States v. Sykes, 658 F.3d 1140, 1146 (9th Cir.2011) (internal quotation marks omitted). Because no exception to the statutory minimum sentence applies in this case, the district court had no authority to sentence Brines to less than five years of imprisonment.

Brines also argues that, if this court remands, the district court should be required to impose a sentence not greater…