1 2 3 UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 4 FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT 5 August Term, 2023 6 (Argued: December 4, 2023 Decided: June 11, 2024) 7 Docket No. 22-3122-cr

8 9 10 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 11 Appellant, 12 v. 13 JOE FERNANDEZ, 14 Defendant-Appellee, 15 16 MANUEL ALADINO SUERO, JOSE GERMAN RODRIGUEZ-MORA, also known as 17 GORDO, LUIS RIVERA, ALBERTO REYES, also known as ZAC, PATRICK H. DARGE, 18 Defendants. 19 20 21 Before: SACK, LOHIER, AND KAHN, Circuit Judges. 22 The government appeals from a judgment entered on November 17, 2022, 23 in which the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York 24 (Alvin K. Hellerstein, Judge) granted federal prisoner Joe Fernandez’s motion for a 25 sentence reduction pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A), reduced his sentence to 26 time served, and ordered his release from custody. The district court based its 27 decision on two grounds: Fernandez’s possible innocence in light of the 28 questionable credibility of the government’s key witness, and the fact that 29 Fernandez received a far longer sentence than his co-defendants. On appeal, the 30 government argues that the district court abused its discretion because potential 31 innocence is never a permissible “extraordinary and compelling reason[]” for 32 reduction of a sentence within the meaning of 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(1)(A), and 22-3122 United States v. Fernandez

1 Fernandez’s sentencing disparity is not an “extraordinary and compelling 2 reason[]” for a sentence reduction on the facts of this case. For the reasons set forth 3 below, we agree, and therefore 4 5 REVERSE the judgment of the district court.

6 DAVID ABRAMOWICZ (Christopher D. 7 Brumwell, Won S. Shin, on the brief), 8 Assistant United States Attorneys, for 9 Damian Williams, United States Attorney 10 for the Southern District of New York, New 11 York, NY, for Appellant; 12 13 BENJAMIN GRUENSTEIN, Cravath, Swaine & 14 Moore LLP, New York, NY, for Appellee. 15 16 SACK, Circuit Judge: 17 This appeal raises questions as to which claims and arguments a district 18 court is permitted to consider as “extraordinary and compelling reasons” in 19 support of a motion for a sentence reduction pursuant to 18 U.S.C. 20 § 3582(c)(1)(A), commonly known as a motion for “compassionate release.” 21 Defendant-Appellee Joe Fernandez, then imprisoned in a federal penitentiary, 22 filed this compassionate-release motion seeking a reduction of the mandatory life 23 sentence he was serving for his conviction of murder for hire, in violation of 18 24 U.S.C. § 1958.

2 22-3122 United States v. Fernandez

1 Patrick Darge had hired Fernandez as a “backup shooter” in a scheme to

2 murder two Mexican drug cartel members who had come to New York City to

3 collect payment for more than 270 kilograms of cocaine the cartel had sold to

4 local drug trafficker Jeffrey Minaya. While Darge (and several other co-

5 defendants implicated in the scheme) pleaded guilty to various narcotics,

6 firearms, and murder charges and cooperated with the government, Fernandez