Three Supreme Court justices balked Monday at the court’s refusal to take up a case involving whether a judgment of restitution should be decided by a jury, Courthouse News Service reports. While it is understood that the Sixth Amendment guarantee of the right to a jury trial covers both judgments of imprisonment and fines, in the case of Joshua Hester and Marco Luis, a federal judge ordered them to pay $329,767 in criminal restitution to CitiGroup after they pleaded guilty to various charges. Hester lied on mortgage applications while trying to buy homes where he and a co-defendant planned to grow marijuana, and Luis, the mortgage broker, aided and abetted the conspiracy.
Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote in dissent that the case was worthy of review because of the increasing role restitution plays in federal criminal sentencing today. “From 2014 to 2016 alone, federal courts sentenced 33,158 defendants to pay $33.9 billion in restitution,” said Gorsuch, joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor. “And between 1996 and 2016, the amount of unpaid federal criminal restitution rose from less than $6 billion to more than $110 billion. The effects of restitution orders, too, can be profound. Failure or inability to pay restitution can result in suspension of the right to vote, continued court supervision, or even reincarceration.” He added, “Just as a jury must find any facts necessary to authorize a steeper prison sentence or fine, it would seem to follow that a jury must find any facts necessary to support a (nonzero) restitution order.” Justice Samuel Alito also dissented.