U.S. v. Daoud

Dist. Ct. erred in sentencing defendant to 16-year term of incarceration plus 45-year term of supervised release on charges of attempting to use weapon of mass destruction, attempting to destroy building with explosive, soliciting another to kill FBA agent, who posed as individual who assisted defendant in making fake 1,000-pound car bomb that defendant intended to kill over 200 individuals and assaulting inmate with intent to commit murder, where govt. asserted that said sentence was substantively unreasonable. Advisory guidelines range for defendant’s offenses was life imprisonment, and Dist. Ct. improperly downplayed extreme seriousness nature of defendant’s offenses in ways that conflicted with undisputed facts of defendant’s offenses. Also, Dist. Ct. failed to account for need to protect public from defendant’s high risk of re-offending due to his commission of two offenses after his arrest on car-bomb-related charges and improperly distinguished sentences of similar offenders by relying on defendant’s long period of pre-trial confinement. Fact that defendant had apologized for his conduct, had aspirations for college, had demonstrated polite in-court behavior, and displayed social ineptitude did not support instant substantial deviation from sentencing guidelines.