Mont V. United States

Is a district court required to exercise its jurisdiction in order to suspend the running of a supervised release sentence as directed under 18 U.S.C. §3583(i) prior to expiration of the term of supervised release, when a supervised release is in pretrial detention, or does 18 U.S.C. §3624(e) toll the running of supervised release while in pretrial detention?

During Petitioner’s supervised release, his probation officer filed several violation reports and Petitioner requested a hearing on these alleged violations. However, Petitioner was then held in pretrial detention for a separate offense requiring a continuance of the hearings on his release violations. A warrant for the violations issued twenty-four days after the expiration of his supervised release sentence. Petitioner argued that because his sentence expired prior to the issuing of the warrant the district court lacked jurisdiction. The probation office argued that an individual in pretrial detention cannot be supervised and thus pretrial detention tolls the running of supervised release. The lower court held that the court retained jurisdiction. The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed citing their opinion in U.S. v. Goins, 516 F.3d 416 (6th Cir. 2008), resolving the jurisdictional issue and holding that under the tolling provision of 18 U.S.C. §3624(e), a term of supervised release does not run during any time that the person is imprisoned and further, that pretrial detention is “imprisonment” under the law. The federal courts of appeal are divided on whether pretrial detention qualifies as “imprisonment” under 18 U.S.C. 3624(e) with the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eleventh Circuits holding that pretrial detention qualifies as imprisonment and the Ninth Circuit along with the D.C. Circuit holding that pretrial detention does not qualify as imprisonment.