United States v. Chavez

Defendant-Appellant Cynthia Chavez (“Chavez”) timely appeals her sentence of 15 months’ incarceration for narcotics convictions. Chavez claims that her personal characteristics entitled her to a maximum sentence of probation on the theory that the parsimony clause of 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) establishes the “statutory maximum” for Apprendi purposes. Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466, 120 S.Ct. 2348, 147 L.Ed.2d 435 (2000). We write principally to reject Chavez’s flawed un derstanding of Apprendi, because the criminal statute of conviction — not the parsimony clause of the sentencing statute—…