United States v. Gary Lee Sampson

SELYA, Circuit Judge.

This is a landmark case; for the first time in its history, this court must review a sentence of death imposed by a federal judge. To that extent, we are writing on a pristine page. We are guided in this path-breaking endeavor, however, by a variety of reliable sources, including Supreme Court precedent, decisions of other courts of appeals in capital cases, and legal principles of general application.

With this brief preface, we turn to the particulars of the case at hand. Defendant-appellant Gary Lee Sampson entered a guilty plea to two counts of carjacking resulting in…