Justices Rule for Defendant in Dispute Over Supervised Release

The Supreme Court said a federal sentencing law doesn’t permit courts to automatically extend supervised release for individuals who violate conditions of their release by failing to report to a probation officer.

The 8-1 decision issued Wednesday said the Sentencing Reform Act doesn’t authorize a rule that requires extending a defendant’s term of supervised release when they abscond.

The opinion, by Justice Neil Gorsuch, reasoned that extending a term of supervised release “is not among the many tools” the 1984 law gives courts when considering cases involving defendants who fail to report or violate their supervised release conditions.

The decision reverses a ruling from the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which Gorsuch said risked creating an automatic rule that would allow courts to “extend supervised release beyond the statutory maximums set by Congress.

Justice Samuel Alito dissented, arguing the case is “much simpler than the court’s opinion suggests.”

“The question before us is whether the sentencing judge’s consideration of the drug offense was lawful, and based on the terms of the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984, it clearly was,” Alito said.

The case taken up by the justices centered around a legal principle that the clock on a criminal sentence is tolled, or stops, when a defendant absconds.

Lawyers for Isabel Rico successfully petitioned the case to the justices after Rico faced an enhanced prison sentence for a drug-related offense because it was also alleged to be a violation of her supervised release.

Rico in 2018 lost touch with her probation officer with 37 months remaining on her supervised-release sentence stemming from a separate drug conviction. She was later arrested by state authorities for evading a police officer, driving without a license, and possessing drug paraphernalia, according to briefs submitted in court.

A probation officer brought a motion alleging Rico violated her supervised-release, citing in part the drug possession offense. It was listed as a Grade A violation, carrying stiffer punishment under sentencing guidelines.

But Rico argued the drug conviction shouldn’t be a factor because it happened after her supervised release term expired in 2021.

The US District Court for the Central District of California rejected that argument under the theory that fugitive tolling applied Rico’s case, a decision affirmed by the Ninth Circuit.

Her lawyer stressed at arguments in November that Rico is still subject to prosecution for any crimes committed, and that the justices were only deciding “whether that offense increases her guidelines range.”

The case is Rico v. US, U.S., No. 24-2662, 3/25/26.