by David Kim

In an 8-1 decision authored by Justice Gorsuch, the Supreme Court of the United States held that the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 does not authorize courts to automatically extend a defendant’s term of supervised release when the defendant fails to report to a probation officer and absconds from supervision. Reversing the Ninth Circuit, the Court concluded that while the Act provides numerous tools to address defendants who violate supervised release conditions – including revocation, reimprisonment, and the imposition of additional supervised release – automatic extension of a judicially ordered term is not among them.

As a result, the Petitioner’s January 2022 state drug offense, committed after her judicially ordered term of supervised release expired in June 2021, could not be treated as an independent supervised-release violation on the theory that her abscondment had extended the term. The decision resolves a circuit split, with the Fourth and Ninth Circuits having endorsed an automatic extension rule and the First and Eleventh Circuits having rejected it.

Background

In 2010, Isabel Rico pleaded guilty to federal drug trafficking charges. The sentencing court imposed seven years of imprisonment followed by four years of supervised release. Rico left prison in January 2017 but violated her supervised release conditions within months. Consequently, the judge revoked her release, ordered her to serve two months of additional imprisonment, and imposed a new 42-month term of supervised release scheduled to expire in June 2021.

After her release from prison in December 2017, Rico again violated her supervised release conditions by relocating without notifying her probation officer. A warrant for her arrest issued in May 2018, but federal authorities did not locate Rico until January 2023. During her abscondment, Rico incurred additional state convictions, including the January 2022 drug offense at issue.

Upon her return to federal court, the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California classified Rico’s failure to report and her January 2021 offenses as two independent Grade C violations of her supervised release, each carrying a Guidelines sentencing range of 8 to 14 months of imprisonment. The court further classified her January 2022 drug offense as a Grade A violation, with an associated Guidelines range of 33 to 36 months. Varying downward from these Guidelines, the court sentenced Rico to 16 months of incarceration followed by two additional years of supervised release.

Rico timely appealed, challenging the District Court’s authority to treat her January 2022 drug offense as an independent supervised release violation. She argued that because her judicially ordered term of supervised release expired in June 2021, any offense committed thereafter could not constitute a violation. The Ninth Circuit rejected this argument, reasoning that Rico’s abscondment “tolled” her supervised release term, which therefore continued running until federal authorities apprehended her in 2023. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to resolve a conflict among the circuits.

Analysis

The Court stated that the circuits are divided on whether a defendant’s failure to report automatically extends the term of supervised release. The Ninth and Fourth Circuits have endorsed such a rule. United States v. Crane, 979 F.2d 687 (9th Cir. 1992); United States v. Buchanan, 638 F.3d 448 (4th Cir. 2011). In contrast, the First and Eleventh Circuits have concluded that abscondment does not automatically extend supervised release. United States v. Hernandez-Ferrer, 599 F.3d 63 (1st Cir. 2010); United States v. Talley, 83 F.4th 1296 (11th Cir. 2023).

Before addressing the merits, the Court clarified that the Ninth Circuit’s use of the term “toll” was a misnomer. In legal usage, the Court observed, “the word ‘toll’ often denotes some stop or pause.” However, under the Ninth Circuit’s approach, an absconding defendant “stops or pauses nothing.” Rather, the defendant remains bound by the conditions of supervised release and may be held accountable for any violations committed during the abscondment. Thus, the challenged rule actually extends the period of supervised release beyond what a judge has ordered. It does not toll that period.

Statutory Framework Governing Supervised Release

The Court examined multiple provisions of the Sentencing Reform Act to determine whether any authorized the automatic extension rule. The Act specifies that a term of supervised release commences “the day the person is released from imprisonment.” 18 U.S.C. § 3624(e). The Act also establishes maximum durations for supervised release – generally one, three, or five years – depending on the severity of the underlying offense. § 3583(b). The Court concluded that neither provision contains any hint of an automatic extension mechanism. To the contrary, the Ninth Circuit’s rule “risks flouting the Act by permitting courts to extend supervised release beyond even the maximum terms set by Congress,” the Court reasoned.

The Court further noted that the Act specifically addresses how courts may respond when defendants violate supervised release conditions. Courts may require defendants to report to probation officers and to notify authorities of any change in residence. §§ 3563(b)(15), (17). When a defendant violates these or other conditions, a court may revoke supervised release and impose additional imprisonment followed by a new term of supervised release. §§ 3583(e)(3), (g). The fact that Congress authorized these potent remedies for addressing absconders “but makes no mention of anything like the Ninth Circuit’s automatic extension rule” is “telling,” according to the Court.

The Act’s Specific Extension
and Tolling Provisions

The Court identified several statutory provisions that explicitly address extension and tolling of supervised release, none of which resembles the Ninth Circuit’s rule. Section 3583(e)(2) permits a court to “extend a term of supervised release” but only subject to significant limitations. A hearing must generally be held, various sentencing factors must be considered, and the extension cannot exceed the statutory maximum or occur after the term has already expired. The Ninth Circuit’s rule “disregards not just one but each of these limits,” the Court stated.

Section 3583(i) addresses a court’s authority to revoke supervised release after a term has expired, providing that such power “extends beyond the expiration of the term of supervised release for any period reasonably necessary for the adjudication of matters arising before its expiration if, before its expiration, a warrant or summons has been issued on the basis of an allegation of such violation.” The Court stressed that this provision constrains judicial authority in ways the Ninth Circuit’s rule ignores. Courts may adjudicate only matters arising before expiration and only if a warrant or summons issued during the term.

Section 3624(e) contains what the Court described as “a true tolling rule,” suspending supervised release when a defendant is imprisoned for 30 consecutive days or more. Like the Act’s extension provisions, this tolling mechanism is narrow in scope and “nothing at all like the rule the Ninth Circuit has adopted,” the Court explained.

The Court stated that the cumulative specificity of these provisions carries significant weight. Congress detailed when supervised release may run, the tools available to address violations, and the circumstances permitting extension, tolling, and post-expiration adjudication. “To our eyes, the absence of anything like the Ninth Circuit’s rule in all these exacting instructions is striking and strongly suggestive that the Ninth Circuit’s rule more nearly represents an adornment to Congress’s work than a permissible interpretation of it.”

Conclusion

Accordingly, the Court reversed the judgment of the Ninth Circuit and remanded the case for further proceedings consistent with its opinion. See: Rico v. United States, 2026 U.S. LEXIS 1490 (2026).  

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