by David M. Reutter

The United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit vacated a supervised release revocation judgment and remanded for resentencing, holding that a defendant may challenge standard conditions of supervised release that were never orally pronounced at sentencing through an appeal of a subsequent revocation proceeding. The Court determined that an appellate waiver covering “whatever sentence is imposed” does not preclude such a challenge because, under the Fourth Circuit’s precedent in United States v. Rogers, 961 F.3d 291 (4th Cir. 2020), discretionary conditions appearing for the first time in a written judgment are nullities that were never actually imposed.

Background

On October 16, 2012, John McLaurin pleaded guilty to conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute more than five kilograms of cocaine. His plea agreement contained a provision whereby both McLaurin and the Government waived the right to appeal “whatever sentence is imposed,” including the right to challenge “any issues that relate to … the decision whether to impose and the calculation of any term of imprisonment, fine, order of forfeiture, order of restitution, and term or condition of supervised release.” The agreement preserved McLaurin’s right to appeal a sentence exceeding 120 months of imprisonment.

A presentence investigation report recommended that the District Court impose mandatory and standard conditions of supervised release along with four special conditions requiring participation in substance-abuse treatment, vocational or educational programming, alcohol abstinence, and mental health treatment. At the January 18, 2013 sentencing hearing, the District Court sentenced McLaurin to 120 months of imprisonment and five years of supervised release. During oral sentencing, the court recited the four special conditions but made no mention of any standard conditions of supervision.

The written judgment entered that same day included six mandatory conditions, 14 standard conditions, and the four special conditions. Among the standard conditions were condition six, requiring McLaurin to notify his probation officer 10 days before any change in residence or employment, and condition 10, requiring him to permit probation officer home visits and the confiscation of contraband observed in plain view.

McLaurin began his supervised release term on February 18, 2022. In October 2023, a probation officer filed a petition alleging multiple violations, including failures to appear for scheduled home visits and failure to notify the probation officer of a change of address. At a May 7, 2024 revocation hearing, McLaurin admitted to two violations relating to the failed home visits and unreported address change, both predicated on standard conditions six and 10, in exchange for the Government’s dismissal of the remaining allegations. The District Court accepted this agreement, revoked McLaurin’s supervised release, and imposed 90 days of imprisonment followed by 42 months of additional supervised release with identical conditions. McLaurin did not object to the supervised release conditions at any point during the revocation proceedings and filed his notice of appeal two days after entry of judgment.

Analysis

Scope of the Appellate Waiver

The Court first addressed whether McLaurin’s appellate waiver barred his challenge. Reviewing the plea agreement de novo and applying contract principles that construe ambiguities against the Government as drafter, the Court examined the waiver’s plain language. While the Government characterized the waiver as encompassing any issues relating to supervised release conditions, the Court disagreed with this characterization. The waiver specifically prohibited appeals of “imposed” sentences and the “decision whether to impose” terms of supervised release, the Court observed.

The Court stated that this textual specificity proved dispositive because a challenge under Rogers differs fundamentally from a challenge to an imposed sentence. The Court explained that Rogers addresses conditions that were never properly imposed in the first instance. Quoting United States v. Singletary, 984 F.3d 341 (4th Cir. 2021), the Court noted that when discretionary supervised release conditions appear for the first time in a written judgment, they constitute “nullities; the defendant has not been sentenced to those conditions.” Because the standard conditions McLaurin challenged were never orally pronounced, they were never imposed at all under Fourth Circuit precedent. Consequently, the Court stated that McLaurin was not appealing his 2013 sentence or its associated conditions but rather the 2024 revocation based on “invalid and null conditions.”

The Court rejected the Government’s reliance on general case law regarding appellate waivers, noting that the cited authorities involved direct appeals challenging the substance of properly imposed conditions rather than Rogers challenges to conditions that were procedural nullities. The Court noted that even the Government’s own authority recognized that appellate waivers do not preclude challenges involving claims that a District Court exceeded its authority. The revocation of supervised release predicated on conditions never properly imposed fell squarely within this category, according to the Court.

Appropriate Mechanism
for Rogers Challenges

The Government advanced three procedural arguments: (1) that the law of the case doctrine barred the challenge, (2) that the appeal was untimely under Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 4(b)(1)(A), and (3) that precedent prohibited defendants from challenging release conditions after a violation finding. The Court rejected all of the arguments.

Regarding the law of the case doctrine, the Court clarified that the Government misapprehended the nature of a Rogers error. Because Rogers holds that a discretionary condition not orally pronounced is a nullity, such a condition never became the law of the case in the first instance. The Court acknowledged United States v. Brantley, 87 F.4th 262 (4th Cir. 2023), which stated that a judgment containing a Rogers error remains valid until corrected but distinguished between a valid judgment and a valid condition. As the Court explained, Brantley “continues to recognize that Rogers errors occur, while distinguishing a valid judgment from a valid condition of release.”

On timeliness, the Court addressed the requirement under Brantley and United States v. Newby, 91 F.4th 196 (4th Cir. 2024), that defendants raising Rogers challenges must have a “procedurally appropriate mechanism” for doing so. McLaurin could not have raised a Rogers objection in 2013 because Rogers was not decided until 2020. Nor could he have freely raised the challenge after Rogers was decided, as Brantley and Newby established that defendants possess no freestanding right to appeal a Rogers error absent such a procedurally appropriate mechanism, the Court explained.

The Court ruled that the 2024 revocation proceeding constituted that mechanism. It explained that a procedurally appropriate mechanism includes the appeal of a judgment that is “infected by the initial Rogers error.” Newby. Because the revocation hearing was premised on violations of null conditions, McLaurin’s timely appeal from that proceeding, filed within two days of judgment, properly raised the Rogers challenge, according to the Court.

Plain Error Review

Because McLaurin failed to object at the revocation hearing, the Court applied plain error review, United States v. Lynn, 592 F.3d 572 (4th Cir. 2010), requiring demonstration that an error occurred, that it was plain, that it affected substantial rights, and that it seriously affected the fairness, integrity, or public reputation of judicial proceedings. United States v. Bennett, 986 F.3d 389 (4th Cir. 2021).

The Court determined that each element was satisfied. First, the District Court committed error by revoking supervised release based on conditions that were nullities under Rogers. The standard conditions requiring notice of residence changes and permitting home visits appeared only in the written judgment and were never orally pronounced or even referenced at sentencing. Though characterized as “standard,” these conditions were discretionary rather than mandatory and therefore subject to the Rogers oral pronouncement requirement, according to the Court.

Second, the error was plain. The Court rejected the Government’s argument that McLaurin’s failure to appeal the conditions earlier rendered them part of his sentence through operation of the law of the case doctrine. The Court stated it would not penalize McLaurin for failing to object to an issue that became available only years after his original sentencing. United States v. Cannady, 63 F.4th 259 (4th Cir. 2023).

Third, the error affected McLaurin’s substantial rights by resulting in imprisonment and an extended supervised release term. The Court declined the Government’s invitation to find no prejudice based on other uncharged violations referenced in the probation officer’s petition, reasoning that because McLaurin admitted only to the challenged violations in exchange for dismissal of the others, the District Court never made findings regarding those additional allegations. The Court applied the principle from United States v. McKinney, 60 F.4th 188 (4th Cir. 2023), that courts assessing prejudice examine what actually occurred rather than what alternatively could have supported the same result.

Finally, the Court determined that the error implicated the fairness, integrity, and public reputation of judicial proceedings. Rejecting the Government’s characterization of the challenge as mere formalism, the Court observed that a Rogers challenge vindicates liberty and due process rights by ensuring defendants can object to conditions at sentencing and that conditions are imposed only after consideration of the statutory factors. The Court stated that such appeals necessarily implicate judicial integrity.

Because the probation officer and District Court accepted McLaurin’s plea agreement on the assumption that the standard conditions had been validly imposed, and because that assumption no longer held, the Court determined that the agreement was invalid. Thus, the Court not only vacated the revocation judgment but also remanded for resentencing on the revocation matter.

Conclusion

Thus, the Court held that McLaurin’s appellate waiver did not preclude his Rogers challenge, that he timely raised the challenge through a procedurally appropriate mechanism, and that the District Court committed plain error by revoking supervised release based on standard conditions that were never orally pronounced and therefore constituted nullities under Rogers.

Accordingly, the Court vacated the District Court’s revocation judgment and remanded for resentencing. See: United States v. McLaurin, 2026 U.S. App. LEXIS 6700 (4th Cir. 2026).  

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