Man Commuted by Biden Set to Get New Sentence in Drug Conviction

A man convicted of cocaine trafficking whose sentence was commuted by former President Joe Biden will be resentenced after a federal appeals court ruled the prisoner’s argument for a sentence reduction was improperly disregarded.

A district court abused its discretion when it rejected Jonathan Russell Wright’s sentence reduction argument since his prior convictions for cocaine base distribution are no longer predicate offenses that can be weighed in his sentencing, Judge Raymond W. Gruender said. The US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit vacated Wright’s 330-month sentence and remanded his case to the district court for resentencing where the lower ...