United States v. Scott Goldstein, 24-11046

Scott Goldstein was convicted of wire fraud and sentenced to 33 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release and ordered to pay $245,500 in restitution.
As a condition of supervised release, Goldstein was required to pay at least 10% of his monthly income (net of certain necessary expenses) toward restitution.
After his release, Goldstein made minimal restitution payments, and the Probation Office alleged multiple violations, including nonpayment of restitution and a new criminal offense.
At revocation hearings, Goldstein and his counsel argued his ability to pay was limited by his employment status and health, but the district court focused on his spending and expressed strong feelings about past restitution nonpayments by defendants.
The district court sentenced Goldstein to four months in prison without adequately inquiring into whether his failure to pay was willful or due to inability, as required by Supreme Court precedent.
Goldstein timely appealed, challenging procedural and constitutional aspects of the sentencing.

Issue	Goldstein's Argument	Government's Argument	Held
Whether the district court violated due process and equal protection by revoking supervised release due to nonpayment without inquiring into reasons for nonpayment	The court didn't properly inquire if nonpayment was willful or due to inability, violating constitutional rights	The record implicitly supports a finding of willfulness; inquiry was sufficient	District court erred by failing to inquire into nonpayment reasons as mandated by precedent
Whether the sentence was substantively unreasonable due to excessive weight on inability to pay	Court gave undue weight to restitution nonpayment, not circumstances	District court considered history and spending; within discretion	Not directly addressed, as the core error was the procedural inquiry failure
Whether Goldstein was denied a meaningful opportunity to allocute	Not allowed a fair chance to explain before sentencing	Both parties given opportunity to speak before sentencing	Not the basis for the decision; main error was lack of proper inquiry

Bearden v. Georgia, 461 U.S. 660 (1983) (courts must inquire into reasons for failure to pay restitution before revoking probation or imposing imprisonment)
Bolling v. Sharpe, 347 U.S. 497 (1954) (Fifth Amendment includes equal protection principles akin to Fourteenth Amendment)
Molina-Martinez v. United States, 578 U.S. 189 (2016) (plain error analysis includes whether a different result would have been reasonably probable)
United States v. Bobb, 577 F.3d 1366 (11th Cir. 2009) (plain error standard for constitutional claims first raised on appeal)
United States v. Moriarty, 429 F.3d 1012 (11th Cir. 2005) (plain error rule application in sentencing context)