“No Sentence Means No Bar” – Hewitt v. United States (2025)
and the Present-Perfect Test for Retroactivity under §403(b) of the First Step Act

1. Introduction

In Hewitt v. United States, 606 U.S. ___ (2025), the Supreme Court resolved a stubborn interpretive conflict about who may benefit from the First Step Act’s abolition of “stacked” mandatory 25-year sentences for first-time firearm offenders under 18 U.S.C. §924(c). The petitioners—members of the notorious “Scarecrow Bandits” robbery crew—had originally received sentences exceeding three centuries under the old regime. After portions of those convictions were vacated in collateral proceedings, they faced resentencing and argued that Congress’s newer 5-year mandatory minimums should now apply.

The Fifth Circuit said no, holding that because a sentence had been imposed before the First Step Act’s 2018 enactment, the old penalties remained binding even after the sentence was later vacated. The Supreme Court disagreed, announcing a new rule: for purposes of §403(b) the phrase “a sentence has been imposed” refers only to a sentence that still exists on the books. Once a sentence is vacated, it is as though no sentence had ever been imposed, and the defendant is eligible for the Act’s more lenient penalties at any subsequent sentencing.

Justice Jackson wrote for a five-Justice majority on the crucial Parts I–III; Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Gorsuch joined only those parts. Justice Alito, joined by Justices Thomas, Kavanaugh, and Barrett, dissented.

2. Summary of the Judgment

The Court REVERSED the Fifth Circuit and REMANDED for resentencing under the First Step Act. Key holdings:

• Textual focus on present-perfect tense: §403(b) asks whether a sentence “has . . . been imposed”—a formulation concerned with sentences that remain extant, not historical relics that have been vacated.
• Vacatur wipes the slate clean: When a judgment is vacated it is treated as void ab initio; therefore, after vacatur a defendant stands as if never sentenced.
• Legislative context: Congress enacted §403 to eliminate harsh “stacking” and to ensure courts would not continue to impose it in any sentencing taking place after enactment.
• Resulting rule: All first-time §924(c) offenders sentenced after December 21 2018—whether at an initial sentencing or a resentencing following vacatur—receive the Act’s 5-year (not 25-year) consecutive terms.

3. Analysis

3.1 Precedents Cited

• Deal v. United States, 508 U.S. 129 (1993): Interpreted §924(c) to require successive 25-year terms; expressly abrogated by §403(a).
• United States v. Davis, 588 U.S. 445 (2019): Struck down §924(c)’s residual-clause definition of “crime of violence,” triggering vacatur of some of petitioners’ counts.
• United States v. Wilson, 503 U.S. 329 (1992): Cited for the significance of verb tense in statutory interpretation.
• United States v. Ayres, 76 U.S. (9 Wall.) 608 (1870); Fiswick v. United States, 329 U.S. 211 (1946); Pepper v. United States, 562 U.S. 476 (2011): Support the proposition that a vacated judgment lacks prospective legal effect.
• Lewis v. United States, 445 U.S. 55 (1980), and Bravo-Fernandez v. United States, 580 U.S. 5 (2016): Heavily debated in the opinions regarding whether a vacated order still “exists” as a historical fact.

3.2 Legal Reasoning

1. Grammatical Canon. Congress chose the present-perfect (“has been imposed”) rather than the past-perfect (“had been imposed”). According to linguistic authorities (Chicago Manual of Style, Cambridge Grammar), that tense links past action to present reality. If the sentence no longer exists, it no longer satisfies the description.
2. Vacatur Doctrine. Drawing on 150-year-old precedent, the Court treats vacatur as wiping out the legal effect of the earlier sentence. Thus, on the date of resentencing, the defendant is in the same posture as one who had never been sentenced.
3. Structural Context. Adjacent subsections of the First Step Act speak in the simple past (“was committed,” “was previously imposed”) when Congress meant to reference bare historical facts. The shift to present-perfect in §403(b) must therefore be deliberate.
4. Legislative Purpose. Congress sought to end >25-year stacking for first-time offenders; limiting that relief only to defendants never previously sentenced would leave many courts still forced to re-impose the disfavored punishment whenever an old sentence is vacated—undermining Congress’s chief policy goal.

3.3 Impact of the Decision

• Immediate beneficiaries: Defendants nationwide whose pre-2018 §924(c) sentences have been, or hereafter are, vacated will be eligible for dramatically reduced terms.
• Strategic litigation: Expect increased collateral attacks on old §924(c) convictions (for example, under Davis) because successful vacatur now guarantees access to First Step Act penalties.
• Sentencing practice: District courts no longer need to reference pre-First-Step-Act mandatory minimums once a sentence is vacated—simplifying resentencings.
• Grammar as precedent: The opinion reinforces the Court’s willingness to ground statutory interpretation in fine points of English tense, potentially influencing future textual debates.
• Federalism & finality: The dissent’s warnings about undermining sentence finality may spur legislative clarifications or narrower readings in other contexts, but for now vacatur has enhanced power to reset criminal cases.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

• §924(c) “Stacking” – Before 2018, a first-time firearm offender received 5 years on the first count and an added 25 years for each additional count, even if all counts were tried together.
• Vacatur – A court order nullifying an earlier judgment. After vacatur the law treats the voided judgment as if it never existed, though the historical record remains.
• Present-Perfect vs. Past-Perfect – “Has been imposed” (present-perfect) links the past act to the present; “had been imposed” (past-perfect) would refer solely to a completed past event.
• First Step Act, §403 – Section 403(a) abolished stacking; §403(b) decides which earlier cases get the benefit: those in which a sentence had not yet been imposed on December 21 2018.
• Plenary Resentencing – When multiple counts are interdependent, vacating some counts often leads courts to vacate the entire sentence and start over, considering a new “package.”

5. Conclusion

Hewitt v. United States establishes a crisp, bright-line rule: once a prior §924(c) sentence is vacated, it no longer bars application of the First Step Act’s lenient mandatory minimums. The decision turns on meticulous grammatical analysis and a vigorous embrace of vacatur’s legal effect. By aligning resentencing practice with Congress’s policy to eradicate unduly harsh stacking, the Court extends relief to a class of defendants who, though once sentenced, now stand legally unsentenced. Whether seen as faithful textualism or policy-infused pragmatism, the ruling will reshape §924(c) resentencings, reinforce the interpretive heft of verb tense, and invite further debates over the balance between finality and fairness in federal sentencing law.