Aggregation Controls FSA Credits: Any Disqualifying Conviction Bars First Step Act Time Credits for the Entire Aggregate Term (Bonnie v. Dunbar, 4th Cir. 2025)

Aggregation Controls FSA Credits: Any Disqualifying Conviction Bars First Step Act Time Credits for the Entire Aggregate Term

Commentary on Gregory Allen Bonnie v. Warden Dunbar, No. 24-6665 (4th Cir. Nov. 5, 2025)

Introduction

This published Fourth Circuit decision addresses a recurring question at the intersection of two federal sentencing statutes: the First Step Act of 2018’s earned time credits regime, 18 U.S.C. § 3632(d)(4), and the Sentencing Reform Act’s aggregation directive, 18 U.S.C. § 3584(c). The core issue is whether a federal prisoner serving multiple terms of imprisonment—some tied to convictions that qualify for First Step Act (FSA) earned time credits and at least one tied to a conviction that Congress has deemed disqualifying (e.g., 18 U.S.C. § 924(c))—may earn FSA credits during the non-disqualifying portion of the sentence.

Petitioner Gregory Allen Bonnie is serving an aggregate 144-month federal term comprised of (1) a 120-month sentence for 2021 drug-trafficking convictions (eligible for FSA credits) and (2) a consecutive 24-month revocation sentence tied to 2005 convictions that included a § 924(c) count (disqualifying for FSA credits). The Bureau of Prisons (BOP) denied FSA-credit eligibility for the entire aggregate term, invoking § 3584(c)’s command that multiple terms be treated “as a single, aggregate term of imprisonment” for administrative purposes. The district court denied Bonnie’s 28 U.S.C. § 2241 petition.

In a published opinion by Judge Niemeyer (joined by Judge Quattlebaum), the Fourth Circuit affirmed. Judge Wynn dissented. The majority holds that because § 3584(c) requires aggregation for administrative purposes, and because administering FSA credits is an administrative function, any prisoner serving an aggregate term that includes any disqualifying conviction is ineligible for FSA time credits for the entire aggregate term. The court aligns with other circuits and emphasizes the statute’s categorical prisoner-level disqualification. The dissent would parse eligibility by sentence segments, stressing text, structure, and purpose of the FSA favoring rehabilitation incentives.

Summary of the Opinion

  • Holding: A prisoner serving multiple terms of imprisonment that are aggregated under 18 U.S.C. § 3584(c) is categorically ineligible to receive FSA earned time credits under 18 U.S.C. § 3632(d)(4)(D) if any component of the aggregate term is for a disqualifying conviction (e.g., a § 924(c) offense). The Fourth Circuit therefore affirms the denial of Bonnie’s § 2241 petition.
  • Rationale: Section 3632(d)(4)(D) disqualifies a “prisoner” from FSA credits if the prisoner “is serving a sentence for a conviction” under enumerated statutes. Section 3584(c) requires BOP to treat multiple terms as one aggregate term “for administrative purposes,” which includes the administration of FSA credits. As a result, the aggregate term is evaluated as a whole; because the aggregate includes a disqualifying § 924(c)-based revocation sentence, the “prisoner” is ineligible for credits for the entire aggregate term.
  • Supporting authorities and context: The majority characterizes FSA implementation as “postsentence administration” within Title 18, Chapter 229, cites United States v. Wilson for BOP’s administrative responsibility to compute credits, and aligns with decisions from the Second, Third, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Circuits adopting the same aggregation-based ineligibility rule.
  • Dissent: Judge Wynn argues that the text “is serving a sentence for” naturally means ineligibility only while the disqualifying sentence is actually being served; once that period ends, eligibility resumes for the remaining eligible term. He invokes structural and purposive considerations favoring rehabilitation, contrasting Congress’s phrasing in other provisions where it knew how to make any-disqualifying-offense a global bar, and warns of perverse outcomes that undermine incentives.

Background and Procedural Posture

  • 2005: Bonnie pleaded guilty to drug trafficking (21 U.S.C. §§ 841, 846) and a related § 924(c) firearms count. He received 120 months on the drug count plus a consecutive 60 months on § 924(c), and supervised release terms.
  • 2017: Released to supervised release.
  • 2021: New drug convictions; sentenced to 120 months. Supervised release from 2005 case revoked; 24-month revocation sentence imposed consecutive to the 2021 drug sentence.
  • BOP determination: Treating consecutive terms as a single aggregate 144-month sentence under § 3584(c), BOP found Bonnie ineligible for FSA credits because the aggregate included a § 924(c)-related revocation sentence.
  • District court: Denied § 2241 petition. Question framed as whether the 24-month § 924(c)-related revocation sentence “taints” the separately imposed 120-month drug sentence such that the entire 144 months are ineligible. The court concluded that the FSA’s text, read with § 3584(c), bars eligibility for the whole aggregated term.
  • Appeal: Affirmed by the Fourth Circuit (published). Judge Niemeyer for the court; Judge Wynn dissents.

Detailed Analysis

Precedents and Authorities Cited and Their Influence

  • 18 U.S.C. § 3632(d)(4)(D): Core disqualification provision. It states that a “prisoner is ineligible to receive time credits” if the prisoner “is serving a sentence for a conviction” under enumerated laws, including § 924(c). The majority treats this as a categorical bar at the prisoner level once aggregation applies.
  • 18 U.S.C. § 3584(c): Aggregation mandate. “Multiple terms of imprisonment ordered to run consecutively or concurrently shall be treated for administrative purposes as a single, aggregate term of imprisonment.” This provision is dispositive for the majority: because FSA credit administration is administrative, the BOP must look to the aggregate sentence, not its components.
  • United States v. Wilson, 503 U.S. 329 (1992): The Supreme Court recognized BOP’s administrative role in computing sentence credits (there, jail-time credit under § 3585(b)). The Fourth Circuit relies on Wilson to classify FSA credit administration as an administrative function within BOP’s remit.
  • United States v. LaBonte, 520 U.S. 751 (1997): Cited for the broader proposition about administrative implementation of sentences.
  • King v. Burwell, 576 U.S. 473 (2015); West Virginia v. EPA, 597 U.S. 697 (2022): Canonical directions to read statutory text in its context and as part of a coherent whole. The majority leans on whole-text and contextual reading to integrate § 3584(c) with § 3632.
  • INS v. National Center for Immigrants’ Rights, Inc., 502 U.S. 183 (1991); Project Vote/Voting for America, Inc. v. Long, 682 F.3d 331 (4th Cir. 2012): Titles and headings can aid interpretation. The majority notes § 3632’s location in Title 18, Chapter 229 (“Postsentence Administration”) as evidence that the FSA time-credits regime falls within administrative functions.
  • Muscarello v. United States, 524 U.S. 125 (1998): Rule of lenity applies only if there is “grievous ambiguity.” The majority finds no such ambiguity once § 3584(c) is read with § 3632(d)(4)(D).
  • Consensus circuit precedent:
    • Giovinco v. Pullen, 118 F.4th 527 (2d Cir. 2024), cert. denied, 145 S. Ct. 1947 (2025).
    • Teed v. Warden Allenwood FCI Low, 2023 WL 4556726 (3d Cir. July 17, 2023).
    • Martinez v. Rosalez, 2024 WL 140438 (5th Cir. Jan. 12, 2024).
    • Keeling v. Lemaster, 2023 WL 9061914 (6th Cir. Nov. 22, 2023); Oiler v. LeMaster, 2025 WL 1864875 (6th Cir. Jan. 10, 2025).
    • Sok v. Eischen, 2023 WL 5282709 (8th Cir. Aug. 17, 2023).
    These decisions uniformly adopt the aggregation-based ineligibility rule for FSA credits when any disqualifying offense is present in the aggregate sentence. The Fourth Circuit cites them to show national uniformity and to avoid a circuit split.
  • Second Chance Act comparison (34 U.S.C. § 60541): The majority distinguishes this different statute (elderly/terminally ill offender home detention) where Congress expressly included aggregation language and used different eligibility phrasing (“offense or offenses”), stressing that the Second Chance Act does not change sentence length and is thus a poor analog for the FSA’s sentence-reducing credits program.
  • U.S.-Mexico Treaty implementation and BOP Program Statement 5140.42: The court finds these transfer mechanics inapposite to FSA credits and notes that, even there, statutory aggregation is used where applicable.

Majority’s Legal Reasoning

  1. Textual framing at the “prisoner” level: Section 3632(d)(4)(D) uses the subject “a prisoner” and predicates ineligibility on whether the prisoner “is serving a sentence for a conviction” under enumerated laws. The majority emphasizes that the statute disables the prisoner, not particular sentence slices.
  2. Mandatory aggregation under § 3584(c): Because multiple federal terms ordered concurrent or consecutive “shall be treated for administrative purposes as a single, aggregate term,” BOP must apply eligibility rules to the entire aggregate term. Whether the prisoner is serving one or several components on a given day is not dispositive; the statute commands administrative treatment as one term.
  3. FSA credits are an administrative function: Implementing the FSA’s risk and needs system, placing inmates in programming, and calculating/awarding credits fall within postsentence administration. Wilson confirms BOP’s administrative responsibility to compute sentence credits. The placement of § 3632 in Chapter 229 (“Postsentence Administration”) reinforces the point.
  4. Rebuttal to “administrative purposes” being merely discretionary: Administration encompasses execution of congressional commands, not only discretionary choices. Even when directions are mandatory, they are still administered.
  5. Rejecting negative implication from the Second Chance Act: The FSA and the Second Chance Act are structurally different. The home-detention program’s express aggregation language does not imply § 3584(c) is inapplicable to the FSA; rather, the FSA changes sentence length via credits, making § 3584(c) naturally applicable even without restatement.
  6. Rule of lenity: No “grievous ambiguity” exists when § 3632(d)(4)(D) is read with § 3584(c). The text and interlocking statutory scheme are sufficiently clear.
  7. Policy coherence: Congress enumerated 68 disqualifying crimes as markers of elevated recidivism risk. If any part of the prisoner’s aggregate term reflects such conduct, Congress chose not to extend the FSA’s early-release incentives to that prisoner.

The Dissent’s Approach and Counterpoints

Judge Wynn’s dissent marshals textual, structural, and purposivist arguments to contend that FSA-credit eligibility should track the specific sentence being served on a given day. Key points:

  • Plain language: The phrase “is serving a sentence for” in § 3632(d)(4)(D) is naturally temporal and sentence-specific. A prisoner cannot be “serving” a 24-month sentence for 144 months. Once the disqualifying 24-month period is over, eligibility should attach for the remaining 120-month eligible sentence.
  • Statutory structure and purpose: Title I of the FSA is a recidivism-reduction, incentive-based system. Interpreting eligibility broadly serves that purpose by keeping incentives meaningful for as many prisoners as possible.
  • Congress knows how to say “any offense disqualifies”: In the same Act, Congress specified in the terminally-ill-offender home-detention provision that a prisoner is eligible only if serving a “term of imprisonment based on conviction for an offense or offenses that do not include” certain crimes (34 U.S.C. § 60541(g)(5)(D)). Congress omitted similar “offense or offenses” language in § 3632(d)(4)(D), implying a different, sentence-specific approach here.
  • Specific-over-general canon and surplusage: The dissent suggests § 3632’s specific eligibility text should control over § 3584(c)’s general aggregation directive in this particular context (to avoid undermining § 3632’s goals). He also notes potential surplusage if § 3584(c) alone fully resolves aggregation, given Congress expressly added aggregation language in § 60541(g)(5)(C).
  • BOP capability to “day-parse”: Because credits are earned by days of participation and BOP can track eligibility by day, nothing prevents workable sentence-by-sentence administration.
  • Practical consequences: The majority’s rule produces anomalies (e.g., a two-month ineligible count wiping out credits across an otherwise lengthy eligible sentence) and invites strategic charging to defeat rehabilitation incentives, contrary to the FSA’s aims.

The majority responds primarily by integrating § 3584(c) into the FSA’s eligibility calculus and by recharacterizing FSA credits as a postsentence administrative function to which aggregation naturally applies. It also stresses the uniformity of appellate precedent and the absence of grievous ambiguity needed to invoke lenity.

Impact and Implications

  • Practical rule in the Fourth Circuit:
    • If a prisoner’s aggregate federal term (concurrent or consecutive) includes any conviction enumerated in § 3632(d)(4)(D) (e.g., § 924(c)), the prisoner is categorically ineligible to earn FSA time credits for the entire aggregate term.
    • This includes revocation sentences tied to cases with disqualifying convictions, as in Bonnie’s situation.
  • Alignment with national consensus: The Fourth Circuit joins the Second, Third, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Circuits in embracing aggregation-based ineligibility. The Supreme Court denied certiorari in Giovinco, which reduces the likelihood of near-term Supreme Court review absent a new conflict.
  • Defense strategy considerations:
    • Plea and charging decisions: Avoiding disqualifying counts (notably § 924(c)) becomes even more consequential if a client might later face revocation or stacked terms. A single disqualifying count can foreclose FSA credits across the entire aggregate sentence.
    • Revocations: Counsel and probation officers should be alert that revocation sentences tied to earlier cases involving disqualifying counts will likely bar FSA credits on later, otherwise eligible sentences if the terms are ordered to run consecutively or concurrently.
    • Sentencing sequencing: Where lawful discretion exists, the order and structure of terms may affect whether aggregation applies; but if multiple federal terms are ordered to run consecutively or concurrently, § 3584(c) will require aggregation for BOP.
  • Institutional administration: The decision cements a bright-line administrative rule for BOP in the Fourth Circuit, reducing per-sentence parsing and potential inconsistencies but at the cost, as the dissent notes, of narrowing incentives for a class of mixed-sentence prisoners.
  • Legislative terrain: If Congress wishes to calibrate the incentive differently for mixed-sentence prisoners, it could amend § 3632(d)(4)(D) to specify sentence-by-sentence eligibility or to authorize day-by-day parsing notwithstanding aggregation. The dissent provides a roadmap for such an amendment.
  • Post-Loper Bright landscape: Although the panel does not expressly rely on agency deference, its analysis is textual and structural. Post-Chevron, this kind of court-centered construction—grounded in interlocking statutes and context—will likely continue to shape FSA litigation.

Complex Concepts Simplified

  • FSA earned time credits vs. “good time” credits:
    • Good time credits (18 U.S.C. § 3624(b)) reduce time based on compliance and generally apply to most prisoners serving more than one year; they are distinct from FSA credits and not offense-specific in the same way.
    • FSA earned time credits (18 U.S.C. § 3632(d)(4)) are awarded for successful participation in evidence-based recidivism reduction programs or productive activities (10 or 15 days per 30 days of participation) but are categorically unavailable to prisoners serving for certain enumerated convictions.
  • Aggregate sentence (18 U.S.C. § 3584(c)): When a court orders multiple federal terms to run consecutively or concurrently, BOP must treat those terms as one unified term “for administrative purposes” (e.g., credit computations, release-date calculations, programming eligibility).
  • “Administrative purposes”: This phrase refers to BOP’s execution and management of a sentence following imposition—calculating credits, designating facilities, providing programs, and determining prerelease placements. It does not turn on whether a task is discretionary or mandatory; it encompasses the implementation of Congress’s directives.
  • “A prisoner is ineligible if the prisoner is serving a sentence for a conviction under [enumerated statutes]”: The majority reads this as a status rule—if, by virtue of aggregation, the prisoner’s current custody includes a disqualifying conviction, the prisoner is ineligible across the aggregate term. The dissent reads the phrase temporally, keyed to the particular sentence being served at any given time.
  • Rule of lenity: A canon that resolves grievous ambiguity in penal statutes in favor of the defendant. The majority finds no such ambiguity here because of the synergy between § 3632(d)(4)(D) and § 3584(c).

Notable Comparative Statutory Language

  • Recidivism credits (FSA): “A prisoner is ineligible to receive time credits… if the prisoner is serving a sentence for a conviction under [§ 924(c) and other provisions].” 18 U.S.C. § 3632(d)(4)(D).
  • Home detention for terminally ill offenders (First Step Act amendment to the Second Chance Act): Eligibility requires “an offender… who is serving a term of imprisonment based on conviction for an offense or offenses that do not include” certain crimes. 34 U.S.C. § 60541(g)(5)(D) (emphasis added). The dissent views this as proof Congress knew how to write an “any offense” bar but did not do so in § 3632(d)(4)(D); the majority distinguishes the programs and notes different statutory purposes.

Key Takeaways

  • New Fourth Circuit Rule: When a federal prisoner’s multiple terms are aggregated under § 3584(c), the presence of any disqualifying conviction within that aggregate term renders the prisoner ineligible to earn First Step Act time credits for the entire aggregate term.
  • Administration Matters: FSA time credits are administered by BOP as part of postsentence administration; “administrative purposes” in § 3584(c) includes FSA credit computation.
  • Uniformity Across Circuits: This decision joins a growing nationwide consensus, limiting prospects for further appellate disruption absent congressional change.
  • Defense Implications: Even a short ineligible term (including a revocation term tied to an old case with a § 924(c) count) can foreclose FSA credits on a long otherwise-eligible term when aggregated. Charging, plea, and sentencing strategies should account for that reality.
  • Policy Debate Continues: The dissent highlights serious incentive and proportionality concerns—issues that may be more appropriately addressed legislatively than judicially under current statutory text.

Conclusion

In Bonnie v. Dunbar, the Fourth Circuit cements a bright-line rule: under § 3584(c), multiple terms ordered consecutively or concurrently merge for administrative purposes, and when the aggregate includes any conviction Congress has designated as disqualifying in § 3632(d)(4)(D), the “prisoner” is ineligible to earn First Step Act time credits for the entirety of the aggregate term. The opinion situates FSA credit administration squarely within BOP’s postsentence administrative function and harmonizes the FSA with the Sentencing Reform Act’s aggregation directive.

Judge Wynn’s dissent offers a robust alternative grounded in the FSA’s text, structure, and rehabilitation purpose, emphasizing sentence-by-sentence, time-sliced eligibility and warning of counterproductive outcomes under the majority’s rule. But with the Fourth Circuit’s published decision joining several sister circuits and the Supreme Court’s recent denial of certiorari in comparable cases, the aggregation rule now predominates. Practitioners should plan for its practical effects at the charging, plea, and sentencing stages, while policymakers considering the FSA’s incentive architecture may evaluate whether statutory refinements are warranted to align implementation more closely with the Act’s rehabilitative goals.

Case Details

Year: 2025
Court: Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit

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