Von Kahl v. Segal, No. 19-3026 (7th Cir. 2021)
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Von Kahl is serving a life sentence, plus consecutive terms of 10 and five years’ imprisonment, for murdering two deputy U.S. Marshals and related crimes. The Bureau of Prisons originally calculated his release date as February 2013. In 1994, the Bureau recalculated his release date as February 2023. Von Kahl contested the calculation of his release date 28 U.S.C. 2241. Von Kahl, whose crime predates the 1984 Sentencing Reform Act, is subject to the 1976 Reorganization Act, 18 U.S.C. 4201–28, and was eligible for parole as soon as he was sentenced. The Parole Commission denied him release. He contends that he is now entitled to mandatory release under section 4206(d), which caps how long anyone must serve unless the inmate has seriously or frequently violated institutional rules or that there is a reasonable probability that he will commit any crime.
The Seventh Circuit upheld the 2023 release date. The statute says that a life term is treated the same as a 45-year term, so anyone sentenced to life is presumptively released after 30 years but, unless paroled earlier, a prisoner must serve two-thirds or 30 years of “each consecutive term or terms.” Von Kahl is serving three consecutive terms: life, ten years, and five years. Thirty years for the life term, plus two-thirds of each term of years, adds to 40 years, running through February 2023.
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