A federal appeals court Friday affirmed its earlier ruling that former Mayor Marion Barry's sentence for cocaine possession may be lengthened because of an allegation that he lied to a grand jury.
Barry had asked the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia to reconsider a narrow part of its July 12 decision, which upheld Barry's conviction but ordered him resentenced. Without comment, the court declined.Barry was convicted in August 1990 of a single count of cocaine possession. He was acquitted on another and the jury deadlocked on 12 others, including three of lying to a grand jury.
In July, the appeals court ordered Barry resentenced on grounds that U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson did not follow guidelines when he ordered a six-month prison term.
But it rejected arguments that the sentence could not be lengthened based on the judge's belief that Barry committed perjury while testifying before a federal grand jury in December 1988 about alleged drug use by a friend.
Barry's lawyer had argued that because the testimony occurred almost a year before the offense for which he was convicted the two could not be linked.
But the court said such a standard would bar judges from increasing the sentence of a defendant who bribed a police officer not to investigate a crime he was about to commit.