United States v. Paulino-Guzman , 807 F.3d 447 ( 2015 )

United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit
No. 14-1859
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Appellee,
v.
OMAR PAULINO-GUZMAN,
Defendant, Appellant.
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO
[Hon. Francisco A. Besosa, U.S. District Judge]
Before
Howard, Chief Judge,
Lynch and Kayatta, Circuit Judges.
Jane Elizabeth Lee on brief for appellant.
Nelson Pérez-Sosa, Assistant United States Attorney, Chief,
Appellate Division, Susan Jorgensen, Assistant United States
Attorney, and Rosa Emilia Rodríguez-Vélez, United States Attorney,
on brief for appellee.
December 9, 2015
KAYATTA, Circuit Judge. Following his guilty plea to
one count of unlawful possession of a firearm, Omar Paulino-Guzman
("Guzman") appeals his 60-month sentence on the grounds that it is
substantively unreasonable. After careful review of the record,
we find that the district court did not abuse its discretion in
relying in part on the sentence's supposed deterrent effect to
justify an upward variance from a recommended sentencing range of
41–51 months.
I. Background1
In the early morning of November 28, 2013, the Puerto
Rico Police Department was alerted that a gas station's security
alarm had been activated. When agents arrived at the gas station,
they discovered that its front door had been broken. Nearby, they
found a vehicle with its engine running and with no people inside.
Soon thereafter, the agents saw two people––one of whom was later
identified as Guzman––running out of the gas station with
merchandise. Guzman got into the waiting vehicle and drove away.
The agents followed Guzman and saw him crash the vehicle, scramble
out, and flee. The police approached the vehicle and saw a loaded
firearm, as well as a magazine with five additional rounds.
1 On appeal from a guilty plea, we draw our facts from the
plea colloquy and sentencing materials. United States v. Whitlow,
714 F.3d 41, 42 (1st Cir. 2013).
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Guzman was arrested later that day and charged with one
count of being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm.2 On
February 13, 2014, Guzman entered into a plea agreement with the
government. Under the agreement, Guzman pled guilty, and both
parties agreed to recommend that the court impose a prison term
within the United States Sentencing Guidelines range corresponding
to Guzman's total adjusted offense level of 21.3 The court accepted
Guzman's plea as knowingly and voluntarily made and ordered the
probation office to prepare a Presentence Investigation Report
("PSR").
The PSR, as ultimately revised, calculated a criminal
history score of 3, which placed Guzman in criminal history
category ("CHC") II. The PSR calculated the guidelines sentencing
range associated with a total offense level of 21 and a CHC of II
as 41–51 months.
Guzman's sentencing hearing took place on July 23, 2014.
Defense counsel, citing Guzman's low education level, troubled
2Guzman had previously been convicted of robbery and firearms
offenses under Puerto Rico law.
3 Due to Guzman's past conviction for a crime of violence,
his base offense level for unlawful possession of a firearm was
20. See U.S.S.G. § 2K2.1(a)(4)(A). This base offense level was
increased by four levels because Guzman possessed the firearm in
connection with another felony offense, see U.S.S.G.
§ 2K2.1(b)(6)(B), and then reduced by three levels to reflect
Guzman's acceptance of responsibility, see U.S.S.G. § 3E1.1,
resulting in a total adjusted offense level of 21.
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family background, drug problems, and aspirations to vocational
training, recommended a low-end guidelines sentence of 41 months.
The government, emphasizing that Guzman had been arrested only
after he had caused property damage to a gas station and recklessly
fled the scene, and referring to Guzman's past firearms offenses
and pending state charges for the damage done to the gas station,
recommended a high-end guidelines sentence of 51 months. The court
reviewed the terms of the PSR and Guzman's criminal history, as
well as "several juvenile adjudications which, though not
considered for criminal history category points, may be considered
by the Court as part of the [sentencing] factors" laid out in 18
U.S.C. § 3553(a). After noting that the PSR "satisfactorily
reflects the components of [Guzman's] offense by considering its
nature and circumstances," the court reviewed in considerable
detail Puerto Rico's struggle with a high rate of murders, the
role of firearms in those murders, and the perception that
punishing the unlawful possession and use of firearms can reduce
the number of murders. The court also cited our decision in United
States v. Flores-Machicote, 706 F.3d 16 (1st Cir. 2013), as
blessing its consideration of Puerto Rico's serious crime problem
in sentencing for violent crimes.
Following this explanation of its concerns, the court
then announced that it elected to "exercise its discretion and
impose a variant sentence after considering all the provisions of
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[18 U.S.C. § 3553(a)]." The court sentenced Guzman to 60 months'
imprisonment. This appeal followed.4
II. Discussion
A. Standard of Review
We review the district court's sentencing decisions for
reasonableness under an abuse of discretion standard. United
States v. Trinidad-Acosta, 773 F.3d 298, 308 (1st Cir. 2014)
(citing Gall v. United States, 552 U.S. 38, 51 (2007)). Review is
bifurcated: we first assure ourselves that the sentencing is free
of procedural error before evaluating the sentence's substantive
reasonableness in light of the totality of the circumstances. See
id. at 308–09. Guzman alleges no procedural error, so we proceed
immediately to the question of whether the district court abused
its discretion by imposing a substantively unreasonable sentence.5
4 Under the plea agreement, Guzman waived his right to appeal
if the district court issued a sentence that aligned with the
"terms, conditions, and recommendations" of the agreement.
Because the court's 60-month sentence exceeded the parties'
guidelines recommendations, Guzman's waiver does not deprive this
court of jurisdiction over the appeal.
5 Guzman concedes that he made no objection to his sentence
in the district court. Typically, when the defendant makes no
objection to his sentence below, we set aside the challenged
sentence only if the defendant can satisfy the demanding plain-
error standard. United States v. Padilla, 415 F.3d 211, 218 (1st
Cir. 2005). Guzman argues nonetheless that the plain-error
standard should not apply to substantive reasonableness
challenges. This argument runs counter to circuit precedent. See,
e.g., United States v. Díaz-Bermúdez, 778 F.3d 309, 313–14 (1st
Cir. 2015) (applying plain-error review to a substantive
reasonableness challenge not raised below); United States v.
Tavares, 705 F.3d 4, 33 (1st Cir. 2013) (same). Regardless, the
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B. Substantive Reasonableness
"The hallmarks of a substantively reasonable sentence
are 'a plausible sentencing rationale and a defensible result.'"
United States v. Díaz-Bermúdez, 778 F.3d at 313 (quoting United
States v. Martin, 520 F.3d 87, 96 (1st Cir. 2008)). In assessing
substantive reasonableness, a reviewing court must remain "mindful
that deference to the trial court is a lineament of appellate
review of federal criminal sentences" and that "sentencing courts
may custom-tailor sentences to fit the distinctive circumstances
of particular cases." United States v. Del Valle-Rodríguez, 761
F.3d 171, 176 (1st Cir. 2014). This custom-tailoring sometimes
results in above-guidelines sentences. See, e.g., Díaz-Bermúdez,
778 F.3d at 313–14 (affirming a sentence 48 months above a
guidelines recommendation of 60 months). Nevertheless, "[w]here,
as here, a court imposes a sentence above the [guidelines
sentencing range], it must justify the upward variance." Del
Valle-Rodríguez, 761 F.3d at 176.
Guzman argues that the district court here has provided
no plausible sentencing rationale. He concedes that the district
court sought by its sentence "to deter [him] and others from . . .
government has failed to assert that plain-error review applies,
and "[w]hen the government fails to request plain error review,"
we may "review the claim under the standard of review that is
applied when the issue is properly preserved below." United States
v. Encarnación-Ruiz, 787 F.3d 581, 586 (1st Cir. 2015).
Accordingly, we proceed under an abuse of discretion standard.
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future criminal behavior" but argues that the attenuated causal
link between sentence length and deterrence renders this rationale
implausible. This argument is foreclosed by precedent, which amply
recognizes a sentence's deterrent signal as a legitimate basis for
upward variance. See, e.g., United States v. Zapata-Vázquez, 778
F.3d 21, 24 (1st Cir. 2015). And, indeed, Congress not only
permits the district courts to consider deterrence as a sentencing
factor but mandates that they do so. See 18 U.S.C. §
3553(a)(2)(B).6 Similarly, we have blessed consideration of local
conditions in sentencing. See Flores-Machicote, 706 F.3d at 22–
24.
To get around our precedent, Guzman argues that the
district court here relied exclusively on community considerations
in imposing an upwardly variant sentence and therefore did not
satisfy its obligation to root its sentence in the "nature and
circumstances of the offense and the history and characteristics
of the defendant." 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a)(1). But even were we to
adopt the view that the community affected by Guzman's offense
does not constitute one of the "circumstances of the offense," it
6 Guzman adduces a number of sources that question the
efficacy of lengthy sentences in achieving deterrence. But whether
or not Guzman's arguments are meritorious, they are not new. See,
e.g., Frank S. Dodge, Doing Justice, 19 A.F. L. Rev. 339, 339
(1977) (book review) (describing a 1976 study by the Committee for
the Study of Incarceration that argued that "the length of
incarceration was not necessarily important" to its deterrent
effect).
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is clear that the district court did not base its sentence
exclusively on community considerations. It provided a lengthy
run-down of Guzman's criminal history, including a number of
juvenile adjudications, which it noted "may be considered . . . as
part of the [sentencing] factors." It prefaced its discussion of
community considerations with the statement that "[t]he Court has
also considered the other sentencing factors set forth in [18
U.S.C. § 3553(a)]." And it concluded its discussion of the
sentencing factors with a reference to Guzman's age, education,
work history, and history of drug use. The context here thus makes
clear that community considerations formed but part of a larger
calculus.7
Finding Guzman's sentence supported by a plausible
sentencing rationale, our only remaining task is to ask whether a
60-month sentence represents a defensible result. This need not
detain us long. Each offense is associated with a "wide universe
7Guzman argues that the court's statement that the PSR
"satisfactorily reflects the components of [Guzman's] offense by
considering its nature and circumstances" should be read as an
indication that it accepted the guidelines range as appropriate
for Guzman's conduct and that any upward variance from the
guidelines range is therefore attributable to the court's weighing
of community considerations. Even were we to assume that
sentencing courts typically employ such conceptual partitions, the
court's statement here does not indicate that it did so. The
court's statement should be read alongside its related statement
that it had "reviewed the guideline calculations and [found] that
the probation officer [had] correctly calculated the guideline
adjustments." It seems that the court was merely indicating that
it found no fault with the preparation of the PSR.
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of reasonable sentences." United States v. Santiago-Rivera, 744
F.3d 229, 234 (1st Cir. 2014). Given the district court's concern
for the unique problem of firearms in Puerto Rico and for Guzman's
criminal history––including his prior firearms offenses––we cannot
say that a 60-month sentence, representing a 9-month upward
variance from the recommended guidelines sentence, is outside the
universe of reasonable sentences for an offense with a statutory
maximum of 120 months. See 18 U.S.C. § 924(a)(2).
III. Conclusion
Finding that the district court acted within its
discretion in imposing a variant sentence, Guzman's sentence is
affirmed.
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