United States v. Michael Satterfield ( 2013 )

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 12-4706
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
MICHAEL SHANE SATTERFIELD, a/k/a Michael Shane Gellispie,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle
District of North Carolina, at Greensboro. N. Carlton Tilley,
Jr., Senior District Judge. (1:03-cr-00246-NCT-1)
Submitted: May 10, 2013 Decided: June 24, 2013
Before NIEMEYER, DIAZ, and FLOYD, Circuit Judges.
Dismissed in part and affirmed in part by unpublished per curiam
opinion.
Todd Allen Smith, LAW OFFICE OF TODD ALLEN SMITH, Graham, North
Carolina, for Appellant. Michael Francis Joseph, Assistant
United States Attorney, Greensboro, North Carolina, for
Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Michael Shane Satterfield appeals the district court’s
judgment revoking his supervised release and sentencing him to
eleven months’ imprisonment and a new two-year term of
supervised release. Satterfield’s attorney has filed a brief
pursuant to Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738 (1967), asserting
that there are no meritorious grounds for appeal, but
questioning whether the district court abused its discretion in
refusing to allow Satterfield to enter a rehabilitation program
he desired, and instead giving him an active prison sentence.
Satterfield was notified of his right to file a pro se
supplemental brief, but has not done so. For the reasons that
follow, we affirm.
Satterfield was originally sentenced to 160 months of
imprisonment for three counts of bank robbery. His sentence was
later reduced to 109 months. He was released and began serving
his term of supervised release in November 2011. Satterfield
subsequently violated the conditions of his supervised release
by testing positive for cocaine and absconding from the
residential re-entry center where he was residing. At the
revocation hearing, Satterfield admitted these two violations.
The district court sentenced him to an active sentence of eleven
months and a second term of twenty-four months’ supervised
release. Satterfield appealed his sentence. On March 18, 2013,
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while this appeal was pending, Satterfield was released from
incarceration and began serving his new term of supervised
release.
First, we may address sua sponte whether an issue on
appeal presents “a live case or controversy . . . since mootness
goes to the heart of the Article III jurisdiction of the
courts.” Friedman’s, Inc. v. Dunlap, 290 F.3d 191, 17 (4th Cir.
2002) (internal quotation marks omitted). Because Satterfield
has already served his term of imprisonment, there is no longer
a live controversy regarding the length of his confinement.
Therefore, his challenge to the district court’s decision to
impose an active prison sentence is moot. See United States v.
Hardy, 545 F.3d 280, 283-84 (4th Cir. 2008). However, because
Satterfield is serving a new term of supervised release and
because his attorney filed an Anders brief, we retain
jurisdiction to review the district court’s decision to revoke
Satterfield’s supervised release and to impose a new term of
supervised release.
A district court’s decision to revoke supervised
release is reviewed for abuse of discretion. United States v.
Pregent, 190 F.3d 279, 282 (4th Cir. 1999). To revoke
supervised release, a district court need only find a violation
of a condition of supervised release by a preponderance of the
evidence. 18 U.S.C.A. § 3583(e)(3) (West Supp. 2013); United
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States v. Copley, 978 F.2d 829, 831 (4th Cir. 1992). Here,
Satterfield admitted committing two violations of the conditions
of his supervised release. Therefore, we conclude that the
district court did not abuse its discretion in revoking
Satterfield’s supervised release.
This court will affirm a sentence imposed after
revocation of supervised release if it is within the governing
statutory range and not plainly unreasonable. United States v.
Crudup, 461 F.3d 433, 439-40 (4th Cir. 2006). “When reviewing
whether a revocation sentence is plainly unreasonable, [the
court] must first determine whether it is unreasonable at all.”
United States v. Thompson, 595 F.3d 544, 546 (4th Cir. 2010);
see United States v. Moulden, 478 F.3d 652, 656 (4th Cir. 2007).
A sentence is procedurally reasonable if the district
court has considered the policy statements contained in Chapter
Seven of the Sentencing Guidelines and the applicable 18 U.S.C.
§ 3553(a) (2006) factors, Crudup, 461 F.3d at 440, and has
adequately explained the sentence chosen, though it need not
explain the sentence in as much detail as when imposing the
original sentence. Thompson, 595 F.3d at 547. A sentence is
substantively reasonable if the district court states a proper
basis for its imposition of a sentence up to the statutory
maximum. Crudup, 461 F.3d at 440. If, after considering the
above, the sentence is not unreasonable, we will affirm. Id. at
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439. Only if we find the sentence unreasonable, must we decide
whether it is “plainly” so. Moulden, 478 F.3d at 657.
Satterfield’s new term of supervised release was both
procedurally and substantively reasonable. Eleven months was
within the limit prescribed in 18 U.S.C.A. § 3583(h) (West Supp.
2013). The district court did not explicitly discuss the
§ 3553(a) factors; however, the probation officer’s
recommendation, which the parties accepted and the court
implicitly adopted, addressed Satterfield’s history and
characteristics, § 3553(a)(1), and the need to deter future
criminal conduct by him and protect the public. See
§§ 3553(a)(2)(B)-(C), 3583(d). The court specifically addressed
Satterfield’s need for “correctional treatment,”
§ 3553(a)(2)(D), which in this case meant drug treatment.
We recently held that a district court is not
permitted to rely on the need for substance abuse treatment in
announcing a revocation sentence of imprisonment. United
States v. Bennett, 698 F.3d 194, 197-99 (4th Cir. 2012) (relying
on Tapia v. United States, 131 S. Ct. 2382, 2385, 2389 (2011)),
cert. denied, 133 S. Ct. 1506 (2013). However, the rationale
used in Bennett and Tapia–that imprisonment is not an
appropriate way to promote a defendant’s rehabilitation–does not
prohibit a district court from relying on a defendant’s
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rehabilitative needs in choosing to impose a supervised release
term or in determining the length or manner of supervision.
In accordance with Anders, we have reviewed the entire
record in this case and have found no meritorious issues for
appeal. We therefore affirm the district court’s judgment, but
dismiss the appeal as moot to the extent that Satterfield seeks
to challenge his sentence of incarceration. This court requires
that counsel inform his client, in writing, of his right to
petition the Supreme Court of the United States for further
review. If the client requests that a petition be filed, but
counsel believes that such a petition would be frivolous, then
counsel may move in this court for leave to withdraw from
representation. Counsel’s motion must state that a copy thereof
was served on the client. Finally, we dispense with oral
argument because the facts and legal contentions are adequately
presented in the materials before this court and argument would
not aid the decisional process.
AFFIRMED IN PART,
DISMISSED IN PART
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