United States v. Samuel Eaton , 607 F. App'x 689 ( 2015 )

FILED
NOT FOR PUBLICATION JUN 04 2015
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, No. 14-50103
Plaintiff - Appellee, D.C. No. 2:10-cr-00304-JFW-3
v.
MEMORANDUM*
SAMUEL ANTHONY EATON, AKA
Samuel Easton, AKA Sammy Anthony
Eatom, AKA Samuel Eaton, AKA Samuel
Jackson, AKA Anthony Lawson, AKA
Deadra Sinton, AKA Dalon Smith,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Central District of California
John F. Walter, District Judge, Presiding
Submitted June 2, 2015**
Pasadena, California
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
**
The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision
without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).
Before: THOMAS, Chief Judge, CALLAHAN, Circuit Judge and SINGLETON,***
Senior District Judge.
Samuel Eaton appeals from his resentencing by the district court pursuant to
his convictions on two counts of bank larceny, 18 U.S.C. § 2113(b). We review
his challenge to the sentence de novo, United States v. Garcia-Guizar, 234 F.3d
483, 489 n.2 (9th Cir. 2000), and affirm. Because the parties are familiar with the
history of the case, we need not recount it here.
I
The district court was not required to impose the sixty-month “alternative
sentence” on remand following our reversal of Eaton’s convictions under 18
U.S.C. § 844 in the previous appeal. Our remand order in that appeal was open-
ended and, unlike in any of the cases Eaton cites, did not direct the district court to
impose the alternative sentence it had previously considered. The district court
was therefore free to undertake a new sentencing analysis without regard to its
earlier sentencing determinations. See United States v. Ponce, 51 F.3d 820, 825-26
(9th Cir. 1995) (concluding that the “district court did not err in resentencing [the
defendants] without regard to its previous [sentencing] determinations” because the
disposition in the prior appeal simply “vacated the [original] sentences and
***
The Honorable James K. Singleton, Senior District Judge for the U.S.
District Court for the District of Alaska, sitting by designation.
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remanded for resentencing” without elaboration); United States v. Caterino, 29
F.3d 1390, 1395 (9th Cir. 1994) (concluding that, absent “clear evidence to the
contrary,” a disposition vacating a defendant’s sentence and remanding for
resentencing “should be read as granting a general rather than limited remand to
the district court”), overruled on other grounds by Witte v. United States, 515 U.S.
389 (1995).
II
The district court’s decision to impose a sentence greater than sixty months
at Eaton’s resentencing hearing was not motivated by vindictiveness and did not
violate his due process rights.
The district court explained that it was imposing the eighty-month sentence
instead of the sixty-month “alternative sentence” because the sixty-month sentence
was based on an erroneous analysis of the sentencing factors in 18 U.S.C.
§ 3553(a). This explanation was sufficient to avoid a presumption of
vindictiveness. Even assuming the presumption arose, this explanation rebuts that
presumption. As we have recognized, a district court may impose a higher
sentence on a defendant at resentencing, without violating due process, where the
“higher sentence resulted solely from the district court’s correction of an error” in
its prior sentencing analysis. Garcia-Guizar, 234 F.3d at 489; see also Ponce, 51
3
F.3d at 826 (finding no “authority for the proposition that due process is violated
where a court reexamines all aspects of a sentence following a successful appeal of
a prior sentence and a general remand”).
AFFIRMED.
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