United States v. Anthony Girard Williams

[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT FILED
________________________ U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
JAN 21, 2009
No. 08-14088
THOMAS K. KAHN
Non-Argument Calendar
CLERK
________________________
D. C. Docket No. 02-00448-CR-T-26-MSS
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
versus
ANTHONY GIRARD WILLIAMS,
a.k.a. Jabo,
Defendant-Appellant.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of Florida
_________________________
(January 21, 2009)
Before CARNES, HULL and PRYOR, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Anthony Girard Williams, a federal prisoner convicted of crack cocaine
offenses, appeals the district court’s sua sponte reduction of his sentences under
Amendment 706 and 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(2). Williams contends that the district
court erred by concluding that it lacked the authority to reduce his sentences below
the low end of his newly reduced guideline range on the ground that United States
v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220, 125 S. Ct. 738 (2005), does not apply to § 3582(c)(2)
proceedings.
We review de novo a district court’s conclusions about the scope of its
authority to reduce a sentence under 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(2). United States v.
Jones, 548 F.3d 1366, 1368 (11th Cir. 2008). However, we will not reverse if any
error is harmless. United States v. Mathenia, 409 F.3d 1289, 1292 (11th Cir.
2005).
It remains an open question in the Eleventh Circuit whether Booker’s
requirement that sentencing guidelines be treated as advisory rather than
mandatory applies once § 3582(c) allows a resentencing. In fact, there is a circuit
split on the issue. Compare United States v. Rhodes, 549 F.3d 833 (10th Cir.
2008) (holding Booker inapplicable at a § 3582 resentencing) with United States
v. Hicks, 472 F.3d 1167, 1168 (9th Cir. 2007) (holding that Booker does apply
once resentencing is granted under § 3582(c)(2), so that a district court may depart
2
below the new guidelines level). However, although Williams strenuously argues
that Booker should have been applied, we need not settle that issue in this case
because any error committed by the district court in refusing to apply Booker was
harmless.
There are two types of Booker errors— constitutional and statutory.
Mathenia, 409 F.3d at 1291–92. When a court erroneously treats the sentencing
guidelines as mandatory instead of advisory, it commits Booker statutory error.
Mathenia, 409 F.3d at 1291 (“Statutory error occurs when the district court
sentences a defendant under a mandatory guidelines scheme. . .”) (citations,
alteration, and quotation marks omitted). Booker statutory error is harmless if
viewing the proceedings in their entirety, a court determines that the error
did not affect the sentence, ‘or had but very slight effect.’ If one can say
‘with fair assurance . . . that the sentence was not substantially swayed by
the error,’ the sentence is due to be affirmed even though there was error.
Mathenia, 409 F.3d at 1292 (citations and alterations omitted).
In this case, the district court found that Booker did not apply at Williams’
resentencing under § 3582. Therefore, the district court used the reduced offense
levels created by Amendment 706 and presumably treated their corresponding
sentencing guidelines as mandatory rather than advisory. The amended guidelines
range applicable to Williams was 168 to 210 months imprisonment. In sentencing
3
Williams to 168 months, the district court stated that “even if Booker were
applied, the Court would in all likelihood impose the same sentence.” The district
court added that “The Court is satisfied that [the sentence reduction afforded
Defendant] is sufficient but not greater than necessary to comply with all of the
factors considered under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a).”
In light of these statements by the district court, we can say “with fair
assurance . . . that the sentence was not swayed by the error,” if any error occurred.
Mathenia, 409 F.3d at 1292. Instead, it appears that the district court would have
imposed the same 168-month sentence even if convinced that it had the authority
to impose a sentence below the amended guidelines range. Therefore, any error
the district court made in failing to apply Booker had no effect on Williams’
sentence and was harmless under the Mathenia standard. We affirm.
AFFIRMED.
4