United States v. Willis , 138 F. App'x 118 ( 2005 )

F I L E D
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
June 29, 2005
TENTH CIRCUIT
PATRICK FISHER
Clerk
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v. No. 04-5142
(D.C. No. CR-03-53-EA)
WILLIAM DAVID WILLIS, (N.D. Okla.)
Defendant-Appellant.
ORDER AND JUDGMENT *
Before BRISCOE , LUCERO , and MURPHY, Circuit Judges.
William Willis appeals his sentence for unlawful possession of a firearm by
a felon in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 922g(1) and 924(a)(2). Although originally
indicted for being a felon in possession of a firearm, the government filed two
superceding indictments that added various drug offenses to the firearms offense.
As part of a pretrial agreement, Willis agreed to plead guilty to possession of a
firearm and waived his appeal rights, reserving the right to appeal only ineffective
The case is unanimously ordered submitted without oral argument pursuant
*
to Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2) and 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). This order and judgment is
not binding precedent, except under the doctrines of law of the case, res judicata,
and collateral estoppel. The court generally disfavors the citation of orders and
judgments; nevertheless, an order and judgment may be cited under the terms and
conditions of 10th Cir. R. 36.3.
assistance of counsel and sentencing matters. In exchange, the government
dismissed the other charges, and agreed that he should receive a three-level
reduction for acceptance of responsibility pursuant to U.S.S.G. § 3E1.1.
Before sentencing, Willis filed written objections to the pre-sentence report
(“PSR”) 1 and sought a downward departure for atypical conduct not accounted for
under the two applicable Guideline provisions – acceptance of responsibility
(U.S.S.G. § 3E1.1) and aberrant behavior (U.S.S.G. § 5K2.20). Willis did not
challenge either the base offense level or the criminal history score recommended
by the PSR. Finding that the case does not fall outside the heartland of similar
cases, the district court denied the downward departure.
Willis then filed a motion seeking to have the Sentencing Guidelines
declared facially unconstitutional under Blakely v. Washington, 124 S. Ct. 2531(2004), and United States v. Green, 346 F. Supp. 2d 259 (D. Mass. 2004). Willis
also made an as-applied challenge to the constitutionality of the Guidelines. In
denying Willis’s motion, the district court held that the Guidelines could be
applied constitutionally, and that there were “no Blakely issues” because the court
was “not doing any Blakely findings.” Willis was sentenced to 33 months
imprisonment, the middle of the applicable guideline range of 30-37 months, a
1
The objections involved the amount of income that Willis would reasonably
expect to earn after release from incarceration. The district court did accept
Willis’s argument on this point and amended the PSR.
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$1000 fine, and three years of supervised release.
On appeal, Willis argues that the Sentencing Guidelines are invalid or
unconstitutional in their entirety, or as applied, thereby necessitating
resentencing. After supplemental briefing, Willis further argues that the district
court’s consideration of the dismissed charges in its formulation of his sentence
amounted to “a lethal cocktail” requiring a new sentencing hearing under United
States v. Booker, 125 S. Ct. 738, 756 (2005). Our jurisdiction arises under 28
U.S.C. § 1291 and 18 U.S.C. § 3742(a), and we AFFIRM.
In his pre-sentencing motion challenging the Guidelines’ facial
constitutionality, Willis argued that because Apprendi, Ring, and Blakely 2 applied
to the Guidelines, the creation of a mandatory determinate sentencing regime by
the Sentencing Commission constituted an impermissible delegation of
Congressional powers to the Sentencing Commission, and an impermissible
exercise of judicial powers by Congress. In September 2004, the district court
2
Ring v. Arizona , 536 U.S. 584 (2002) applied Apprendi v. New Jersey , 530
U.S. 466 (2000), to an Arizona law authorizing the death penalty if a sentencing
judge found one or more of ten aggravating factors, and held that the defendant’s
constitutional rights had been violated because the judge had imposed a sentence
greater than the maximum he could have imposed under state law without the
challenged finding. Ring , 536 U.S. at 603-609. Blakely expanded Apprendi ’s
holdings to a determinate sentencing system similar to the federal Guidelines,
clarifying that “the ‘statutory maximum’ for Apprendi purposes is the maximum
sentence a judge may impose solely on the basis of the facts reflected in the jury
verdict or admitted by the defendant .” Blakely v. Washington , 124 S. Ct. 2531,
2537 (2004) (emphasis in original).
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rejected this argument, concluding that Blakely was not implicated because the
court had not engaged in judicial factfinding that changed the upper limit of the
Guideline range to which Willis was exposed.
In January 2005, the Supreme Court, in United States v. Booker, held that
Blakely applies to the Sentencing Guidelines so that “[a]ny fact (other than a prior
conviction) which is necessary to support a sentence exceeding the maximum
authorized by the facts established by plea of guilty or a jury verdict must be
admitted by the defendant or proved to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt.” 125 S.
Ct. 738, 756 (2005). The court also expressly rejected the separation-of-powers
argument raised by Willis in his motion. See id. at 754-755. Imposing a global
remedy, the Court excised the two provisions of the Sentencing Reform Act which
mandated the Guidelines application – 18 U.S.C. §§ 3553(b)(1) and 3742(e). Id.
at 764-766. It then instructed courts to sentence in accordance with the factors
listed in § 3553(a), and for appellate courts to review for reasonableness. Id. at
766.
In his supplemental brief, Willis contends that the district court’s
consideration of the dismissed charges is improper after Booker because such
consideration is not included within the § 3553(a) factors. Willis’s sentence was
not enhanced based on these dismissed charges. Instead the district court noted
their existence at two points during the sentencing hearing, first when he rejected
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Willis’s motion for a downward departure, and again when selecting a sentence
from within the Guidelines range. Recognizing that this issue was not raised
below, Willis argues that in light of Booker this “consideration” is plain error.
We disagree.
The Supreme Court has recognized that the Sentencing Guidelines did not
divest sentencing courts of their traditional discretion to consider all aspects of
the criminal act at issue and to sentence a defendant accordingly. United States v.
O’Flanagan, 339 F.3d 1229, 1235 (10th Cir. 2003) (citing United States v. Watts,
519 U.S. 148, 152 (1997)). “This is true if the other activities were not charged
in a federal indictment, were charged in the indictment but eventually dismissed,
resulted in acquittal, or if the conduct violated state criminal laws.” Id. Watts
was premised upon 18 U.S.C. § 3661, which the Court stated “codified the
longstanding principle that sentencing courts have broad discretion to consider
various kinds of information.” Watts, 519 U.S. at 151. The statute states:
No limitation shall be placed on the information concerning the
background, character, and conduct of a person convicted of an
offense which a court of the United States may receive and consider
for the purpose of imposing an appropriate sentence.
§ 3661. We have held in a recent case that § 3661 “remains in full force” after
Booker. United States v. Magallanez, 408 F.3d 672, 684 (10th Cir. 2005).
Additionally as noted by the Court in Watts, Section 1B1.4 of the Guidelines
reflects the policy set forth in 18 U.S.C. § 3661:
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In determining the sentence to impose within the guideline range, or
whether a departure from the guidelines is warranted, the court may
consider, without limitation, any information concerning the
background, character and conduct of the defendant, unless otherwise
prohibited by law. See 18 U.S.C. § 3661.
Watts, 519 U.S. at 152. The commentary to Section 1B1.4 addresses an identical
situation to that of Willis:
A court is not precluded from considering information that the
guidelines do not take into account in determining a sentence within
the guideline range or from considering that information in
determining whether and to what extent to depart from the
guidelines. For example, if the defendant committed two robberies,
but as part of a plea negotiation entered a guilty plea to only one, the
robbery that was not taken into account by the guidelines would
provide a reason for sentencing at the top of the guideline range and
may provide a reason for an upward departure.
U.S. Sentencing Guidelines Manual (“U.S.S.G.”) § 1.B.1.4, cmt. background
(2004). Booker specifically requires sentencing courts to “take account of the
Guidelines together with other sentencing goals.” See Booker, 125 S. Ct. at 744
(discussing § 3553(a)(4)). Because consideration of dismissed offenses is
specifically authorized by § 3661 and by U.S.S.G. § 1B1.4, Willis’s argument that
these considerations are not authorized under § 3553(a) fails. We next turn to the
Booker error alleged.
Booker applies to Willis’s case because it was pending direct review when
Booker was decided. Id. at 769; Griffith v. Kentucky, 479 U.S. 314, 328 (1987).
Because the judge did not perform any judicial factfinding in formulating Willis’s
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sentencing range, there was no Sixth Amendment violation. Nevertheless, the
Supreme Court has instructed, “in cases not involving a Sixth Amendment
violation, whether resentencing is warranted or whether it will instead be
sufficient to review a sentence for reasonableness may depend upon application of
the harmless-error doctrine.” Booker, 125 S. Ct. at 769.
Because Willis raised the Blakely issues in the court below, they have been
preserved for appeal, and we evaluate for harmless error. “A non-constitutional
error is harmless unless it had a ‘substantial influence’ on the outcome or leaves
one in ‘grave doubt’ as to whether it had such an effect.” United States v. Rivera,
900 F.2d 1462, 1469 (10th Cir. 1990) (en banc) (quoting Kotteakos v. United
States, 328 U.S. 750, 765 (1946)). The district court sentenced Willis under the
Sentencing Guidelines, viewing them as mandatory. Booker makes clear that they
are not. As a result, Willis’s sentence was imposed as a result of an incorrect
application of the guidelines, and is therefore error. See United States v.
Labastida-Segura, 396 F.3d 1140, 1142 (10th Cir. 2005). Moreover, if a sentence
was imposed either in violation of law or as a result of an incorrect application of
the guidelines, then remand is required under § 3742(f)(1), unless “the reviewing
court concludes, on the record as a whole, that the error was harmless, i.e., that
the error did not affect the district court’s selection of the sentence imposed.” Id.
at 1143 (quoting Williams v. United States, 503 U.S. 193, 203 (1992). In
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Williams, the Court stated: “in determining whether a remand is required under
§ 3742(f)(1), a court of appeals must decide whether the district court would have
imposed the same sentence had it not relied upon the invalid factor or factors.”
Williams, 503 U.S. at 203.
Willis contends that Labastida-Segura squarely controls this case because
we simply do not know what the district court would have done after hearing from
the parties. Labastida-Segura, 396 F.3d at 1143. The government, however,
asserts that this case differs from Labastida-Segura in several respects. First,
unlike Labastida-Segura, the district court rejected Willis’s motion for a
downward departure based on analogous atypical conduct, specifically noting that
Willis had prior felony convictions, a criminal history which involved drugs, and
that absent the existence of the plea agreement, Willis would have “been facing a
lengthier sentence if convicted of the other counts.” Finally, the government
argues, Willis was sentenced in the middle of the guidelines range, rather than at
the bottom of the range as was Labastida-Segura.
Because Willis can assert only non-constitutional Booker error, it is the
mandatory nature of the sentencing that must be the focus of our harmless error
analysis. Willis raised three points in his argument for a downward departure
based on analogous factors, relying largely on United States v. Nunemacher, 362
F.3d 682 (10th Cir. 2004). He first argued that his possession of the firearm was
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of limited duration because after he received it as payment for doing work he took
it immediately to his brother for safekeeping and retrieved it only to consummate
the sale of the weapon to a third party and did not use it or menace anyone with it.
Second, Willis contended that he voluntarily terminated his possession of the
firearm long before the police became aware of his possession, and cooperated
with the police when they came to execute the search warrant providing
information that led the police to the ultimate purchaser of the firearm. Finally
Willis claimed that he had shown substantial post-offense rehabilitation by
passing all drug tests and working hard for his brother as a construction worker.
His brother testified that he had been an excellent worker. At sentencing
however, the court decided that pursuant to U.S.S.G. § 5K2.0(c), “[t]he Court may
depart only if the offender characteristics or other circumstances makes the case
exceptional and each characteristic or circumstance is present to such a degree
and identified in the guidelines as a permissible ground for departure, even if not
ordinarily relevant to a determination of whether a departure is warranted.” The
district court discussed and rejected each ground presented by Willis to justify the
departure and concluded that Willis’s conduct did not meet that high standard. At
sentencing, the government argued for a sentence at the top of the guideline
range, while Willis argued for one at the bottom. The record makes clear that the
district court rejected Willis’s arguments that his case fell outside the heartland
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on the merits, stating that “[b]ecause there are no particularly aggravating or
mitigating circumstances, a sentence near the middle of the guidelines range is
appropriate.”
Clearly “under the new post-Booker framework, the district court is
empowered with greater discretion to consider the factors provided in 18 U.S.C.
§ 3553(a) in determining a proper sentence.” United States v. Barnett, 398 F.3d
516, 528 (6th Cir. 2005). The district court’s rejection of the factors that Willis
advanced under the high standard of § 5K2.0(c) does not necessarily mean that it
would assign no weight to these same arguments in a purely discretionary
sentencing decision. But we are also faced with the fact that, in the face of this
evidence, the district court did not exercise what discretion it did possess to
sentence Willis at the bottom of the applicable Guidelines range.
Thus, in our analysis of the record to determine whether the Booker error in
this case was harmless, we must balance the district court’s non-exercise of its
existing discretion and its clear rejection that Willis’s arguments met § 5K2.0’s
enhanced standard for a downward departure, with the inherent difficulty of
predicting what weight the court would have assigned these factors in a purely
discretionary regime, and the reality of the pre-Booker sentencing landscape
having resulted in “no opportunity or incentive, as there is now post-Booker, for
[the defendant] or the government to present evidence or arguments outside the
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bounds allowed by the Guidelines.” Gonzalez-Huerta, 403 F.3d at 751 (Briscoe,
J., dissenting). On appeal, Willis advances no new evidence beyond that already
presented to the sentencing court. We recognize the government bears the burden
to demonstrate that the mandatory nature of the pre-Booker sentencing regime did
not influence the district court’s selection of the sentence. After carefully
considering the record as a whole, in the context of the district court’s rejection
of Willis’s downward departure motion following a full evidentiary hearing on the
elements that Willis contended were relevant, and the court’s decision to sentence
Willis in the middle of the Guidelines range, we conclude the government has met
its burden.
Accordingly, we AFFIRM.
ENTERED FOR THE COURT
Carlos F. Lucero
Circuit Judge
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