United States v. Giovanni Wright ( 2020 )

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 19-4875
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Plaintiff - Appellee,
v.
GIOVANNI WRIGHT, a/k/a G,
Defendant - Appellant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, at Baltimore.
George L. Russell, III, District Judge. (1:13-cr-00229-GLR-3)
Submitted: October 23, 2020 Decided: November 3, 2020
Before DIAZ and HARRIS, Circuit Judges, and TRAXLER, Senior Circuit Judge.
Affirmed by unpublished per curiam opinion.
Eugene V. Gorokhov, Ziran Zhang, BURNHAM & GOROKHOV PLLC, Washington,
D.C., for Appellant. Robert K. Hur, United States Attorney, Sandra Wilkinson, Assistant
United States Attorney, OFFICE OF THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY, Baltimore,
Maryland, for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Giovanni Wright pled guilty to conspiracy to participate in a racketeering enterprise,
in violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1962(d) (Count 1); discharging a firearm in furtherance of a
crime of violence (referring to Count 1) and aiding and abetting the same, in violation of
18 U.S.C. §§ 2, 924(c)(1)(A)(iii) (Count 7); and unlawful dealing in firearms and aiding
and abetting the same, in violation of 18 U.S.C. §§ 2, 922(a)(1)(A) (Count 12). The district
court accepted the parties’ Fed. R. Crim. P. 11(c)(1)(C) plea agreement and sentenced
Wright to 216 months’ imprisonment. We granted the Government’s motion to dismiss
Wright’s first appeal as untimely.
Wright thereafter filed a 28 U.S.C. § 2255 motion seeking vacatur of his § 924(c)
conviction pursuant to Johnson v. United States, 576 U.S. 581 (2015), which declared the
residual clause of the Armed Career Criminal Act, 18 U.S.C. § 924(e), unconstitutionally
vague. The motion remained pending until the Supreme Court issued United States v.
Davis, 139 S. Ct. 2319 (2019), which held that § 924(c)’s residual clause is also
unconstitutionally vague. The district court concluded that, after Davis, Wright’s
racketeering-conspiracy conviction no longer qualified as a crime of violence. The court,
therefore, granted Wright’s § 2255 motion, vacated his § 924(c) conviction in Count 7, and
scheduled the case for resentencing on Counts 1 and 12.
The district court resentenced Wright to 180 months’ imprisonment. On appeal,
Wright argues that this upward variant sentence is procedurally and substantively
unreasonable. We affirm.
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We review a criminal sentence, “whether inside, just outside, or significantly
outside the Guidelines range,” for reasonableness “under a deferential abuse-of-discretion
standard.” Gall v. United States, 552 U.S. 38, 41 (2007); see United States v. Provance,
944 F.3d 213, 217 (4th Cir. 2019). We must first determine whether the district court
committed procedural error, such as failing to calculate or improperly calculating the
Sentencing Guidelines range, failing to give the parties an opportunity to argue for an
appropriate sentence, insufficiently considering the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors, relying on
clearly erroneous facts, or inadequately explaining the sentence imposed. United States v.
Lymas, 781 F.3d 106, 111-12 (4th Cir. 2015). After determining that the sentence is
procedurally reasonable, we consider the substantive reasonableness of the sentence,
“tak[ing] into account the totality of the circumstances.” Gall, 552 U.S. at 51.
Wright argues that his sentence is procedurally unreasonable because the district
court did not consider his nonfrivolous arguments for a within-Guidelines sentence, render
an individualized assessment of the offense conduct as applied to him, or explain
adequately the need for such a dramatic upward variance.
“A district court is required to provide an individualized assessment based on the
facts before the court, and to explain adequately the sentence imposed to allow for
meaningful appellate review and to promote the perception of fair sentencing.” United
States v. Lewis, 958 F.3d 240, 243 (4th Cir. 2020) (internal quotation marks omitted).
“Although every sentence requires an adequate explanation, a more complete and detailed
explanation of a sentence is required when departing from the advisory Sentencing
Guidelines, and a major departure should be supported by a more significant justification
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than a minor one.” United States v. Hernandez, 603 F.3d 267, 271 (4th Cir. 2010) (internal
quotation marks omitted).
When explaining the sentence, the “district court must address or consider all non-
frivolous reasons presented for imposing a different sentence and explain why it has
rejected those arguments.” United States v. Webb, 965 F.3d 262, 270 (4th Cir. 2020)
(alteration and internal quotation marks omitted). “The explanation is sufficient if it,
although somewhat briefly, outlines the defendant’s particular history and characteristics
not merely in passing or after the fact, but as part of its analysis of the statutory factors and
in response to defense counsel’s arguments.” United States v. Lozano, 962 F.3d 773, 782
(4th Cir. 2020) (internal quotation marks omitted). “District courts need not spell out their
responses to defendants’ arguments where context makes them clear. But the context must
make it patently obvious that the district court found the defendant’s arguments to be
unpersuasive.” Id. (alteration, citation, internal quotation marks omitted). Moreover, when
the court has fully addressed the defendant’s “central thesis” in mitigation, it need not
“address separately each supporting data point marshalled on its behalf.” United States v.
Nance, 957 F.3d 204, 214 (4th Cir. 2020) (internal quotation marks omitted), petition for
cert. filed, No. 20-5825 (U.S. Sept. 19, 2020).
Wright correctly notes that, “[i]n a typical case, the guidelines sentencing range
embodies the § 3553(a) factors and reflects a rough approximation of sentences that might
achieve § 3553(a)’s objectives.” Lymas, 781 F.3d at 112 (alteration and internal quotation
marks omitted). The district court, however, was clear that this was not a typical case.
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The court acknowledged that Wright accepted responsibility for his actions and
expressed remorse, that he has a son and a supportive family, that he now recognizes the
importance of his family, that his family struggled financially, that he joined the gang and
started using drugs at a young age, that he has a high school diploma, and that he suffers
from mental health and substance abuse issues. But the court also remarked on Wright’s
cavalier attitude while selling deadly firearms, his lack of restraint, his commission of
criminal conduct not accounted for in the Guidelines, his failure to apologize to the victims
during his allocution, his role as a founding member of the gang in Howard County, and
his predatory behavior that caused significant harm to the community. While the court at
times talked generally about the actions of the gang, it also described Wright as an active
participant in the criminal activity. Finally, the court explained that it was not totally
persuaded that Wright had been a model prisoner, observing that there was no evidence of
his participation in any vocational training during his many years in prison. Based on the
district court’s careful assessment of the mitigating and aggravating factors in its robust
explanation, we conclude that Wright’s challenges to the procedural reasonableness of his
sentence are without merit, and we have discerned no other procedural hurdles that would
preclude us from considering the substantive reasonableness of his sentence. See
Provance, 944 F.3d at 218-20.
To that end, Wright argues that his sentence is substantively unreasonable because
the district court did not identify any factors that would differentiate his case from the
typical gang-related racketeering cases. He maintains that all of the factors on which the
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court relied in imposing his upward variant sentence are fully accounted for in the
Guidelines calculation.
“Substantive reasonableness examines the totality of the circumstances to see
whether the sentencing court abused its discretion in concluding that the sentence it chose
satisfied the standards set forth in § 3553(a).” United States v. Hargrove, 701 F.3d 156,
160-61 (4th Cir. 2012) (internal quotation marks omitted). “Where, as here, the sentence
is outside the advisory Guidelines range, we must consider whether the sentencing court
acted reasonably both with respect to its decision to impose such a sentence and with
respect to the extent of the divergence from the sentencing range.” Nance, 957 F.3d at 215
(internal quotation marks omitted). District courts, however, “have extremely broad
discretion when determining the weight to be given each of the § 3553(a) factors, and the
fact that a variance sentence deviates, even significantly, from the Guidelines range does
not alone render it presumptively unreasonable.” Nance, 957 F.3d at 215 (citation and
internal quotation marks omitted).
Here, the district court identified several factors justifying a significant upward
variance from the Guidelines range, such as Wright’s cavalier attitude and lack of restraint
when committing the crimes, the uncharged predatory and violent behavior in which he
engaged as a founding member of the gang, and his failure to apologize to the victims of
his crimes. In the end, the court determined that these aggravating factors and others
warranted an upward variant sentence but not to the extent requested by the Government
due, in part, to the mitigating factors highlighted by counsel. Wright has failed to identify
any reason for overruling the court’s considered judgment “that the § 3553(a) factors, on a
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whole, justify the extent of the variance.” Id. (internal quotation marks omitted).
Accordingly, we conclude that Wright’s sentence is substantively reasonable.
We affirm the district court’s judgment. 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
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