Case ID: f-appx_539/html/0776-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Duane Byron FIELDS, Jr., Defendant-Appellant.
    No. 12-30315.
    United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.
    Argued and Submitted Aug. 14, 2013.
    Filed Aug. 28, 2013.
    Stephan Alexander Collins, Esquire, Assistant U.S., Jo Ann Farrington, Office of the U.S. Attorney, Anchorage, AK, for Plaintiff-Appellee.
    Allison Elizabeth Mendel, Mendel & Associates, Anchorage, AK, for Defendant-Appellant.
    Before: KOZINSKI, Chief Judge, BERZON and IKUTA, Circuit Judges.
   MEMORANDUM

1. The quantity of cocaine subjecting Fields to increased penalties for his conspiracy conviction was properly “charged in the indictment, submitted to the jury, subject to the rules of evidence, and proved beyond a reasonable doubt.” United States v. Buckland, 289 F.3d 558, 568 (9th Cir.2002) (en banc); see also Alleyne v. United States, 570 U.S.-, 133 S.Ct. 2151, 2155, 186 L.Ed.2d 314 (2013). The 439 grams found on his person and in his trailer, together with the other evidence of the conspiracy’s drug-dealing activities, was ample to support the jury’s special verdict that the conspiracy involved at least 500 grams. See United States v. Reed, 575 F.3d 900, 923 (9th Cir.2009).

2. Fields’s acquittal on the firearm charge didn’t preclude the sentencing judge from considering the gun in applying a two-level enhancement. See United States v. Watts, 519 U.S. 148, 157, 117 S.Ct. 633, 136 L.Ed.2d 554 (1997) (per curiam). Fields didn’t prove it was “clearly improbable” that his gun possession was connected to his crimes, so the enhancement was properly applied. United States v. Ferryman, 444 F.3d 1183, 1186 (9th Cir.2006); see also U.S.S.G. § 2D1.1 cmt. n. 11.

3. Application of the managerial role enhancement to Fields’s sentence was also proper. U.S.S.G. § 3B1.1(c). He twice sent others to deliver cocaine. Even if these were the only times Fields exerted control over others, they qualify him for the aggravating role enhancement. See, e.g., United States v. Maldonado, 215 F.3d 1046, 1050 (9th Cir.2000).

AFFIRMED. 
      
       This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.