Case ID: f-appx_410/html/0733-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "PER CURIAM: \n    ", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellee v. Clifton DeWarren RIVERS, also known as Clifton Rivers, Defendant-Appellant.
    No. 08-51154.
    United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.
    Oct. 28, 2010.
    Joseph H. Gay, Jr., Assistant U.S. Attorney, U.S. Attorney’s Office, San Antonio, TX, for Plaintiff-Appellee.
    Clifton DeWarren Rivers, Beaumont, TX, pro se.
    Before WIENER, PRADO, and OWEN, Circuit Judges.
   PER CURIAM:

Defendant-Appellant Clifton DeWarren Rivers, federal prisoner # 36491-180, appeals the denial of his 18 U.S.C. § 3582(c)(2) motion to reduce the sentence he received following his guilty-plea conviction for possession with intent to distribute more than 50 grams of crack cocaine within 1,000 feet of a school, in violation of 21 U.S.C. §§ 841 and 860. Rivers moves for permission to appeal in for-ma pauperis (IFP). The district court has certified that the appeal is not in good faith. See Baugh v. Taylor, 117 F.3d 197, 202 (5th Cir.1997).

Rivers asserts that the district court erroneously denied his § 3582(c)(2) motion based on the fact that he had already received a three-level reduction for acceptance of responsibility. His assertion is factually incorrect. The district court’s denial was based not on Rivers’s acceptance of responsibility but on its determination that Rivers’s already-reduced sentence, resulting from the government’s Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 35 motion, fell within the amended guidelines range resulting from the retroactive crack cocaine amendments and that no further reduction was warranted. Rivers has abandoned any challenge to that determination by failing to brief it. See United States v. Reyes, 300 F.3d 555, 558 n. 2 (5th Cir.2002); Fed. R.App. P. 28(a)(9).

Rivers additionally contends that United States v. Booker, 543 U.S. 220, 125 S.Ct. 738, 160 L.Ed.2d 621 (2005), and Kimbrough v. United States, 552 U.S. 85, 128 S.Ct. 558, 169 L.Ed.2d 481 (2007), should apply in § 3582(c)(2) proceedings, allowing district courts to impose sentences lower than the two-level adjustment contemplated by the retroactive crack cocaine amendments. He urges that the initial determinations regarding both the amount of crack cocaine attributable to him and his criminal history score were erroneous, and he also contends that his sentence is unreasonable and that he is entitled to resen-tencing with full consideration of the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors. Because the Supreme Court’s decision in Booker does not apply to sentence reductions under § 3582(c)(2) and because a § 3582(c)(2) proceedings is not an opportunity to challenge the original sentence, these arguments are without merit. See United States v. Doublin, 572 F.3d 235, 237 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, — U.S.-, 130 S.Ct. 517, 175 L.Ed.2d 366 (2009); see also United States v. Evans, 587 F.3d 667, 672 (5th Cir.2009), cert. denied, — U.S.-, 130 S.Ct. 3462, 177 L.Ed.2d 1064 (2010); United States v. Whitebird, 55 F.3d 1007, 1011 (5th Cir.1995).

Rivers has failed to show that he will raise a nonfrivolous issue on appeal. See Howard v. King, 707 F.2d 215, 220 (5th Cir.1983). Accordingly, his motion to proceed IFP is DENIED; and, because his appeal is frivolous, it is DISMISSED. See 5th Cir. R. 42.2. 
      
       Pursuant to 5th Cir. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5th Cir. R. 47.5.4.