Case ID: f-appx_472/html/0075-01.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, Appellee, v. Carlos David VANEGAS-GOMEZ, Defendant-Appellant.
    No. 11-2708-cr.
    United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit.
    July 9, 2012.
    Ronald B. Resetarits, Assistant Federal Defender, for Terence S. Ward, Acting Federal Defender, New Haven, CT, for Appellant.
    Carolyn A. Ikari, Assistant United States Attorney (Sandra S. Glover, Assistant United States Attorney, on the brief), for David B. Fein, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, Hartford, CT, for Appellee.
    Present: AMALYA L. KEARSE, ROSEMARY S. POOLER, DEBRA ANN LIVINGSTON, Circuit Judges.
   SUMMARY ORDER

Carlos David Vanegas-Gomez appeals from his 57-month prison sentence for illegally reentering the United States in violation of federal law after previously having been convicted of an aggravated felony and deported. We assume the parties’ familiarity with the underlying facts, procedural history, and specification of issues for review.

Federal law requires district court judges to “state in open court the reasons for [their] imposition of the particular sentence[s]” they have chosen. 18 U.S.C. § 3553(c). “The appropriateness of brevity or length, conciseness or detail, when to write, what to say, depends upon circumstances.” Rita v. United States, 551 U.S. 338, 356, 127 S.Ct. 2456, 168 L.Ed.2d 203 (2007). “[W]e never have required a District Court to make specific responses to points argued by counsel in connection with sentencing.... Referring to Supreme Court precedent, we have held that the District Court must satisfy us only that it has considered the party’s arguments and has articulated a reasonable basis for exercising its decision-making authority.” United States v. Bonilla, 618 F.3d 102, 111 (2d Cir.2010).

Here, while the district court judge was concise in explaining her reasons for arriving at the sentence she chose for VanegasGomez, we do not believe that she was required by federal law to say any more than she did. The district court judge stated: “So in considering all of the factors that [a court] must” consider, including “the nature of the crime, the nature of the individual involved, the general deterrence factor, as well as the specific deterrence factor, I am not inclined to downwardly depart from the guidelines.” The district court continued: “I think a sentence at the bottom of the guideline range is appropriate and not excessive, and it does address the issues that we have in front of us, but I don’t think anything below that is justified, and I’m not going to do that.” In addition, the district court explicitly stated that it “ha[d] tried to give consideration to the arguments you’ve made.”

The court also addressed Vanegas-Gomez’s request for a reduced sentence on the basis that the delayed federal prosecution deprived him of an opportunity to receive a federal sentence that was concurrent with his state sentence. The court rejected the suggestion that the delay warranted a below-Guidelines-range sentence, but it stated that “that is one of the factors that persuades me that the bottom of the guideline range is appropriate.” In sum, Vanegas-Gomez’s argument that the district court’s explanation for Vanegas-Gomez’s sentence was insufficient is belied by the record.

Nor, in light of the factors outlined in 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a), do we believe that the district court’s decision to sentence Vane-gas-Gomez, who had been deported after having been convicted on two separate occasions for molesting children, to around five years in prison for illegally re-entering the United States was substantively unreasonable. See 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) (“The court shall impose a sentence sufficient, but not greater than necessary, to comply with the purposes” of sentencing as defined by federal law.); United States v. Cavera, 550 F.3d 180, 189 (2d Cir.2008) (en banc) (“We will ... set aside a district court’s substantive determination only in exceptional cases where the trial court’s decision ‘cannot be located within the range of permissible decisions.’ ”).

We have considered Vanegas-Gomez’s remaining arguments and find them to be without merit. Accordingly, the judgment of the district court hereby is AFFIRMED.