Case ID: f-appx_132/html/0531-02.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. Gabriel PALACIOS-FRAUSTO, Defendant-Appellant.
    No. 04-41146.
    Summary Calendar.
    United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.
    Decided May 27, 2005.
    James Lee Turner, Assistant U.S. Attorney, U.S. Attorney’s Office, Southern District of Texas, Houston, TX, for PlaintiffAppellee.
    Thomas S. Berg, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Marjorie A. Meyers, Federal Public Defender, Margaret Christina Ling, Assistant Federal Public Defender, Federal Public Defender’s Office, Southern District of Texas, Houston, TX, for Defendant-Appellant.
    
      Before JONES, BARKSDALE, and PRADO, Circuit Judges.
   PER CURIAM:

Gabriel Palacios-Frausto (“Palacios”) appeals the forty-six-month sentence imposed following his conviction for illegal reentry into the United States after deportation. He argues that the enhancement provisions under 8 U.S.C. § 1326(b) are unconstitutional. He further argues that the “timing” of his prior felony conviction, which was used to enhance his sentence, is a separate fact that must be alleged in the indictment and proven to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt.

Palacios acknowledges that his first argument is foreclosed by the Supreme Court’s decision in Almendarez-Torres v. United States, 523 U.S. 224, 118 S.Ct. 1219, 140 L.Ed.2d 350 (1998), but he seeks to preserve the issue for Supreme Court review in light of the decision in Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466, 120 S.Ct. 2348, 147 L.Ed.2d 435 (2000). Apprendi did not overrule Almendarez-Torres. See Apprendi, 530 U.S. at 489-90, 120 S.Ct. 2348; United States v. Dabeit, 231 F.3d 979, 984 (5th Cir.2000). The Supreme Court’s recent decisions in Blakely v. Washington, 542 U.S. 296, 124 S.Ct. 2531, 159 L.Ed.2d 403 (2004), and United States v. Booker, — U.S.-, 125 S.Ct. 738, 160 L.Ed.2d 621 (2005) did not overrule Almendarez-Torres. See Booker, 125 S.Ct. at 756; Blakely, 124 S.Ct. at 2536-43. This court does not have the authority to overrule Almendarez-Torres. See Dabeit, 231 F.3d at 984. Thus, Palacios’s argument is foreclosed.

Palacios’s argument that the indictment must allege the “timing” of the prior felony conviction, which was used to enhance his sentence under 8 U.S.C. § 1326(b), has no merit. Palacios has not explained why an indictment that need not allege the defendant’s prior conviction at all under Almendarez-Torres is deficient for omitting the details of that prior conviction.

Accordingly, Palacios’s conviction and sentence are AFFIRMED. 
      
       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.