Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca4-07-04375/USCOURTS-ca4-07-04375-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Jesus Martinez-Varela
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

PUBLISHED

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.  No. 07-4375

JESUS MARTINEZ-VARELA, a/k/a Cruz

Echeverria-Mendez,

Defendant-Appellant. 

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Western District of North Carolina, at Asheville.

Lacy H. Thornburg, District Judge.

(1:06-cr-00248)

Argued: March 21, 2008

Decided: June 25, 2008

Before WILKINSON, KING, and GREGORY, Circuit Judges.

Affirmed by published opinion. Judge Gregory wrote the opinion, in

which Judge Wilkinson and Judge King joined.

COUNSEL

ARGUED: Raquel Kathy Wilson, FEDERAL DEFENDERS OF

WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA, INC., Asheville, North Carolina,

for Appellant. Amy Elizabeth Ray, OFFICE OF THE UNITED

STATES ATTORNEY, Asheville, North Carolina, for Appellee. ON

BRIEF: Claire J. Rauscher, Executive Director, FEDERAL

DEFENDERS OF WESTERN NORTH CAROLINA, INC., AsheAppeal: 07-4375 Doc: 39 Filed: 06/25/2008 Pg: 1 of 7
ville, North Carolina, for Appellant. Gretchen C. F. Shappert, United

States Attorney, Charlotte, North Carolina, for Appellee. 

OPINION

GREGORY, Circuit Judge:

The Appellant, Jesus Martinez-Varela ("Varela"), a/k/a Cruz

Echeverria-Mendez, pled guilty to illegal reentry into the United

States after deportation following an aggravated felony, in violation

of 8 U.S.C. § 1326(a) and (b)(2). United States Sentencing Guideline

("U.S.S.G.") § 2L.1.2(b)(1) provides that the base offense level for a

person convicted of illegal reentry into the United States should be

increased by twelve levels if the defendant was previously convicted

of a drug trafficking offense for which the "sentence imposed" was

thirteen months or less, and sixteen levels if the "sentence imposed"

was greater than thirteen months.

The district court concluded that Varela’s three prior felony drug

trafficking convictions — all of which were committed on the same

day and arose out of the same set of events — should be aggregated

per U.S.S.G. § 4A1.2(a)(2) to calculate his "sentence imposed." Upon

aggregation, Varela’s sentences added up to twelve-sixteen months,

thus making Varela eligible for the sixteen-level enhancement under

U.S.S.G. § 2L.1.2(b)(1)(A). Varela contends that the district court

erred because the relevant Sentencing Guidelines did not call for

aggregating his three prior sentences for felony drug convictions. For

the reasons that follow, we affirm the district court’s decision.

I.

On November 2, 2006, Varela pled guilty to illegal entry after

deportation for an aggravated felony. Relying on U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2(a),

the district court determined that Varela’s base offense level was

eight. In addition, the district court concluded, over Varela’s objection, that he was eligible for the sixteen-level enhancement per

U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2 (b)(1)(A) because of Varela’s three 2004 state felony drug trafficking convictions: possession with intent to distribute

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cocaine, possession with intent to distribute marijuana, and possession

with intent to distribute methamphetamine. Varela received concurrent sentences of six to eight months for the cocaine and marijuana

possession charges. In addition, Varela received a sentence of sixeight months for the methamphetamine possession charge with the

sentence to run consecutive to the marijuana and cocaine possession

sentences. The PSR determined, and the district court agreed, that the

Guidelines require the aggregation of Varela’s three sentences, resulting in a combined sentence of twelve-sixteen months. Since the maximum aggregated sentence exceeded the thirteen months necessary to

apply the U.S.S.G. § 2L.1.2(b)(1)(A) enhancement, Varela’s base

offense level was increased by sixteen levels. After the district court

applied a three-level reduction for acceptance of responsibility,

Varela’s offense level totaled twenty one, which combined with his

criminal history category of IV, resulted in a guideline range of fiftyseven to seventy-one months imprisonment. The district court sentenced Varela to a guideline sentence of sixty-four months imprisonment and three years supervised release.

Varela appeals the decision of the district court to apply the

sixteen-level enhancement.

II.

We review a district court’s sentence under an abuse of discretion

standard for procedural reasonableness. The first task in this process,

and the only task in this case, is to determine if the district court properly calculated the applicable Guidelines range. Gall v. United States,

128 S.Ct. 586, 596 (2007). Since the applicable Guidelines range is

directly related to a defendant’s offense level, we focus on the district

court’s decision to aggregate Varela’s three prior felony sentences

when calculating his "sentence imposed" under U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2.

U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2, Application Note 1(B)(vii), defines sentence

imposed1 as:

"Sentence of imprisonment" has the meaning given that

term in Application Note 2 and subsection (b) of § 4A1.2

1The Guidelines treat the terms "sentence imposed" and "sentence of

imprisonment" as synonyms. 

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(Definitions and Instructions for Computing Criminal

History), without regard to the date of the conviction.

(emphasis added). A plain reading of the cross-referenced provisions

confirms that neither of them address the issue of aggregation. Section 4A1.2(b) defines sentence of imprisonment as "a sentence of

incarceration and refers to the maximum sentence imposed" while

§ 4A1.2, Application Note 2, states that "in the case of an indeterminate sentence," e.g., six to eight months, the maximum sentence is the

longest sentence possible. Thus, in Varela’s situation, the maximum

sentence for each of his three felonies would be eight months. Thus,

without aggregating the sentences, the "sentence imposed" by the district court would not have exceeded the thirteen-month threshold necessary to make Varela eligible for the sixteen-level enhancement

under U.S.S.G. § 2L1.2.

Due to the lack of any guidance on the issue of aggregation from

the cross-referenced provisions, the PSR recommended, and the district court agreed, that it was appropriate to turn to a non-referenced

provision, U.S.S.G. § 4A1.2(a)(2), which states, in relevant part:

For purposes of applying § 4A1.1(a), (b), and (c), if prior

sentences are counted as a single sentence, use the longest

sentence of imprisonment if concurrent sentences were

imposed. If consecutive sentences were imposed, use the

aggregate sentence of imprisonment.

(emphasis added.) The central thrust of Varela’s argument is that the

district court erred in looking beyond the provisions specifically

cross-referenced in U.S.S.G. § 2L1.1. In support of his argument,

Varela cites to our case law and the Guidelines themselves. Most persuasively, Varela refers us to U.S.S.G. § 1B1.5, Application Note 1,

which states that "[a] reference may also be to a specific subsection

of another guideline; . . . In such case, only the specific subsection of

that other guideline is used."

The Government contends that U.S.S.G. § 4A1.2(b) cannot be read

in isolation from U.S.S.G. § 4A1.2(a) when related offenses are

involved because U.S.S.G. § 4A1.2(a) "instructs the court as to how

to treat related offenses for purposes of determining the ‘sentence

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imposed’ as a result of [Varela’s] prior convictions." (Appellee’s Br.

7.) Thus, despite U.S.S.G. § 4A1.2(a) not being cross-referenced, the

Government argues that proper application of U.S.S.G. § 4A1.2(b)

necessitates consideration of U.S.S.G. § 4A1.2(a). In addition, in

response to Varela’s U.S.S.G. § 1B1.5 argument, the Government

cites us to U.S.S.G. § 1B1.5(b)(2) which makes it clear that the commentary only applies to an "offense guideline" and since Section

§ 4A1.2 involves calculating a defendant’s criminal history points,

§ 1B1.5 is inapplicable.

The crux of this case boils down to whether the district court

abused its discretion in looking beyond the specifically crossreferenced provisions in determining whether Varela’s felonies

should be aggregated. We are unable to locate any circuit court decision that conclusively resolves this issue in the context of these specific Guideline provisions. However, circuit courts have addressed the

relationship between Chapter 4 and § 2L1.2. See e.g., United States

v. Frias, 338 F.3d 206, 210 (3d Cir. 2003) ("The Government disputes [Defendant’s] conclusion that there is a theoretical difference

between Chapter 4 and § 2L1.2, arguing that each section is clearly

aimed at the same thing, which is varying the punishment based on

the criminal record and thus the expected dangerousness of the

offender. We agree, believing that, while it may not always be appropriate to look at other sections of the Guidelines to interpret a term,

such a course is warranted in this case."); United States v. MorenoCisneros, 319 F.3d 456, 460 (9th Cir. 2003) (holding that "Section

4A1.2 is a broadly applicable section of the Guidelines"); United

States v. Galicia-Delgado, 130 F.3d 518, 521 (2d Cir. 1997) ("We

note that the definitions found in § 4A1.2 have often been borrowed

to interpret terms in § 2L1.2"). In addition, we addressed the propriety

of a district court’s decision to look beyond cross-referenced provisions in United States v. Payne, 952 F.2d 827 (4th Cir. 1991). In

Payne, we decided that U.S.S.G. § 2B5.1(b)(1)’s cross reference to a

table in U.S.S.G. § 2F1.12 precluded the district court from referenc2For purposes of clarity, we include a part of that table below: 

1) If the loss exceeded $2,000, increase the offense level as follows:

Loss (Apply the Greatest) Increase in Level

(A) $2,000 or less no increase

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ing any other part of that guideline. As the Government correctly

points out, Payne is easily distinguished from the instant case because

the guideline provision cross-referenced provided a complete answer

to the relevant issue — i.e., how many levels the face value of the

counterfeited currency increased the defendant’s base offense level.

It makes little sense to look beyond the cross-referenced provisions

when those provisions themselves resolve the query involved. In addition, while the instant case involved calculating Varela’s criminal history points, Payne concerned determining the defendant’s offense

level. Thus, in our view, Payne, while informative, fails to directly

resolve the question of how far a district court can "stray" from crossreferenced provisions to resolve an ambiguity in the Guidelines.

The Guidelines themselves provide us with some guidance in

resolving the issue. Section 1B1.11, Background, citing to the Second

Circuit’s decision in United States v. Stephenson, 921 F.2d 438 (2d

Cir. 1990) states that the Guidelines should "be applied as a cohesive

and integrated whole rather than in a piecemeal fashion." (internal

quotation marks omitted). This guidance provides persuasive evidence that under appropriate circumstances, referral to a related

guideline provision is not a disfavored approach. This approach also

conforms with the post-Booker approach to the sentencing guidelines,

which transformed the guidelines from mandatory to advisory. Of

course, the advisory nature of the guidelines does not mean that district courts are free to disregard the relevant guidelines and any crossreferences within those guidelines. However, in cases in which the

guidelines themselves provide that interpreting a cross-referenced

provision requires looking to another section, it would nonsensical for

a district court to refuse to do so. This is especially the case when the

related provision that definitively addresses the matter in question.

This is precisely the situation we have in this case. While the crossreferenced provisions do not address aggregation, § 4A1.1’s Com-

(B) More than $2,000 add 1

(C) More than $5,000 add 2

(D) More than $10,000 add 3

(E) More than $20,000 add 4

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mentary states that "[t]he definitions and instructions in § 4A1.2 govern the computation of the criminal history points. Therefore,

§§ 4A1.1 and 4A1.2 must be read together." This Commentary provides us with strong evidence that these two provisions should be read

together in determining Varela’s criminal history points. Thus, based

on the instructions from the guidelines themselves, guidance from the

relevant provisions in question, and the lack of any persuasive or

direct precedent to the contrary, we conclude that the district court

properly aggregated Varela’s sentences.

III.

For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the district court’s decision.

AFFIRMED

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