Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca5-08-30662/USCOURTS-ca5-08-30662-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Emile Russell
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

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.

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 08-30662

Summary Calendar

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Plaintiff-Appellee

v.

EMILE RUSSELL

Defendant-Appellant

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Eastern District of Louisiana

USDC No. 2:06-CR-160-3

Before JONES, Chief Judge, and DAVIS and WIENER, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:*

Emile Russell, federal prisoner # 29814-034, appeals from the 18 U.S.C.

§ 3582(c)(2) reduction of his sentence for conspiring to possess with intent to

distribute and distributing cocaine base and distributing cocaine hydrochloride

from 90 months to 87 months of imprisonment. He argues that since his original

sentence was near the bottom of his original guidelines range of 87-108 months

of imprisonment, the district court erred by sentencing him at the top of his

revised guidelines range of 70-87 months of imprisonment without explicitly

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

F I L E D

March 16, 2010

Charles R. Fulbruge III

Clerk

 Case: 08-30662 Document: 00511052638 Page: 1 Date Filed: 03/16/2010
No. 08-30662

2

considering the 18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) factors or giving a “legally sufficient reason”

for the revised sentence.

This court reviews the decision whether to reduce a sentence under

§ 3582(c)(2) for abuse of discretion. United States v. Evans, 587 F.3d 667 (5th

Cir. 2009). Reasonableness review, as outlined in United States v. Booker,

543 U.S. 220 (2005), is not applicable to § 3582(c)(2) proceedings. Id. As this

court observed in Evans, since “a defendant cannot successfully challenge a

district court for failing to provide reasons for denying his motion to reduce his

sentence, it is axiomatic that he cannot do so for granting his motion but not

providing a satisfactorily low enough sentence within the recalculated range.”

Evans, 587 F.3d at 674 (emphases in original). The district court was aware of

the facts that Russell claims justified a lower sentence. Although Russell

deduces from the district court’s brevity that it ignored the § 3553(a) factors,

“that the court did not mention the § 3553(a) factors when it summarily reduced

[his] sentence does not mean that it did not consider them.” Id. at 673. “The

court, which was under no obligation to reduce [Russell’s] sentence at all, was

under no obligation to reduce it even further within the recalculated range.” Id.

AFFIRMED.

 Case: 08-30662 Document: 00511052638 Page: 2 Date Filed: 03/16/2010