Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca11-22-13999/USCOURTS-ca11-22-13999-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Mandel Lamont Stewart
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

[DO NOT PUBLISH]

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eleventh Circuit

____________________

No. 22-13999

Non-Argument Calendar

____________________

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff-Appellee,

versus

MANDEL LAMONT STEWART, 

Defendant-Appellant.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Middle District of Florida

D.C. Docket No. 6:22-cr-00083-CEM-DAB-1

____________________

USCA11 Case: 22-13999 Document: 59-1 Date Filed: 01/15/2025 Page: 1 of 7
2 Opinion of the Court 22-13999

Before LAGOA, ANDERSON and WILSON, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

Mandel Lamont Stewart appeals the district court’s imposition of “standard” discretionary conditions of supervised release 

upon being sentenced to 96 months’ imprisonment and 3 years’ supervised release for possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. 

On appeal, he argues that the district court’s oral pronouncement 

at sentencing that it was imposing the Middle District of Florida’s 

standard conditions for supervised release, without specifying what 

those conditions were, was insufficient to provide him notice or an 

opportunity to object to his sentence. The government moves to 

dismiss Stewart’s appeal based on a sentence-appeal waiver in his 

plea agreement, wherein Stewart waived the right to appeal his 

sentence in all but four circumstances: (1) if his sentence exceeded 

the applicable guidelines range, as determined by the district court, 

(2) if his sentence exceeded the statutory maximum penalty, (3) if 

his sentence violated the Eighth Amendment, and (4) if the government appealed his sentence. We previously carried that motion 

with the case.

I.

We review the validity of a sentence-appeal waiver de novo. 

United States v. Johnson, 541 F.3d 1064, 1066 (11th Cir. 2008). An 

appeal waiver will be enforced if it was made knowingly and voluntarily. Id. Sentence-appeal waivers are valid if the government 

shows either that: (1) the district court specifically questioned the 

USCA11 Case: 22-13999 Document: 59-1 Date Filed: 01/15/2025 Page: 2 of 7
22-13999 Opinion of the Court 3

defendant about the waiver or (2) the record makes clear that the 

defendant otherwise understood the full significance of the waiver. 

United States v. Bushert, 997 F.2d 1343, 1351 (11th Cir. 1993). 

We have rejected the view that examining the text of the 

plea agreement is sufficient to make a sentence-appeal waiver 

knowing and voluntary. Id. at 1352. Instead, the “touchstone” for 

assessing whether a sentence-appeal waiver was made knowingly 

and voluntarily is whether “it was clearly conveyed to the defendant that he was giving up his right to appeal under most circumstances.” United States v. Boyd, 975 F.3d 1185, 1192 (11th Cir. 2020) 

(quotations omitted and alterations accepted). We have found that 

a sentence-appeal waiver is valid when it “was referenced during 

[the] Rule 11 plea colloquy” and the defendant “agreed that she understood the [sentence-appeal waiver] provision and that she entered into it freely and voluntarily.” United States v. Weaver, 275 

F.3d 1320, 1333 (11th Cir. 2001). The district court need not cover 

every exception to the sentence-appeal waiver in its colloquy to effectively convey that a defendant is giving up his right to appeal in 

most circumstances. Boyd, 975 F.3d at 1192.

In Boyd, we determined that the record demonstrated that 

the defendant knowingly and voluntarily entered the sentence-appeal waiver when he initialed each page of the plea agreement; 

signed the portion of the plea agreement stating that he had read 

the agreement in its entirety, discussed it with counsel, and understood it; and confirmed that he had read the plea agreement, discussed it with counsel, and understood it during the plea colloquy. 

USCA11 Case: 22-13999 Document: 59-1 Date Filed: 01/15/2025 Page: 3 of 7
4 Opinion of the Court 22-13999

Id. at 1192. However, in that case, the district court also had advised the defendant that, if it sentenced him within the advisory 

guideline range, the defendant would “‘not be able to appeal that 

sentence or ever attack it in any way through a direct appeal or 

some collateral attack,’” and the defendant “stated that he understood.” Id. We considered these facts together to conclude that 

the sentence-appeal waiver was knowingly and voluntarily made. 

Id.

Appeal waivers may bar not only “frivolous claims, but also 

. . . difficult and debatable legal issues.” King v. United States, 41 

F.4th 1363, 1367 (11th Cir. 2022) (quotations omitted). A defendant 

who waives his right to appeal “gives up even the right to appeal 

blatant error, because the waiver would be nearly meaningless if it 

included only those appeals that border on the frivolous.” Id. (quotations omitted). Motions to dismiss based on sentence-appeal 

waivers should be decided as early as possible, and carrying such 

motions with the case is generally disfavored because it deprives 

the government of the benefit of its bargain. Buchanan, 131 F.3d 

at 1008. 

Here, the district court did not sufficiently convey that Stewart was waiving his right to appeal his sentence under most circumstances and the record does not make clear that Stewart otherwise 

understood the full significance of the waiver, rendering Stewart’s 

sentence-appeal waiver invalid and unenforceable. Accordingly, 

the government’s motion to dismiss is DENIED.

II.

USCA11 Case: 22-13999 Document: 59-1 Date Filed: 01/15/2025 Page: 4 of 7
22-13999 Opinion of the Court 5

When a defendant fails to object to the imposition of conditions of supervised release in the district court, we review the imposition of such conditions for plain error. Hayden, 119 F.4th 

at 838. We decide de novo whether a defendant “had no opportunity to object at sentencing because the court included the condition for the first time in its written final judgment.” Id. (quotations omitted and alterations adopted).

Supervised release, and the conditions thereof, are part of a 

defendant’s sentence. United States v. Hamilton, 66 F.4th 1267, 1275 

(11th Cir. 2023). Due process requires that the district court “pronounce the sentence, giving the defendant notice of the sentence 

and an opportunity to object.” United States v. Rodriguez, 75 F.4th 

1231, 1247 (11th Cir. 2023) (quotations omitted). “Due process 

concerns arise when a district court’s in-court pronouncement of a 

sentence differs from the judgment that the court later enters.” Id. 

Accordingly, “a district court must pronounce at the defendant’s 

sentencing hearing any discretionary conditions of supervised release.” Id. at 1246. District courts can “satisfy this requirement by 

referencing a written list of supervised release conditions.” Id. 

That is, instead of articulating each condition of supervised release, 

a district court can simply say that it adopts the PSI’s recommended 

conditions of supervised release or that it is imposing the standard 

conditions of supervised release from a standing administrative order. Id. This is sufficient to give “any defendant who is unfamiliar 

with the conditions the opportunity to inquire about and challenge 

them.” Id.

USCA11 Case: 22-13999 Document: 59-1 Date Filed: 01/15/2025 Page: 5 of 7
6 Opinion of the Court 22-13999

In United States v. Hayden, a case arising out of the Middle 

District of Florida, we held that the district court’s statement that 

a defendant “would ‘need to comply with the mandatory and 

standard conditions adopted by the Court in the Middle District’” 

satisfied due process because that oral reference to “the 13 discretionary standard conditions of supervised release for the Middle 

District of Florida” gave the defendant notice and the opportunity 

to challenge the conditions of supervised release. 119 F.4th 832,

838 (11th Cir. 2024). First, reviewing the record de novo, we held 

that the defendant had an opportunity to object to the sentence because the district court said that there would be standard conditions 

attached to his supervised release and asked for objections before 

ending the sentencing hearing. Id. Second, we held that, because 

the district court orally referenced the standard conditions of supervised release and because the oral pronouncement and written 

judgment did not conflict, the court “did not err—much less plainly 

err—when it failed to describe the conditions of supervised release 

in its oral pronouncement.” Id. at 838-39. We observed that the 

Middle District’s standard conditions for supervised release were 

available in a publicly available judgment form, and that the conditions tracked the standard conditions for supervised release outlined in the Guidelines. Id. at 839. We explained that the oral pronouncement and written judgment did not conflict because the 

written judgment specified what already had been orally pronounced at sentencing. Id. 

Our prior-precedent rule requires usto follow our own precedent unless that precedent is overruled by an en banc decision of 

USCA11 Case: 22-13999 Document: 59-1 Date Filed: 01/15/2025 Page: 6 of 7
22-13999 Opinion of the Court 7

this Court or by the Supreme Court. United States v. White, 837 

F.3d 1225, 1228 (11th Cir. 2016). 

Here, Hayden forecloses Stewart’s argument that generally 

referencing the Middle District of Florida’s standard conditions for 

supervised release at sentencing was insufficient to provide him notice or an opportunity to object. Accordingly, the district court did 

not err, plainly or otherwise, in failing to specifically describe each 

standard condition of supervised release in its oral pronouncement.

AFFIRMED.

USCA11 Case: 22-13999 Document: 59-1 Date Filed: 01/15/2025 Page: 7 of 7