Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-94-02281/USCOURTS-ca10-94-02281-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Jesus Acosta-Olivas
Appellee
United States of America
Appellant

Document Text:

PUBLISH 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

FILED--

united States Court o1 Appc~:S 

Tenth Circuit 

DEC 0 5 1995 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff - Appellant, No. 94-2281 

v. 

JESUS ACOSTA-OLIVAS, 

Defendant - Appellee. 

APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEW MEXICO 

(D.C. No. 94-CR-171-1) 

Richard A. Friedman, Attorney, Appellate Section, Criminal Division, Department of 

Justice, Washington, D.C. (John J. Kelly, United States Attorney, and Larry Gomez, 

Assistant United States Attorney, District of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 

with him on the brief), for Plaintiff-Appellant. 

Ron Koch, Attorney at Law, Albuquerque, New Mexico, for Defendant-Appellee. 

Before ANDERSON, LOGAN, and REA VLEY, * Circuit Judges. 

ANDERSON, Circuit Judge. 

*The Honorable Thomas M. Reavley, Senior Circuit Judge, United States Court of 

Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, sitting by designation. 

Appellate Case: 94-2281 Document: 01019280235 Date Filed: 12/05/1995 Page: 1 
The government appeals from the district court's imposition of a seventy-eight 

month sentence on defendant Jesus Acosta-Olivas. The district court determined that Mr. 

Acosta-Olivas qualified for a downward departure from the statutory minimum 

mandatory sentence often years, because he met all the requirements of 18 U.S.C. 

§ 3553(f). 1 This appeal addresses the scope of§ 3553(f)(5), which requires defendants 

seeking relief from a statutory mandatory minimum to truthfully provide the government 

with "all information and evidence the defendant has concerning the offense or offenses 

that were part of the same course of conduct or of a common scheme or plan." 18 U.S.C. 

§ 3553(f)(5). For the following reasons, we remand. 

BACKGROUND 

On March 9, 1994, Francisco Javier Rosales-Quiroz, accompanied by his wife and 

small child, drove a 1990 Nissan Sentra to the United States Border Patrol checkpoint 

near Truth or Consequences, New Mexico. When questioned by Border Patrol agents 

about their citizenship, they produced documentation, and when questioned about the car, 

Rosales-Quiroz stated that he owned the car and had purchased it approximately fifteen 

1

The language of§ 3553(f) has been adopted verbatim in the United States 

Sentencing Comm'n Guidelines Manual at §5C1.2. 

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days before. A Border Patrol agent apparently recognized the car as the type which was 

commonly used to hide contraband in its bumpers. When he inspected the rear bumper of 

the Rosales-Quiroz car, the agent noticed that mud had been placed on the bolts and 

brackets. With Rosales-Quiroz's consent, the agent removed the rear bumper and found 

fourteen plastic packages containing a substance which field-tested positive for cocaine. 

Rosales-Quiroz and his wife were arrested, and a search of their car revealed 23 .4 

kilograms of cocaine. 

Rosales-Quiroz gave conflicting stories as to the details of where in Albuquerque 

the cocaine was to be delivered. However, consistent with what he had told one DEA 

agent, Rosales-Quiroz called a telephone number in El Paso, Texas, and was told to go to 

room 213 at the Howard Johnson Plaza Hotel in Albuquerque. A DEA agent supervised 

this phone call. 

When agents went to the hotel, they observed a man matching Rosales-Quiroz's 

description of"Willie," whom Rosales-Quiroz said paid him to deliver the cocaine. 

When Rosales-Quiroz and another agent drove Rosales-Quiroz's car to the hotel parking 

lot, Mr. Acosta-Olivas approached the car and asked the agent if he had the "produce." 

When the agent indicated it was in the car, Mr. Acosta-Olivas said he did not want to 

remove the drugs in the parking lot, and said he would follow the car to a warehouse 

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Appellate Case: 94-2281 Document: 01019280235 Date Filed: 12/05/1995 Page: 3 
where they could remove the contraband. When he returned to the parking lot to get into 

his car, after collecting his family from the hotel, Mr. Acosta-Olivas was arrested. 

Rosales-Quiroz pled guilty to conspiracy to possess cocaine with intent to 

distribute. The government filed a motion stating that he had provided substantial 

assistance to the government under USSG §5K1.1, and he was sentenced to 24 months 

imprisonment. 

Mr. Acosta-Olivas also pled guilty, but refused to cooperate with the government. 

He did, however, provide the government and court with a letter describing his own 

involvement in the conspiracy. 

Because of the quantity of cocaine involved, Mr. Acosta-Olivas was subject to the 

statutory mandatory minimum often years, under 21 U.S.C. § 841(b)(1)(A). He sought 

relief from the mandatory minimum under 18 U.S.C. § 3553(f). The district court 

determined that he qualified under § 3 55 3 (f) for relief from the minimum mandatory 

sentence and calculated his sentence as follows: the court adopted the presentence report 

recommendation that the base offense level was 34 under USSG §2D1.1(c)(3), based 

upon the 23.4 kilograms of cocaine. The court also adopted the presentence report's 

recommendation that Mr. Acosta-Olivas receive the maximum three-level adjustment for 

acceptance of responsibility under USSG §3E1.1(a) & (b). The court gave Mr. Acosta-

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Olivas a further three-level adjustment because he was a minor participant.2 The court 

accordingly calculated that the total offense level was 28, which, with Mr. Acosta-Olivas' 

criminal history category I, yielded a guideline range of 78-97 months. The court then 

sentenced him to a seventy-eight month term. This appeal by the government followed. 

DISCUSSION 

The only issue in this case is whether the district court correctly determined that 

Mr. Acosta-Olivas met the requirements of 18 U.S.C. § 3553(f)(5). Section 3553(f) 

provides that a defendant can be given a guideline sentence, instead of the mandatory 

minimum prescribed by statute, if the court finds at sentencing that: 

(1) the defendant does not have more than 1 criminal history point, as 

determined under the sentencing guidelines; 

(2) the defendant did not use violence or credible threats of violence or 

possess a firearm or other dangerous weapon (or induce another participant 

to do so) in connection with the offense; 

(3) the offense did not result in death or serious bodily injury to any person; 

(4) the defendant was not an organizer, leader, manager, or supervisor of 

others in the offense, as determined under the sentencing guidelines and 

was not engaged in a continuing criminal enterprise, as defined in 21 U.S.C. 

848;and 

2

The presentence report recommended no downward adjustment for Mr. AcostaOlivas' role in the offense. 

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(5) not later than the time of the sentencing hearing, the defendant has 

truthfully provided to the Government all information and evidence the 

defendant has concerning the offense or offenses that were part of the same 

course of conduct or of a common scheme or plan, but the fact that the 

defendant has no relevant or useful other information to provide or that the 

Government is already aware of the information shall not preclude a 

determination by the court that the defendant has complied with this 

requirement. 

18 U.S.C. 3553(±). The government argues that§ 3553(f)(5) requires a defendant "to tell 

the government all he knows about the offense of conviction and the relevant conduct, 

including the identities and participation of others, in order to qualify for relief from the 

statutory mandatory minimum sentence." Appellant's Br. at 10. Mr. Acosta-Olivas 

argues that the section merely requires him to detail his own personal involvement in the 

crime, and he asserts that the district court correctly held that his letter met that standard. 

We review de novo the district court's interpretation of a statute or the sentencing 

guidelines. United States v. Richards, No. 94-4052, 1995 WL 596840 at *2 (lOth Cir. 

Oct. 11, 1995); United States v. Wilson, 41 F.3d 1403, 1404 (lOth Cir. 1994); United 

States v. Phelps, 17 F.3d 1334, 1337 (lOth Cir. 1994V 

3

ln this case, the district court interpreted the scope and meaning of§ 3553(f)(5). 

We therefore review that legal determination de novo. We note, however, that a district 

court's application of the correct legal standard to a particular defendant, and the specific 

conclusion that the defendant is or is not eligible for relief under§ 3553(f), would 

ordinarily be reviewed for clear error. See United States v. Rodriguez, No. 94-3935, 

1995 WL 621776 at *8 (7th Cir. Oct. 23, 1995) ("We believe that the district court's 

(continued ... ) 

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Section 3553(f) was enacted as a "safety valve" to permit courts to sentence less 

culpable defendants to sentences under the guidelines, instead of imposing mandatory 

minimum sentences. As the legislative history of the section states, without such a safety 

valve, for "the very offenders who most warrant proportionally lower sentences--

offenders that by guideline definitions are the least culpable--mandatory minimums 

generally operate to block the sentence from reflecting mitigating factors." H.R. Rep. No. 

103-460, 103d Cong., 2d Sess., 1994 WL 107571 (1994). This would have the 

unfortunate effect that the "least culpable offenders may receive the same sentences as 

their relatively more culpable counterparts." Id. The legislative history does not, 

however, assist us in interpreting the scope of§ 3553(f)(5). We conclude that the plain 

language of the statute and its implementing guideline, as well as the scheme of the 

guidelines, indicate that the government's interpretation is correct. The few cases 

addressing this provision with any specificity have so held. 

As indicated, the statute and guideline themselves require the disclosure of "all 

information and evidence ... concerning the offense or offenses that were part of the 

same course of conduct or of a common scheme or plan." 18 U.S.C. § 3553(f)(5). The 

3

( ... continued) 

determination that a defendant is not eligible for the reduction permitted by sec. SC 1.2 

ought to be governed by the clearly erroneous standard. The court's determination is a 

fact-specific one and will often depend on credibility determinations that cannot be 

replicated with the same accuracy on appeal."). 

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phrase "all information and evidence" is obviously broad. The Application Notes to 

§5C 1.2 define "offense or offenses that were part of the same course of conduct or of a 

common scheme or plan" to mean "the offense of conviction and all relevant conduct." 

USSG §5Cl.2, comment. (n.3). "Relevant conduct" has in tum been defined to include 

"in the case of a jointly undertaken criminal activity ... all reasonably foreseeable acts 

and omissions of others in furtherance of the jointly undertaken criminal activity." USSG 

§1Bl.3(a)(l)(B). Thus, the guidelines appear to require disclosure of"all information" 

concerning the offense of conviction and the acts of others if the offense of conviction is a 

conspiracy or other joint activity. 

As applied to Mr. Acosta-Olivas, the guideline would therefore require disclosure 

of everything he knows about his own actions and those of his co-conspirators. See 

United States v. Rodriguez, No. 94-3935, 1995 WL 621776 at *7 (7th Cir. Oct. 23, 1995) 

(affirming district court's conclusion that defendant was ineligible for a§ 3553(f) 

reduction because "he produced no information concerning the offense; if he did not 

know the identities of [drug suppliers or buyers], then he should have at least 

communicated that fact to the government"); United States v. Wrenn, 66 F.3d 1, 3 (1st 

Cir. 1995) (rejecting applicability of§ 3553(f), stating defendant "did not provide the 

government with all of the information and evidence he had concerning the very crime to 

which he pleaded guilty [and observing] he claimed to have a number of reliable 

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customers to whom he supplied cocaine, but he supplied nary a name to the 

government"); United States v. Saint Martinez, No. 94-277, 1995 WL 328127 at *2 

(D.N.J. May 24, 1995) (holding defendant ineligible for safety valve because he "failed to 

provide information that was highly likely to be [in] his possession," including identities 

of co-conspirators); United States v. Buffington, 879 F. Supp. 1220, 1223 (N.D. Ga. 

1995) ("Defendant is obliged to provide information relevant to his own course of 

conduct and his immediate chain of distributors, i.e., from whom he bought and to whom 

he sold, if he wishes to avail himself of the benefits of§ 3553(f)."); see also Vincent L. 

Broderick, Flexible Sentencing and the Violent Crime Control Act of 1994, 7 Fed. 

Sentencing Rep. 128, 129 (1994) (describing§ 3553(f)(5) as a '"tell all that you can tell' 

requirement"). 

Mr. Acosta-Olivas argues that this interpretation has the effect of requiring him to 

become a government informant, and thereby renders USSG §5K1.1 on substantial 

assistance redundant. As both parties point out, we should interpret statutory provisions 

and the guidelines in a way which gives meaning and effect to each part of the statutory 

or guideline scheme. See Daleske v. Fairfield Communities, Inc., 17 F .3d 3 21, 3 24 (1Oth 

Cir.), cert. denied, 114 S. Ct. 1832 (1994); Phillips Petroleum Co. v. Lujan, 4 F.3d 858, 

863-64 (lOth Cir. 1993). In holding that§ 3553(f)(5), and therefore §5Cl.2, require a 

defendant to disclose all that he knows concerning both his own involvement in the crime 

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and that of any co-conspirators, we do not render any part of the guidelines superfluous or 

redundant. 

Section 5Kl.l concerning substantial assistance operates very differently from 

§5C1.2. Section 5Kl.l requires a motion from the government and the government's 

evaluation of the extent of the defendant's assistance is given "substantial weight." 

USSG §5Kl.l, comment. (nJ). Under §5Cl.2, by contrast, the court determines whether 

a defendant has complied with its provisions, including subsection 5. See United States 

v. Cabell, 890 F. Supp. 13, 16-17 (D.D.C. 1995); Buffington, 879 F. Supp. at 1222-23; 

United States v. Aristizibal, No. 93 Cr. 1091, 1994 WL 689089 (S.D.N.Y. Dec. 8, 1994). 

And the section specifically states that a defendant may still enjoy the benefits of the 

section even if the information he provides is not "relevant or useful" to the government. 

As one court recently observed, it: 

eliminates the necessity for a defendant to obtain a letter from the 

prosecution under section SKI ... in order to obtain a reduction of an 

otherwise mandatory minimum sentence. Instead, a defendant may come 

forward and furnish all available information and obtain consideration as a 

result if justified, regardless of the position of the prosecutor and regardless 

of whether anyone else can be prosecuted and convicted based on the 

defendant's disclosures. 

Shendur v. United States, 874 F. Supp. 85, 87 (S.D.N.Y. 1995). Thus, §5Cl.2, if its 

directive that a defendant disclose "all information" is interpreted to require disclosure of 

the identities of co-conspirators, does not make §5Kl.l redundant. See Broderick, supra, 

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at 129 (describing§ 3553(f)(5)'s "tell all that you can tell" requirement as "less draconian 

that the former reliance on letters from the prosecutors under §5Kl.1 "). It operates 

differently anyway, regardless of whether a defendant must "tell all" or not. 

On the other hand, Mr. Acosta-Olivas' interpretation of§ 3553(f)(5) and §5C1.2 

renders USSG §3El.1(b)(1) concerning enhanced acceptance of responsibility largely 

redundant. Under §3E 1.1 (b)( 1 ), a defendant with an initial offense level of 16 or higher, 

like Mr. Acosta-Olivas, can qualify for an additional 1level decrease ifhe "timely 

provid[ es] complete information to the government concerning his own involvement in 

the offense." USSG §3E1.1(b)(l). While §3El.1(b)(l) requires "timely disclosure," and 

§SC 1.2( 5) requires disclosure "not later than the time of sentencing," Mr. Acosta-Olivas' 

interpretation of §5Cl.2(5) to only require disclosure of his own involvement would 

make the two sections virtually identical. 

In sum, § 3553(f), as repeated in guideline §5Cl.2, was clearly intended to permit 

courts to sentence relatively less culpable offenders to sentences below an otherwise 

applicable mandatory statutory minimum sentence. Besides requiring that a defendant 

seeking to avail himself of this safety valve meet certain objective criteria, the section 

also requires that a defendant truthfully tell all he knows to the government, regardless of 

whether this information is useful to the government. Presumably, this requirement 

assists courts in determining whether a defendant truly is relatively less culpable. We 

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therefore hold that the district court erred in interpreting§ 3553(±)(5) to require a 

defendant to reveal only information regarding his own involvement in the crime, not 

information he has relating to other participants. 

For the foregoing reasons, we REMAND this case with instructions to vacate the 

sentence and resentence. If, at resentencing, the court makes a factual finding that, in 

deciding what information to disclose to the government, Mr. Acosta-Olivas 

relied upon the district court's interpretation of§ 3553(±)(5), the court shall allow him the 

opportunity to comply with the statute as this court has interpreted it in this opinion. 

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