Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca7-15-01719/USCOURTS-ca7-15-01719-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Willie J. Evans III
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals 

For the Seventh Circuit 

Chicago, Illinois 60604 

Submitted February 3, 2016 

Decided February 3, 2016 

Before 

DANIEL A. MANION, Circuit Judge 

ILANA DIAMOND ROVNER, Circuit Judge 

DAVID F. HAMILTON, Circuit Judge

No. 15-1719 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

Plaintiff-Appellee, 

v. 

WILLIE J. EVANS III, 

 Defendant-Appellant.

 Appeal from the United States District 

Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin.

No. 14-Cr-167 

Rudolph T. Randa, 

Judge. 

O R D E R 

Just days before Willie Evans was due to begin serving time in federal prison, he 

contacted an FBI agent and said that a gang member had hidden an assault rifle in his 

cousin’s backyard and would be retrieving it later that day. A district judge had revoked 

Evans’s supervised release for a 2009 federal conviction after he was arrested in early 

2014 and charged with state offenses. Those charges were still pending, and Evans was 

hoping that, by appearing to cooperate, he could persuade state prosecutors to be 

lenient. Surveillance agents watched the cousin’s house, but no one came for the gun. 

The FBI discovered later that, contrary to his story, Evans had learned from his cousin 

that the gang member’s rifle was in her house, so he had taken the gun himself and 

hidden it outdoors with the idea of luring the gang member to retrieve it with the FBI 

watching. Evans pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI, 18 U.S.C. § 1001(a)(2), and the district 

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

To be cited only in accordance with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1 

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No. 15-1719 Page 2 

court sentenced him to an additional 30 months’ imprisonment and 3 years’ supervised 

release. 

Evans filed a notice of appeal, but his appointed lawyer contends that the appeal 

is frivolous and seeks to withdraw. See Anders v. California, 386 U.S. 738 (1967). Evans has 

not responded to counsel’s motion. See CIR. R. 51(b). Counsel’s brief adequately explains 

the nature of the case and discusses potential issues that an appeal of this kind might be 

expected to involve, and thus we limit our review to the subjects that counsel identifies. 

See United States v. Bey, 748 F.3d 774, 776 (7th Cir. 2014); United States v. Wagner, 103 F.3d 

551, 553 (7th Cir. 1996). 

Counsel begins by evaluating the adequacy of the plea colloquy, but the lawyer 

does not tell us whether he consulted Evans to learn whether the defendant wants his 

guilty plea set aside. That oversight was erroneous but harmless, since our review of the 

colloquy convinces us that a challenge would be frivolous. See United States v. Konczak, 

683 F.3d 348, 349 (7th Cir. 2012); United States v. Knox, 287 F.3d 667, 670–71 (7th Cir. 2002). 

Evans never asked the district court for leave to withdraw his guilty plea, so our review 

would be limited to plain error. See United States v. Vonn, 535 U.S. 55, 62–63 (2002); 

United States v. Davenport, 719 F.3d 616, 618 (7th Cir. 2013). During the colloquy Evans 

was told that he could persist with his plea of not guilty and proceed to a jury trial at 

which he could confront and cross-examine adverse witnesses, present evidence, and 

testify or not without fear of being compelled to incriminate himself. See FED. R. CRIM. P. 

11(b)(1)(B), (C), (E). A guilty plea, the district court admonished, would waive these 

rights. FED. R. CRIM. P. 11(b)(1)(F). The court also disclosed the possible penalties, 

ensured that no one had coerced Evans’s guilty plea, and confirmed that Evans agreed 

with the factual basis in the plea agreement. FED. R. CRIM. P. 11(b)(1)(H–L), (b)(2–3). 

The colloquy, though, was not flawless. The district court did not mention that 

Evans had a continuing right to counsel, FED. R. CRIM. P. 11(b)(1)(D), but Evans surely 

knew this given that he had appointed counsel present with him, see United States v. 

Lovett, 844 F.2d 487, 491 (7th Cir. 1988). The court also neglected to discuss the § 1001 

charge and did not tell Evans that he could be prosecuted if he perjured himself during 

the hearing, that he could compel the attendance of defense witnesses at trial, or that the 

court was obligated to consider the sentencing guidelines and other statutory factors in 

determining a sentence. See FED. R. CRIM. P. 11(b)(1)(A), (E), (G), (M). But a challenge 

based on these omissions would be frivolous because Evans waived reading of the 

charge, and all of the points are covered in his written plea agreement, which he 

acknowledged having reviewed with counsel. See United States v. Adams, 746 F.3d 734, 

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No. 15-1719 Page 3 

746–47 (7th Cir. 2014); United States v. Driver, 242 F.3d 767, 771 (7th Cir. 2001). There is no 

hint from the colloquy that Evans misunderstood the charge or its statutory elements, 

and he said no when asked if he had questions for counsel or the court about the 

proceeding. 

Counsel next rejects as frivolous any argument that Evans’s prison sentence is 

substantively unreasonable. The district court correctly calculated a guidelines 

imprisonment range of 27 to 33 months and imposed a within-range term of 30 months. 

As counsel points out, on appellate review a sentence within the range is presumed to be 

reasonable. See Rita v. United States, 551 U.S. 338, 347 (2007); United States v. 

Williams-Ogletree, 752 F.3d 658, 664 (7th Cir. 2014). Counsel has not identified any reason 

to question this presumption, nor have we. The district court evaluated the factors in 

18 U.S.C. § 3553(a) when explaining the sentence, including Evan’s criminal history, his 

past drug abuse, and his assistance to the FBI in recovering the rifle. 

We conclude by observing that we have criticized two of the standard conditions 

of supervised release included in the written judgment, conditions 6 (requiring Evans to 

notify the probation officer “prior to any change in residence or employment”) and 13 

(requiring him to “notify third parties of risks that may be occasioned by [his] criminal 

record or personal history or characteristics”). See United States v. Kappes, 782 F.3d 828, 

849 (7th Cir. 2015); United States v. Thompson, 777 F.3d 368, 379 (7th Cir. 2015). And a 

special condition ordering Evans to participate in a treatment program for drug and

alcohol abuse and to “refrain from use of all alcoholic beverages” may be overbroad 

given the absence of evidence in the record that Evans has a history of alcohol abuse. 

Compare Kappes, 782 F.3d at 852 (vacating alcohol ban imposed without connection to 

offense of conviction or defendant’s history), with United States v. Speed, Nos. 15-1520, 

15-1561, 2016 WL 212507, at *5 (7th Cir. Jan. 19, 2016) (upholding alcohol restriction 

where defendant had stopped drinking but continued using marijuana and also had 

undergone alcohol treatment previously). But neither Evans nor his attorney has 

identified a potential argument related to these conditions, and we thus have no reason 

to believe that Evans wishes to challenge them. See United States v. Bryant, 754 F.3d 443, 

447 (7th Cir. 2014). If Evans later finds the conditions problematic in application, he can 

seek modification to the extent authorized by 18 U.S.C. § 3583(e)(2). See United States v. 

Neal, No. 14-3473, 2016 WL 258622, at *6–8 (7th Cir. Jan 21, 2016). Also, some of the 

special conditions in the written judgment, including the alcohol restriction, were not 

orally pronounced. To the extent that these conditions conflict with those orally 

pronounced, they are null. See United States v. Medina-Mora, 796 F.3d 698, 700 (7th Cir. 

2015); United States v. Alburay, 415 F.3d 782, 788 (7th Cir. 2005). But it is not necessary to 

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deny counsel’s motion and order briefing; at any time Evans can ask the district court to 

conform the written judgment to the oral pronouncement. See FED. R. CRIM. P. 36; 

United States v. Anobah, 734 F.3d 733, 739 (7th Cir. 2013). 

Counsel’s motion to withdraw is GRANTED, and the appeal is DISMISSED. 

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