Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca5-15-40849/USCOURTS-ca5-15-40849-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Pedro Juan-Solano
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 15-40849

c/w No. 15-40859

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, 

 Plaintiff - Appellee

v.

PEDRO JUAN-SOLANO, 

 Defendant - Appellant

Appeals from the United States District Court

for the Southern District of Texas

USDC No. 1:15-CR-2-1

 USDC No. 1:14-CR-885-1

Before HIGGINBOTHAM, SMITH, and OWEN, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:*

Appellant Pedro Juan-Solano pled guilty to one count of illegal reentry, 

in violation of 8 U.S.C. § 1326. The district court sentenced him to 54 months 

imprisonment followed by three years of supervised release. Juan-Solano also 

received an additional 8-month sentence for violating the conditions of his term 

of supervised release. For the first time on appeal, Juan-Solano argues that 

 

* 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.

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

FILED

July 11, 2016

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

 Case: 15-40849 Document: 00513586972 Page: 1 Date Filed: 07/11/2016
No. 15-40849 c/w No. 15-40859

2

the district court erroneously assessed an extra criminal history point for a 

2008 conviction. Because Juan-Solano did not object below, he must satisfy 

the four prongs of plain error review:

First, there must be an error or defect—some sort of “[d]eviation 

from a legal rule”—that has not been intentionally relinquished or 

abandoned, i.e., affirmatively waived, by the appellant. Second, 

the legal error must be clear or obvious, rather than subject to 

reasonable dispute. Third, the error must have affected the 

appellant’s substantial rights, which in the ordinary case means 

he must demonstrate that it “affected the outcome of the district 

court proceedings.” Fourth and finally, if the above three prongs 

are satisfied, the court of appeals has the discretion to remedy the 

error—discretion which ought to be exercised only if the error 

“seriously affect[s] the fairness, integrity or public reputation of 

judicial proceedings.”1

Juan-Solano cannot prevail under this standard of review. As the 

Government notes, the record is equivocal regarding the number of days in jail 

that Juan-Solano served for the 2008 conviction.2 That is, any error is not

“clear or obvious.” And “in asking us to exercise our discretion, [Juan-Solano]

points to nothing beyond the district court’s error and the increase in h[is]

sentence that the error may have caused.”3 We remind that this Court has 

warned that such a “per se fourth-prong argument” is insufficient as a matter 

of law.4 But regardless, we are not persuaded that the alleged error “seriously 

affect[s] the fairness, integrity or public reputation of judicial proceedings.”

We AFFIRM the district court.

 

1 Puckett v. United States, 556 U.S. 129, 135 (2009) (alterations in original) (citations 

omitted) (quoting United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 732-34, 736 (1993)).

2 See United States v. Garcia-Arellano, 522 F.3d 477, 480 (5th Cir. 2008) (“We analyze 

the district court’s error and the plainness of any error at the time of appellate consideration.” 

(emphasis added)).

3 United States v. Rivera, 784 F.3d 1012, 1018 (5th Cir. 2015); see also United States 

v. Escalante-Reyes, 689 F.3d 415, 425 (5th Cir. 2012) (en banc) (“[W]e do not view the fourth 

prong as automatic if the other three prongs are met.”). 4 Rivera, 784 F.3d at 1018.

 Case: 15-40849 Document: 00513586972 Page: 2 Date Filed: 07/11/2016