Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-18-03056/USCOURTS-caDC-18-03056-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Steven Mason
Appellant
United States of America
Appellee

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued September 20, 2019 Decided March 6, 2020

No. 18-3056

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

APPELLEE

v.

STEVEN MASON, ALSO KNOWN AS SAM MASON,

APPELLANT

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 1:17-cr-00195-2)

Gregory S. Smith, appointed by the court, argued the cause 

and filed the briefs for appellant.

Daniel J. Lenerz, Assistant U.S. Attorney, argued the 

cause for appellee. With him on the brief were Jessie K. Liu, 

U.S. Attorney, and Elizabeth Trosman and John P. Mannarino, 

Assistant U.S. Attorneys.

Before: ROGERS, GRIFFITH, and KATSAS, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge GRIFFITH.

GRIFFITH, Circuit Judge: A jury convicted Steven Mason

and a codefendant of conspiring to deal heroin and other drugs. 

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 1 of 16
2

Mason was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment, the 

statutory mandatory minimum. On appeal, Mason argues that

the government violated its constitutional obligation under 

Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963), to disclose material

helpful to his defense in a timely manner. Mason also objects 

to the district court’s refusal to grant him a trial separate from 

that of his codefendant. And he says the district court should 

have found him eligible for a reduction of his sentence under

section 5C1.2 of the Sentencing Guidelines. We reject each of 

Mason’s arguments and affirm his conviction and sentence.

I

Because Mason’s arguments are highly fact-bound, we 

describe discovery, the trial, and sentencing in some detail.

A

In 2016, a federal grand jury indicted Mason, Andrea 

Miller, Nicholas Jones, Frank Walker, and several others for 

their participation in a drug conspiracy. The government

alleged that Jones and Walker led a conspiracy that imported 

drugs into the United States, then sold them to middlemen. 

According to the government, Mason was one of the 

middlemen and Miller received a shipment of drugs at her 

home.

Although most of the conspirators pleaded guilty, Mason 

and Miller did not. The government filed a new two-count

indictment against them in October 2017. The first count

charged Miller with conspiracy to import heroin and Xanax. 

The second charged Mason and Miller with conspiracy to 

distribute heroin, Xanax, and fentanyl. Mason sought to 

separate his trial from Miller’s, but the district court denied his 

motion and set their joint trial to begin in January 2018.

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 2 of 16
3

Problems arose in December 2017, when the government 

made a series of disclosures that suggested that Nicholas Jones, 

who was likely to appear as a key government witness, might 

lie at the trial. In early March 2017, the government learned of 

a rumor that a member of the conspiracy had written a letter 

reporting that he planned to tell lies about Walker’s role and 

that Walker had a copy of the letter. The government suspected 

that Jones wrote the letter but he denied that he was the author

when asked during a March 10 interview. In May, the 

government asked Jones about the letter again, this time with 

the aid of a polygraph. Although he denied authorship, the 

polygraph suggested he was lying.

In a June interview, the previously uncooperative Walker 

gave the government the handwritten letter, which described its 

author’s plan to “go down there and lie on everybody.” 

According to Walker, Robert Bethea, a fellow inmate whose

nickname was “Jazz,” told Walker in February that Jones had 

written the letter. Jazz gave the letter to Walker later that 

month.

Neither counsel for Mason nor Miller knew any of this

until disclosed by the government on the eve of trial in 

December 2017. Displeased by this late disclosure, they moved 

for dismissal of the indictment, arguing that the government 

had violated its Brady obligation to timely disclose material

helpful to them. Defense counsel also set out to find Jazz,

whose testimony might link Jones to the letter undermining his 

credibility. They soon discovered, however, that Jazz had died 

of a drug overdose in April 2017, shortly after his release from 

jail.

Jazz’s death limited the letter’s value to the defense. So, 

too did the “conclusive” determination of the government’s 

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 3 of 16
4

handwriting expert that Jones did not write the letter, the 

district court’s ruling that defense counsel could not refer to 

Jones’s failed polygraph, and Walker’s refusal to testify, 

invoking the protection of the Fifth Amendment.

The district court denied the Brady motion on the ground 

that Mason and Miller suffered no prejudice from the belated 

disclosure. The government “didn’t have an opportunity to 

review the letter until June 2017, at which point Jazz had 

already died,” the court found. “So the defense would not have 

had an ability to interview Jazz had the government disclosed 

this information in June when they should have.” Tr. of Pretrial 

Hr’g (Jan. 29, 2018) at 31:22-32:1, J.A. 248-49. To allow the 

defense additional time to prepare, the court continued the trial 

for more than a month.

B

The seven-day jury trial against Mason and Miller began 

on February 26, 2018. The government presented its case 

against Miller first, with testimony that showed Miller had 

allowed Jones to ship drugs to her home. Before the 

government began its case against Mason, the court received 

the following note from Juror #1:

Your Honor, would it be possible for the government to 

ask Mr. Jones, one, why did he or Mr. Walker choose 

Mr. Mason’s house for drug delivery? And two, did he or 

Mr. Walker have a personal relationship with Mr. Mason 

or was this address picked at random?

Tr. of Jury Trial (Mar. 2, 2018) at 795:3-10, J.A. 874. The court 

acknowledged that the note was “concerning,” as the 

government had never suggested that Mason’s house was used 

for drug delivery. “[I]t seems to me that at least one juror is 

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 4 of 16
5

confused and thinks that Mr. Mason lives at [Miller’s address]. 

I don’t know how.” Id. at 794:12, 795:11-13, J.A. 873-74. The 

court instructed the jury that its “question may be resolved 

through the remainder of the evidence.” If not, the court said, 

the jury should send another note “at the close of the evidence.”

Id. at 802:12-14, J.A. 881.

Shortly after the court’s instruction, the government asked 

Jones whether he knew Mason’s address. Jones answered no.

Id. at 807:18-808:1, J.A. 886-87. Mason renewed his motion 

for severance, this time citing the juror note as evidence of 

prejudice, but the court denied the motion. No juror ever sent a 

follow-up note on the subject.

The government then presented its case against Mason, 

including testimony by Jones and wiretapped phone calls in 

which Mason and his coconspirators discussed dealing drugs.

Concerned that Jones would deny authorship and that the 

government would bolster that denial with the testimony of its 

handwriting expert, defense counsel never used the letter at 

trial. The jury found Mason and Miller guilty of all charges 

other than those related to fentanyl, on which the court had 

granted a judgment of acquittal.

C

Before sentencing, Mason sought to qualify for the

Sentencing Guidelines’ “safety valve,” which would allow him 

to avoid a five-year mandatory minimum sentence if he fully 

debriefed the government on his “offense of conviction and all 

relevant conduct.” U.S.S.G. § 5C1.2 cmt. n.3. During the 

debriefing interview, Mason was asked about his associates in 

the drug trade. Mason refused to answer, saying he didn’t want 

to “put someone else in the line of fire.”

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 5 of 16
6

At sentencing, the government cited Mason’s refusal to 

name his drug suppliers or customers as reason to find him 

ineligible for the safety valve. The district court agreed and 

sentenced Mason to five years’ imprisonment.

This timely appeal of his conviction and sentence 

followed. The district court had jurisdiction under 18 U.S.C. 

§ 3231, and we have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291.

II

A

Mason argues that the government’s belated disclosure of 

what it knew about the handwritten letter violated his 

constitutional rights under Brady v. Maryland. He asks that we

vacate his conviction and direct the district court to dismiss the 

indictment or remand for a new trial. Because the relevant facts 

are uncontested, our review of Mason’s Brady claim is de novo. 

See United States v. Sitzmann, 893 F.3d 811, 821 (D.C. Cir. 

2018) (per curiam).

A Brady violation has three parts. “The evidence at issue 

must be favorable to the accused, either because it is 

exculpatory, or because it is impeaching; that evidence must 

have been suppressed by the State, either willfully or 

inadvertently; and prejudice must have ensued.” Strickler v. 

Greene, 527 U.S. 263, 281-82 (1999).

Information about the letter was favorable to Mason 

because it tended to impeach Jones, a government witness

against him. The government suppressed its knowledge of the

letter by postponing disclosure for months, until trial was 

imminent. See United States v. Pasha, 797 F.3d 1122, 1133 

(D.C. Cir. 2015). At oral argument, the government declined to 

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 6 of 16
7

“defend[] the timeliness” of its disclosure and conceded that it

had “made a misjudgment as to the amount of time that the 

Defense needed” to use the information disclosed. Tr. of Oral 

Arg. at 25:12, 33:25-34:1. We agree. The government’s delay

was “inexcusable.” Pasha, 797 F.3d at 1133.

But even a grossly belated disclosure does not violate

Brady unless the defendant suffers prejudice from the delay.

Prejudice exists only if there is “a reasonable probability 

that . . . the result of the proceeding would have been different”

had the disclosure occurred earlier. Strickler, 527 U.S. at 280 

(quoting United States v. Bagley, 473 U.S. 667, 682 (1985)). A

“‘probability’ reaches the level of ‘reasonable’ when it is high 

enough to ‘undermine confidence in the verdict.’” United 

States v. Johnson, 592 F.3d 164, 170 (D.C. Cir. 2010) (quoting 

Kyles v. Whitley, 514 U.S. 419, 435 (1995)). “The defendant 

bears the burden of showing a reasonable probability of a 

different outcome.” United States v. Johnson, 519 F.3d 478, 

488 (D.C. Cir. 2008).

Mason asserts three forms of prejudice from the belated 

disclosure. First, he says, “earlier production of the letter would 

have kept defense counsel from being hamstrung by the time 

constraints that later arose in the waning weeks before trial.” 

Mason Br. 35. That argument fails, because a continuance of 

reasonable length negates any prejudice arising from time 

constraints alone. See, e.g., United States v. Halloran, 821 F.3d 

321, 341-42 (2d Cir. 2016). The district court granted Mason 

such a continuance.

Mason next argues that an earlier disclosure of what the 

government knew about the letter might have provided defense 

counsel with promising leads. Perhaps, he says, defense 

counsel would have uncovered cellmates who overheard a

conversation between Jazz and Jones about the letter had they 

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 7 of 16
8

investigated the matter earlier in 2017. See Tr. of Oral Arg. at 

40:7-8. Maybe Walker, had he been interviewed earlier, would 

have been willing to testify as to what Jazz told him about the 

letter, instead of pleading the Fifth. See id. at 6:12-7:17. Or 

defense counsel might “have subpoenaed . . . and monitored 

[Jazz] . . . so [that] he never died.” Id. at 12:9-13.

Maybe so. But “mere speculation is not sufficient to 

sustain a Brady claim.” United States v. Horton, 756 F.3d 569, 

575 (8th Cir. 2014) (internal quotation marks and citations 

omitted). Hypothesizing that certain “information, had it been 

disclosed to the defense, might have led [defense] counsel to 

conduct additional discovery that might have led to some 

additional evidence that could have been utilized” is 

disfavored. Wood v. Bartholomew, 516 U.S. 1, 6 (1995) (per 

curiam) (describing such reasoning as “mere speculation, in 

violation of the standards” the Supreme Court has established 

for Brady claims). The argument that an earlier disclosure 

might have led Mason to uncover other promising leads is 

simply too speculative to undermine our confidence in the 

outcome of the trial.

Last, Mason argues that with an earlier disclosure he could 

have “found and interviewed” Jazz, Mason Br. 35, who might 

have provided statements that were “admissible as 

impeachment evidence,” Reply Br. 8. We can assume, for the 

sake of argument, that the government should have disclosed 

its knowledge of the rumored letter in March 2017, before 

Jazz’s death in April. Even so, Mason fails to show that the 

defense he presented at trial differed in any meaningful way 

from the defense he could have presented if he had interviewed 

Jazz. If Mason’s defense would have been the same regardless, 

he cannot meet his burden of showing a “reasonable probability 

of a different outcome” at trial, Johnson, 519 F.3d at 488, and 

his Brady claim fails.

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 8 of 16
9

Mason’s principal obstacle is the rule against hearsay. See

Gov’t Br. 29. Even assuming that an earlier disclosure would 

have led to an interview with Jazz, and that such an interview 

would have provided grounds to impeach Jones, Mason fails to 

show how the out-of-court statements of a deceased declarant 

would have helped him at trial. Such statements would have 

been obvious hearsay if offered for the truth of the matter 

asserted—that Jones had written the letter—and inadmissible 

at trial unless subject to an enumerated hearsay exception. See

FED. R. EVID. 801, 802; see also 30B CHARLES ALAN WRIGHT 

ET AL., FEDERAL PRACTICE AND PROCEDURE § 6728 (2018 ed.).

Mason says that any of three hearsay exceptions would 

have allowed the court to admit Jazz’s hypothetical statements: 

the exception for dying declarations, the exception for 

statements against interest, and the residual exception. See

Reply Br. 8. We disagree. The exception for dying declarations 

does not apply because Jazz’s statements would have had 

nothing to do with the “cause or circumstances” of his death. 

FED. R. EVID. 804(b)(2). The exception for statements against 

interest is unavailing as well. Mason offers no argument why 

statements naming Jones as the letter’s author would have been 

“so contrary to [Jazz’s] proprietary or pecuniary interest or had

so great a tendency . . . to expose [Jazz] to civil or criminal 

liability,” id. 804(b)(3)(A), that they should qualify under that 

exception.

The residual exception fares no better. We apply this 

“extremely narrow” exception “sparingly,” “only in the most 

exceptional circumstances,” and only if the out-of-court 

statement is both “very important and very reliable.” United 

States v. Slatten, 865 F.3d 767, 807 (D.C. Cir. 2017) (per 

curiam) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). We 

can grant that a statement by Jazz impeaching Jones might have 

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 9 of 16
10

been “very important” to Mason’s defense, but it would have 

been of doubtful reliability. Mason argues that the requisite 

“indicia of reliability” would come from the statements of 

others that Jazz had told them Jones wrote the letter. Tr. of Oral 

Arg. at 12:16-24; 39:18-23. But we doubt that more hearsay 

from Jazz would provide the “sufficient guarantees of 

trustworthiness” the residual exception requires. FED. R. EVID.

807(a)(1). And in any event, the government could undermine 

any showing of reliability with the handwriting expert’s 

“conclusive” determination that Jones didn’t write the letter.*

Of course, defense counsel might have relied on Jazz’s 

statements to question Jones during cross-examination. See, 

e.g., United States v. Whitmore, 359 F.3d 609, 621-22 (D.C. 

Cir. 2004). But we doubt such a tack would have been effective 

here. Defense counsel could have cross-examined Jones using 

their knowledge of the letter, but they declined. Moreover, the

use of additional statements from Jazz to impeach Jones was 

unlikely to have improved the cross much, as Jones could deny 

authorship all the same. And defense counsel feared the 

government would bolster that denial with its “conclusive” 

handwriting analysis. See Mason Br. 12, 36. Given the 

circumstances of this case, we see no “reasonable probability 

of a different outcome,” Johnson, 519 F.3d at 488, from such 

an exchange.

We hold that Mason has failed to demonstrate prejudice 

from the government’s belated disclosure and that his Brady

* In the alternative, Mason argues that even if the interview yielded 

no admissible evidence it might have revealed the identity of Jazz’s 

“uncle,” a “potential additional (living) witness to these matters” 

who was mentioned, but never named, in the handwritten letter. 

Reply Br. 8-9. Again, the possibility that additional information 

about an unknown person might have helped Mason’s defense is 

simply too speculative to undermine our confidence in the verdict.

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 10 of 16
11

claim thus fails. That holding is consistent with our decision in

United States v. Pasha, 797 F.3d 1122 (D.C. Cir. 2015), in 

which the government waited eight months to disclose that an 

eyewitness had made statements favorable to the defense. By 

the time defense counsel interviewed the eyewitness, he said

his memory had faded; he was no longer useful to the defense. 

We held that one of the defendants, against whom the evidence 

was particularly weak, was prejudiced by the belated disclosure 

and thus had a valid Brady claim.

Pasha differs from Mason’s case. For one, the defendant

in Pasha demonstrated how an earlier interview with the 

eyewitness would have helped her. Had she taken “a sworn 

statement from [the eyewitness] when his memory was fresh,”

at trial the eyewitness might have read that statement into 

evidence as a recorded recollection. Reply Brief for Appellant 

Daaiyah Pasha at 20, Pasha, 797 F.3d 1122 (No. 13-3024), 

2015 WL 831935; FED. R. EVID. 803(5). That option was

unavailable to Mason because Jazz could not testify under any 

circumstances. Further, the government’s case against the 

defendant who prevailed on her Brady claim in Pasha was not 

strong. See 797 F.3d at 1137 (describing the “weak evidence” 

that the defendant participated in the crime). Mason’s 

incriminating wiretapped statements, through which the jury 

heard Mason himself make several thinly veiled references to 

dealing drugs, distinguish this case from Pasha. See Mason Br. 

22 (acknowledging that these wiretaps were “obviously the 

Government’s strongest evidence against” him).

B

Mason objects to the district court’s denial of his motions 

for misjoinder and severance. The purpose of both motions is 

the same: to separate a defendant’s trial from his codefendant’s. 

Because severance, unlike misjoinder, can require a court to 

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 11 of 16
12

consider events that occurred at trial, we review the denial of a 

severance motion for abuse of discretion and the denial of a 

misjoinder motion de novo. See United States v. Bikundi, 926 

F.3d 761, 781 (D.C. Cir. 2019) (per curiam); United States v. 

Bostick, 791 F.3d 127, 145 (D.C. Cir. 2015).

1

In his pretrial motion for misjoinder, Mason argued that 

the indictment improperly joined his trial with that of his 

codefendant Andrea Miller. He and Miller “were merely two 

small spokes in a larger drug conspiracy,” he says, who did not

conspire “together” at all. Mason Br. 38.

We have a “broad policy favoring initial joinder.” United 

States v. Perry, 731 F.2d 985, 991 (D.C. Cir. 1984). Under 

Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 8(b), an indictment “may 

charge 2 or more defendants if they are alleged to have 

participated in the same act or transaction, or in the same series 

of acts or transactions, constituting an offense or offenses.” Our

Rule 8 “[j]oinder analysis ‘does not take into account the 

evidence presented at trial,’ but rather ‘focuses solely on the 

indictment and pre-trial submissions.’” Bostick, 791 F.3d at 

145 (quoting United States v. Gooch, 665 F.3d 1318, 1334 

(D.C. Cir. 2012)).

The indictment’s allegation that Mason and Miller 

conspired to distribute drugs made joinder of their trials proper.

“The mere allegation of a conspiracy presumptively satisfies 

Rule 8(b), since the allegation implies that the defendants 

named have engaged in the same series of acts or transactions 

constituting an offense.” United States v. Friedman, 854 F.2d 

535, 561 (2d Cir. 1988) (quoting United States v. Castellano, 

610 F. Supp. 1359, 1396 (S.D.N.Y. 1985)). We have frequently 

held that participation in the same charged conspiracy justifies 

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 12 of 16
13

joinder. See, e.g., United States v. McGill, 815 F.3d 846, 905 

(D.C. Cir. 2016); United States v. Spriggs, 102 F.3d 1245, 

1255-56 (D.C. Cir. 1996).

We reject Mason’s argument that the indictment falsely 

alleged that he and Miller conspired “together.” The allegation 

that the two “did knowingly and willfully combine, conspire, 

confederate and agree together” and with others to distribute 

heroin and other drugs, Indictment (Oct. 17, 2017) at 2, J.A. 

24, is nothing more than an allegation that Mason and Miller

participated in the same conspiracy, which they did. We also 

reject Mason’s argument that “the prosecution’s own 

statements made at trial later plainly revealed” that Mason and 

Miller’s “‘acts and transactions’ did not overlap at all.” Mason 

Br. 39. “If the indictment establishes proper joinder under Rule 

8(b), trial evidence cannot render joinder impermissible and is 

thus irrelevant to our inquiry.” United States v. Moore, 651 

F.3d 30, 69 (D.C. Cir. 2011) (per curiam), aff’d sub nom. Smith 

v. United States, 568 U.S. 106 (2013).

2

Under Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 14(a), a district 

court may sever codefendants’ trials if joinder “appears to 

prejudice a defendant.” Mason says severance was required for 

two reasons: the “generalized prejudice” he faced from a joint 

trial with Miller and the “specific prejudice” that arose from 

the “confusion” demonstrated by the note from Juror #1. 

Mason Br. 40.

We disagree. We recognize that in some joint trials, the 

risk of prejudice to one coconspirator is so great that Rule 14(a)

requires severance even where joinder was proper. For 

instance, severance may be appropriate when coconspirators 

are accused of “grossly disparate crimes,” United States v. 

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 13 of 16
14

Sampol, 636 F.2d 621, 645 (D.C. Cir. 1980) (per curiam), or

when there is great “disproportion in the evidence,” United 

States v. Mardian, 546 F.2d 973, 980 (D.C. Cir. 1976) (en 

banc).

This is not one of those cases. Mason and Miller were 

jointly charged with conspiracy to distribute drugs. Miller 

alone was charged with conspiracy to import drugs. Those are 

not grossly disparate crimes. See Sampol, 636 F.2d at 647 

(requiring severance where defendant was accused of making 

false declarations and misprision of felony and codefendants 

were accused of “crimes of conspiracy to assassinate and 

murder”). Nor was there such disproportion in the evidence that

severance was warranted. The government presented evidence 

of international drug trafficking during its case against Miller.

But much of the same might have been introduced at a trial 

against Mason alone to prove he had conspired to distribute a 

significant quantity of heroin. See McGill, 815 F.3d at 947; 

United States v. Law, 528 F.3d 888, 906 (D.C. Cir. 2008).

Nor did the district court abuse its discretion in denying 

Mason’s motion for severance after it received the juror note.

Over the course of the trial, the district court and the 

government took appropriate steps to make sure that the 

confusion revealed in the note was addressed. The government 

presented its cases against Miller and Mason separately. After 

receiving the note, the district court issued an appropriate 

instruction and the government promptly elicited testimony to 

dispel the juror’s confusion. At the close of the trial, the district 

court instructed the jury that it was required to consider the 

evidence separately against each defendant. See Tr. of Jury 

Trial (Mar. 6, 2018) at 1326:1-5, 1336:5-14, J.A. 1405, 1415.

Those steps sufficed to dispel any confusion about the different 

roles of Mason and Miller in the conspiracy.

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 14 of 16
15

Mason argues that “there can be no assurance that the 

spillover prejudice that we clearly know Juror #1 harbored . . . 

was in fact later purged” and that “[n]othing whatsoever 

reveals that Juror #1 did not vote to convict based at least in 

part on this mistaken understanding of the evidence.” Mason

Br. 42. That may be true. But Mason misunderstands the scope 

of our review. We do not ask whether we are certain no juror 

voted to convict based on a mistaken understanding of the 

evidence, a fact neither we nor the district court could know. 

We ask only whether the district court abused its discretion in 

denying his motions for severance. It did not.

C

Last, Mason challenges the district court’s finding that he 

is ineligible for the safety valve provision of the Sentencing 

Guidelines. Under that provision, certain defendants who 

“truthfully provide[] to the Government all information and 

evidence” they possess concerning their “offense of conviction 

and all relevant conduct” may be sentenced without regard to a

mandatory minimum. U.S.S.G. § 5C1.2(a)(5) & cmt. n.3. At 

sentencing, the government objected to Mason’s refusal to 

name his other drug suppliers and the customers who 

purchased drugs from him. Mason argues the government and 

the district court expected him to provide more information 

than the safety valve requires. Because the breadth of the safety 

valve is a legal, not factual, question, we review the district 

court’s finding de novo. See United States v. Vega, 826 F.3d 

514, 538 (D.C. Cir. 2016) (per curiam).

As part of his blanket refusal to “put someone else in the 

line of fire,” Mason refused to name the persons to whom he 

sold the drugs he obtained from Jones and Walker. According 

to the government, those customers would have been

“significant mid-level dealers, purchasing 20 to 50 grams of 

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 15 of 16
16

heroin, worth thousands of dollars, at a time.” Gov’t Br. 61.

Their names constituted “information” concerning “the offense 

of conviction and all relevant conduct” that Mason was 

obligated to provide. See United States v. Wrenn, 66 F.3d 1, 3 

(1st Cir. 1995) (affirming a finding of safety valve ineligibility 

for a drug-dealing defendant who refused to name his 

customers). Refusing to disclose the names of his customers 

disqualified Mason from taking advantage of the safety valve.

III

For the foregoing reasons, we affirm Mason’s conviction 

and sentence.

So ordered.

USCA Case #18-3056 Document #1832120 Filed: 03/06/2020 Page 16 of 16